Glam Rock

New single: Cyanide Pills || The Kids Can’t Be Trusted With Rock ‘N’ Roll

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Power Pop, Punk / 3 Comments

Yes! New Cyanide Pills! And the band from Leeds provides exactly what you expect on their new two song single: late ’70s poppy punkrock like the past four decades haven’t happened.

A-side The Kids Can’t Be Trusted With Rock ‘N’ Roll is an instant classic. On the song, Cyanide Pills proof that Joey Ramone’s OH NO! OOOH NOOHOO! will never sound redundant when you write a kickass song. Flipside Do You Wanna Know is another winner. The bridge, that follows some sweet guitar work, is my favorite part. Singer Phil Privilige doing a fade out of Do you wanna know-know-know gets me everytime.

Single out now through Damaged Goods. Limited to 500 copies, so grab one quick. This one’s gonna fly out of record stores worldwide.


Add to wantlist: Discogs || Damaged Goods

New album: No Monster Club || Deadbeat Effervescent

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Jangle Pop / Leave a Comment

Time for some new music that is quirky and puts a bigger smile on my face with each play. Deadbeat Effervescent is the seventh (I think) full length by Irish three piece No Monster Club. It’s a delightful mess of styles and sounds that’s hard to pinpoint.

In a way the record reminds of me of Architecture In Helsinki’s In Case We Die. It has that same energy and varied instrumentation. Other mid 00’s bands come to mind as well, like The Spinto Band and The Boy Least Likely To. But No Monster Club is more bubblegummy, more glammy and more garagy, I believe. Or like the press release describes it: “At times on this LP, No Monster Club come across like the improbable missing link between ABBA and Daniel Johnston.”

You see, this record is kinda weird and that’s what makes it so much fun. Songs like Waterfight!, Black & White, Case By Case Basis and Save The Circus are here to brighten your mood any time, all the time. Deadbeat Effervescent is out now on Emotional Response.



Add to wantlist: Bandcamp || Emotional Response

New album: Ravagers || Badlands

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock / Leave a Comment

Throwback monday? Badlands is the first full-length album by Baltimore glampunk’n’rollers Ravagers. It was recorded recently, but to my ears Badlands sounds like a mid-to late ’80s glammetal band. To be sure, I don’t mean the glossy kind, but rather the metal bands that were heavily influenced by ’70’s punk.

Hence the throwback feel to the record. I’m getting just as much touches of New York Dolls as Skid Row from Ravagers. And at certain times the band even reminds me of A.F.I., and not just because Ravagers singer Hagen has a similar sound as Davey Havok, but also because both bands write similar massive catchy choruses.

Barely touching 28 minutes, there is a lot to like about Badlands. Play it loud!



Add to wantlist: Bandcamp || Vulture City

Music Year-End List || Niek’s Favorite Singles and EP’s of 2021

By / / Alternative Rock, Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Indie Rock, Jangle Pop, Power Pop, Psych, Punk / 3 Comments

Our last 2021 wrap-up list showcases my favorite singles and EPs of 2021. ICYMI, Dennis posted his short format favs last week. Previously, we posted our Album top 50s here and here.

For me, 2021 had an abundance of great music to offer, and I believe this applies to singles and EPs as well. To avoid decision anxiety, I’ve listed them alphabetically. I’ve excluded some killer EPs and singles because (some of the) songs would later appear on the artists’  full lengths.

Enjoy reading and listening. See you all next year! If you’re looking for a convenient playlist of most (43 of 50) of the songs, check here. [post continues below]

Alvilda || Négatif 
Alvilda, a jangly powerpop sensation from Paris, mix ’60s girl group with ’70s Good Vibrations pop punk influences and je t’aime it a lot.
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Music Year-End List || Dennis’ Favorite Singles and EP’s of 2021

By / / Alternative Rock, Blues & Roots, Country & Folk, Funk & Soul, Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Jangle Pop, Power Pop, Psych, Punk / 5 Comments

You’ve already seen our lists with favorite albums – here‘s Niek’s list and there‘s mine – but also many shorter format releases were wantlist worthy. Below you can listen to an overview of the Top 50 singles and EPs that I thought were the best from 2021. I’ve excluded releases with songs that also appear on my album list. Links point to Discogs or Bandcamp (the headings), and to previously posted reviews (in the body text) – add to your wantlist (or collection) what you like!

1. Noah C Lekas || Sounds From The Shadow Factory
[Beat Poetry, US || Blind Owl] To be honest I haven’t been able to give this one as much attention as I would have liked. Not only because I mainly spent my time on full-length albums, but also for practical reasons: only two songs are shared on Bandcamp, YouTube, Soundcloud and Spotify, and unfortunately a physical copy wasn’t available in Europe (and sold out quickly in the US). Still, I didn’t doubt for a moment whether this should be at the top, simply because this was the most impressive release of the past year in all respects. Poems and rock music form a great combination here: “It’s jazz for the mind // It’s blues for the soul.” It’s Art!

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Music Year-End List || Niek’s Favorite Albums of 2021

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Jangle Pop, Power Pop, Punk / 5 Comments

Okay, time to look back and reflect on the musical year that was 2021. Even though I’ve always spent most of my listening time on new music, I don’t think I’ve ever spent this much time browsing, scanning, and prowling for it as I did in 2021. I did not keep track of the exact numbers (Dennis is our stats guy as he showed in his Top 50 of 2021 post last week – make sure to check that one out if you haven’t already!), but trust me, it was a lot. The focus on new releases came at the cost of not spending as much time as I may have liked with some 2021 records which are decidedly great. The list below reflects the records I ultimately played and enjoyed the most.

Overall, I think 2021 was a really strong year for music, with many of the bands in my list releasing their best work yet. Like always, my list is heavy on punk, powerpop, garage and indie rock. But I’ve also included many indie and jangle pop records, a genre that had a particularly strong year. My number one album of 2021 in some way is an outlier, but I believe it is a modern classic.

Final thought: while working on this list, my mind frequently wandered to Jan Kooi who suddenly died this year. Jan was a record store (co)owner who had impeccable taste in anything music related and whose taste I, and I speak for Dennis as well, blindly trusted. I didn’t know Jan personally, but his curiosity and generosity in sharing new music was one of the main inspirations for starting Add To Wantlist. His top 31 records of the year list was consistently great and his legacy will not be forgotten. So long Jan, and thank you for the tunes.

Check out my Top 50 records (and 50 additional notable records!) below. Here is a convenient playlist with my favorite tracks of the 100 albums (98, because two records are not on Spotify).

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Music Year-End List || Dennis’ Favorite Albums of 2021

By / / Alternative Rock, Blues & Roots, Country & Folk, Funk & Soul, Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Jangle Pop, Power Pop, Psych, Punk / 3 Comments

All year long we look forward to this moment of looking back, escaping the continuous flow of new releases for a while, taking the time to recap what really stood out these 12 months. In 2021 I took my FOMO more seriously than ever: I’ve checked out 2,200+ new albums, twice as many as last year (this hobby is getting out of hand). The disadvantage of this is that you don’t get any sleep, but still it isn’t possible to give anything that looks promising the attention it deserves. Anyway, along the way I built up a longlist of 120+ LPs that are wantlist-worthy, which I now have brought down to a Top 50.

In any post on this website, we try to put into words which artists are involved, how their instruments and vocals sound, whether their songs are catchy or dreamy or energetic or dark, where their inspiration for lyrics came from, etc., but I have my year-end list compiled as I always have, simply in order of what I loved and played the most – personal taste preference as the debatable deciding factor. My choices are all about guitar-driven, authentic indie rock, power pop, garage rock, roots, and jangle pop, plus a little bit of soul, country, folk, and alternative rock.

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New single: Boss || Cash ‘Em In

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Punk / Leave a Comment

If you are looking to get in the right mood for the weekend, let it be this one. A-side Cash ‘Em In is the kind of banger that you don’t mind blowing your speakers on. The song starts with a spoken intro from the Chisel frontman Cal Graham and then transforms in a perfect blend of ’70s UK punk and glam rock-‘n’-roll with a reproduction value that is through the roof. B-side Red Signal sounds like a punked up version of Thin Lizzy.

Boss is an international all-star band fronted by Fucked Up drummer Jonah Falco. He’s joined by Maxime Smadja (Rixe) and Charlie Manning Walker (Chubby And The Gang) on guitar, Amaury Benitez (Rixe, Trap) on bass, and Nick Sarnella (Crown Court and The Chisel) on drums. Cash ‘Em In is the follow up to the band’s excellent first single (Steel Box, 2018). I kinda hope that Boss will be a more prolific band in the near future, but given the output of the other bands Falco and his bandmates are in, there will be plenty of good music coming from this crew either way.

The single is out now on Static Shock Records. It appears to be sold out already, which makes sense given the kickass nature of the songs…


Add to wantlist: Bandcamp

New album: Johnny Jetson || Overheated

By / / Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Power Pop, Punk / Leave a Comment

Tattooed Millionaires frontman Johnny Jetson started rockin’ out in the gritty lower east-side (NYC) in the 1980s. He moved to L.A. in the 1990s, where he formed The Space Age Playboys with Warrior Soul frontman Kory Clark. That band received some serious tailwind in the early days of file sharing and for a while topped the charts at MP3dotcom. His next band The Tattooed Millionairres became the first unsigned band to reach one million streams online. The succes made Johnny a wanted commodity and he wrote, played, recorded and party’d with the likes of Steve Jones (Sex Pistols), Tommy Lee (Motley Crue), Chris Holmes (WASP), and Snoop Dogg. His band toured with Metallica, Motorhead, Monster Magnet, Backyard Babies and Hardcore Superstar.

This week Johnny Jetson releases his latest solo collection Overheated. Featuring ten throwback anthems of glamrock’n’roll, Overheated is the logical successor of the record he released last year (Make Your Move). The songs of Johnny Jetson are no nonsense pretentionless bangers, all about having a good time. Surely, Jetson succeeded with Overheated.

Jetson closes out the album with Rodney On The Rock, a Ramonesesque tribute to legendary DJ Rodney Bingenheimer. “Stay tuned for more rock-‘n’- roll radio!”



Add to wantlist: Bandcamp

New album: Teddy Grey || The Great Failed Romances Of The Twentieth Century

By / / Alternative Rock, Funk & Soul, Glam Rock, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Power Pop, Punk / Leave a Comment

There are worse, much worse ideas for a concept album than The Great Failed Romances Of The Twentieth Century. It’s the focus of an ambitious project by NY based artist Teddy Grey. Grey picked and wrote songs about 30 celebrity romances that went wrong, including iconic couples (Sid & Nancy, Hepburn & Tracy, Ike & Tina, Sonny & Cher, Lindsey Buckingham & Stevie Nicks), but also weird ones (Vanilla Ice & Madonna), and romances that may not have actually occured (Monroe & JFK, Brando & Dean). An extensive supporting cast of musicians helped out in the recordings.

Part satire, part heartfelt tribute to pop culture history, The Great Failed Romances Of The Twentieth Century is packed with wit and catchy melodies. Musically, the record is all over the place with each song sounding differently, from pop punk to arena rock, from ballads to retro pop, giving the record a theatrical, musical vibe that harbors more than a touch of Weird Al Yankovich as well. Consequently, the record can be hit or miss depending on your taste. Put differently, you are unlikely to care for all 84 minutes of the record, but there will be a little bit for everyone. It’s no surprise that Grey describes his music as “Rock N Roll McDonalds.”

Highlights for me are the Sid & Nancy jam There’s Nothing That I Love (But You Come Close), Unwritten Gay Romantic History (Greta & Mercedes), Little Black Book (James & Marlon), and Letters (Virginia & Vita). Cool concept, fun tunes.



Add to wantlist: Bandcamp

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