LOVE IT - Eisley, The Valley.

Eisley is a family band that gets it right. The DuPrees – three sisters, a brother, and a cousin – rise above the occasional Partridge Family stereotypes to create radio-friendly pop infused with just-odd-enough metaphors and symphonic twinkleness that they can’t seem to please the big wigs controlling the airwaves. And that’s what I love about them. They will never sell out or try out whatever’s popular at the moment or create a Bieber Fever-type frenzy. They’re staunch enough to turn down a contract renewal with a label that basically ignored them because they didn’t make enough moolah (Warner Bros.), and they’re true enough to their fans and their art to keep on keepin’ on in the underground by joining the ranks of an indie label (Equal Vision).


With their third LP, The Valley, Eisley comes off as more orchestrated, more mature, and more inspiring than ever. In the four years since their last album, each of the respective DuPrees experienced a low personal valley (hence the title), and most of the songs reflect shock, bitterness, resentment, and recovery from sudden heartbreak. The musicians make you feel their raw but eventually optimistic pain with relatable lyrics crafted around airy layers of melodies and a few tracks marked by the sort of wailing solos that bring you down to the depths of the moment the despair hit. Plus, Sherri and Stacy DuPree have ridiculously clear, angelic voices that even sound pretty when they’re fuming at “you and all your friends who didn’t like me” and “that apocryphal wedding.” Harmonies abound, as usual – a highlight being the Fleetwood Mac-esque vocal layering of “whoas” in “Oxygen Mask.”

Don’t assume this is entirely an angry-chicks-using-art-to-emotionally-murder-their-wrongdoers album. Granted, a small portion of it is. You’ll definitely want to leave a copy of “Smarter” on your ex’s doorstep, and nothing will chill your bones if “Please” doesn’t. But what you’ll really hear on The Valley is a family re-grouping following low points in their lives. What is music if not cathartic? As they realize in “Ambulance,” “I’m gonna be ok, but it doesn’t seem that way.” Not all anger becomes twisted into an “Adam’s Song” miasma of depression and giving up. This album presents proof that music can help get anyone through anything.

The Valley is due out March 1 via Equal Vision Records.

LOVE IT - The Wind, Harum-Scarum.

The Wind’s Harum-Scarum is the best album I never would have heard this year had it not been for the band contacting me personally (because they’re good friends with The Fling, whom I reviewed earlier). Word of mouth, people. That’s the way to get things done.


A self-produced 23-track debut album is ridiculously ambitious, but this project has paid off. Instead of teasing us with 10 or 12 spoonfuls now, then an antsy two-year wait for more, The Wind introduced itself with one huge dose of excellence, infusing the Beatles with Harry Nilsson’s cheeky lyrics and the harmonics of modern-day indie-folk rock acts like Dr. Dog.

Highlights include “Hathor,” “Distractions,” and “An Astral Dance and a Shared Dream.” Go shout it from the mountaintops that the Wind is the shiz. Perhaps they’ll blow our way someday.

LOVE IT - The Fling, When The Madhouses Appear.

I’ve had The Fling’s When the Madhouses Appear on repeat for a few weeks now, and am having a ridiculously hard time putting its awesomeness into intelligible words. Since I am bursting to share these guys with the world, I’ve decided that few words are better than no words at all.

At once recalling Fleet Foxes, Delta Spirit (a band I previously reviewed and whose lead singer, Matt Vasquez, contributes guest vocals on this album) and Rubber Soul-era Beatles, The Fling have produced a debut EP full of beautifully melodic and well-textured songwriting — instantly sing-alongable yet arranged complexly enough to warrant multiple listens.

The swishing layers and impassioned vocals stand out, even above the lovely poetic (yet thankfully un-melodramatic) lyricism; their angelic harmonies left me speechless the first time they soared through my speakers. If you listen to only one song from the album to convince yourself whether this band is worth your time or not, please make it “Strangers.”

Everything about this album screams “give us worldwide fame,” so I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before the masses take notice. If I had it my way, the radio would only play heartfelt music like that purveyed by The Fling. This is the kind of aural pleasure that ears were invented for. (Out now on Lady Monk Records)

LOVE IT - People Eating People, People Eating People.

Seattle is one lucky city. Not only do they get coffee and rain and Tom and Meg and the Space Needle, but they also boast one of the most interesting songwriter/pianists hovering around the indie circuit: Nouela Johnston.

Known these days under the moniker People Eating People (chosen from a friendly contest for the worst band name of all time), Johnston’s complex melodic structures and varying tempos put her somewhere between the likes of Sara Bareilles, Regina Spektor and Amanda Palmer.

That wide medium is ground not often covered, yet Johnston covers it all on her eponymous debut LP. Accompanied by little more than drums and guitar, Johnston’s duet of piano and vocals–raw and real and probably untrained but who cares–are a mesh of sounds I can only describe as confusingly enjoyable. One can sense the typhoon of emotions in her voice, but to hear that with breezy classic piano arrangements is disarming and invigorating.

Her songs paint images of human stupidity, embarrassment, unrequited love, alienation, and anger with an overall sense of black humor and realism. The production quality is often stark–delicate and suddenly pounding, and never glossy–but this only enriches the experience, as if we are standing in the room with her as she plays.

Standout tracks include “I Hate All My Friends,” “For Now,” and “Supernatural Help,” but all 11 songs have something beautiful and cleverly painful to offer.

LOVE IT - Sea of Bees, Songs For The Ravens.

Sea of Bees is the best thing I’ve discovered so far this year. Code name of singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Julie Bee (Baenziger), Sea of Bees is a one-woman act whose debut LP, Songs For The Ravens, has left me spellbound. No kidding, I was thisclose to a car accident this morning because I was zoning out to the insane lilting harmonies of “Willis.”

It’s hard to believe that Songs For The Ravens is Bee’s first full-length. She displays such technical mastery and her musical arrangements are exquisite — layers upon layers of wooshing piano, glockenspiel, slide, and marimba, with the ebb and flow of drums in the background. Some songs are sad, some are hopeful, some are pissed-but-trying-to-rise-above-it-through-this-beautiful-chorus-you-sucker. There are stompers and siren-songs, dark shadows and twinkling lights, intimate acoustic diary entries and anthemic electricity; it’s this smoothly blended diversity that keeps the album experience fresh and intriguing.

And her voice. Good grief, could anything be more enchanting? Imagine, if you can, Sherri DuPree of Eisley and Camila Grey of Uh Huh Her singing a duet. The control, range, sweeping tenderness and swelling force of those two voices are somehow trapped inside of Julie Bee. Restrained and then let loose at a moment’s notice, Bee seems to intuitively know just what to say and when to not say it, just humming or ahh-ing along with her gorgeous melodies to lull the listener into a calm-induced blackout … and a conversation with their Geico representative because of a mysterious crushed fender.

If you find you can’t get enough of Sea of Bees, check out her five-track Bee Eee Pee EP, which she recorded in one day right after learning how to use ProTools. This chick has got something.

Sea of Bees is the best thing I’ve discovered so far this year. Code name of singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Julie Bee (Baenziger), Sea of Bees is a one-woman act whose debut LP, Songs For The Ravens, has left me spellbound. No kidding, I was thisclose to a car accident this morning because I was zoning out to the insane lilting harmonies of “Willis.”

It’s hard to believe that Songs For The Ravens is Bee’s first full-length. She displays such technical mastery and her musical arrangements are exquisite — layers upon layers of wooshing piano, glockenspiel, slide, and marimba, with the ebb and flow of drums in the background. Some songs are sad, some are hopeful, some are pissed-but-trying-to-rise-above-it-through-this-beautiful-chorus-you-sucker. There are stompers and siren-songs, dark shadows and twinkling lights, intimate acoustic diary entries and anthemic electricity; it’s this smoothly blended diversity that keeps the album experience fresh and intriguing.

And her voice. Good grief, could anything be more enchanting? Imagine, if you can, Sherri DuPree of Eisley and Camila Grey of Uh Huh Her singing a duet. The control, range, sweeping tenderness and swelling force of those two voices are somehow trapped inside of Julie Bee. Restrained and then let loose at a moment’s notice, Bee seems to intuitively know just what to say and when to not say it, just humming or ahh-ing along with her gorgeous melodies to lull the listener into a calm-induced blackout … and a conversation with their Geico representative because of a mysterious crushed fender.

If you find you can’t get enough of Sea of Bees, check out her five-track Bee Eee Pee EP, which she recorded in one day right after learning how to use ProTools. This chick has got something.