Like any good film, Movie Theatre Haiku makes its way from melodrama to freak-out, sentimentality to confusion. It’s hard not to love well-timed, well-arranged whistling, even if it comes in one of the album’s weaker tracks (“My Life in Film Festivals”—even the title indicates they were experimenting with a theme here, not really going for the Great Song). “User-Friendly Guide to Change” calls to mind some of …

Throughout the 10 tracks of Yes No Yes No Yes No, this Seattle quartet proves it has perfected the art of writing a solid new wave punk song: a catchy chorus, three chords, a driving bass line and a simple yet always effective drum beat. From the opening chords of “Where Wolves Drink” to the meandering ending of “Point of Departure,” the Girls, for the most part, …

For a band not yet six months out of the gate, Church has accomplished some impressive feats. Its sound is cohesive beyond the band’s years, and the trio is already pushing its self-prescribed boundaries on this EP, its second release overall and first with label support. Gold maintains the trademarks that gave Church such fanatic coverage, from hometown Portland press at its emergence earlier this summer, as …

It’s taken 10 years and six records, but 31 Knots has finally completed the transition from “rock ’n’ roll band” to “what the eff?”, abandoning axes for synthesizers and verses for sampled organ hits in an ongoing effort to match the schizophrenia of its songwriting to that of its legendary stage performance. With Worried Well, the Portland-by-way-of-San Francisco trio pulls a page from the book of Blood …