Cobra Starship - Nice Guys Finish Last

"You're a nice guy with the wrong attitude"

Cobra Starship are a band that really should not be as good as they are. They sprung from the Snakes on a Plane movie, for god sakes! Who would have thought that, three albums later, they'd have hit the bigtime with a proper hit single and one of the summers' best tracks in Good Girls Go Bad. We're in an interesting stage in U.S. music right now that I like to call post-emo. Gone are most of the put-on, whiny "emo" vocals in pop and rock music. Instead we've got bands like 3Oh!3 and Boys Like Girls making genuine pop/dance music. Sure, their albums are certainly not consistently good, but I think Cobra Starship may have created the first consistent, post-emo record worth listening to. The album kicks off with perhaps the best track, the damn-is-it-really-that-good Nice Guys Finish Last. The melody and vocals are pure pop, and I love the bridge with the chanting girls and the super huge/catchy chorus. Check out the new album. It really is surprisingly fantastic.

(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Preorder the new album here. Follow me on twitter at nickajames)

Muse - Uprising

"They will not control us"

My thoughts on the new Muse single? MASSIVE. They keep getting funkier and funkier with their lead singles. It's not a direction I imagined them going in after Absolution, but the spacey electro sound suits them perfectly. With Uprising, they're very nearly in Scissor Sisters territory, as weird as that comparison may sound. The tracks starts out sounding like the theme song to an old sci-fi show before a Goldfrappish glam disco beat kicks in. It's a dang near perfect track and really makes me anxious for the album. I've often thought that Muse would be the perfect band to soundtrack a cool sci-fi/action movie. In fact, I played Map of the Problematique just last Sunday with this in mind. They have a gift for the epic. I love it.

(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Preorder the new album here. Follow me on twitter at nickajames)

Frankmusik - Wonder Woman

"Did the world just miss its second meltdown?"

Frankmusik seems like he's been around forever. It also seems like forever that we've been waiting for his debut album. It finally comes out today, and honestly pretty much all the excitement I felt about it had fizzled months ago. That is, until I listened to the album. We've heard most of the songs before (many in alternate forms), so the thing plays like a greatest hits. It also sounds like a proper breakthrough, something that could actually take off if given the right push. Whoever's behind him has really dropped the ball, and it's pretty sad. Part of me wonders if it's too late to turn the campaign around. Regardless, it's a fantastic album that should please fans. I loved listening to the few tracks I hadn't heard before. Wonder Woman is one of those, and falls more on the pop side of his work than the electronic one. He's a hooky songwriter when he wants to be, and this is an excellent example of this.

(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Buy the album here. Follow me on twitter at nickajames)