Trappist
Ancient Brewing Tactics
Relapse (2018)
I could write way too many words about this album, but instead I’ll keep it short and mostly to the point. Ancient Brewing Tactics from Trappist is a 33-minute album about beer. The band includes familiar faces with scene-ties to the likes of Spazz, Despise You, and the metal-themed restaurant Grill ‘Em All. The latter (which I’ve never been to), … Read more
Trash Talk
Eyes And Nines
Trash Talk Collective (2010)
Over the five years of their existence, Trash Talk has been consistently evolving and changing with each release. With Eyes And Nines, their newest full-length, the band shows their top-notch progression once again.Produced by Joby Ford of The Bronx, Eyes And Nines pulls no punches as far as getting right to the grit of this record. “Vultures” starts out the … Read more
Trash Talk
Plagues
Malfunction (2008)
2007 was a huge year for this group of young men from Sacramento. A relentless touring schedule in support of their debut full-length, Walking Disease, fueled a hype machine - not necessarily in a bad way - that landed them on Malfunction Records and onto a lot of hardcore kids' favorites of '07 lists. Plagues picks up where the band … Read more
Trash Talk
Trash Talk
Trash Talk Collective (2008)
Trash Talk, the hype band come hardcore mainstays through relentless touring, have a lot of eyes and ears on them with the release of their self-titled album. Adhering to the D.I.Y. ethics that are the backbone of punk, the Sacramento band opted to release their newest album themselves, leaving behind Deathwish Inc., one of the largest labels in hardcore. If … Read more
Trash Talk
Walking Disease
Rumble (2007)
Some bands are like wine; they only get better with age. Trash Talk's new "full-length" effort is a great example of just that. Trash Talk has been playing shows since late 2005, with a demo, seven inch, and split with Bay Area friends Steel Trap put out in just over a year. But this is what we've really been waiting … Read more
Travoltas
Back To The City
White Russian Records (2021)
Somehow it seems to me that Travoltas released Until We Hit The Shore only last year or perhaps the year before. But nooooo, it’s been four years already. That record is still on heavy rotation here, especially when the weather is sunny and the temperature is high (but not too hot). So I was so happy to hear a new … Read more
Travoltas
Until We Hit the Shore
White Russian Records (2017)
Reunions make me cringe. I’ll just say it like it is. I dislike reunions. A lot. I am always afraid a band will ruin their legacy. Or at the very least it will feel different. This is most likely due to the fact I’m a different person than I was when I listened to a band first. New material just … Read more
Treasure Fleet
The Sun Machine
Recess (2015)
You can’t have your middle finger in the air all the time. As such, Isaac Thotz (The Arrivals) has stepped away from his punk-leaning project to explore spacey 1960’s inspired psychedelia with The Treasure Fleet. The band also includes members of Smoking Popes, The Lawrence Arms, and Sass Dragons and was produced by Preston Bryant of Andrew Jackson Jihad, so … Read more
Tree Wave
Cabana
Made Up (2004)
The sound is akin to being smothered by some heavenly, heavily pixilated pillow- warm washes of analog static, compressed layers of computerized bleeps, waves of soft, arpeggiated trills, and a beautiful voice emerging from the dense, intoxicating cloud. Tree Wave are a Dallas-based duo that write fantastic, mind-bending songs with nothing more than some antiquated technology (Commodore 64's, Dot Matrix … Read more
Trees
Lights Bane
Crucial Blast (2008)
A monolithic drone keeps you on guard. You're waiting for whatever is coming, but you don't know that "what" is. The artwork of Trees' Lights Bane hints at something intense, but there's an ambiguity that accompanies it. The album, the Portland quartet's debut, has only two tracks listed, and each of them are over twelve minutes in length. Lights Bane... … Read more
Trent Fox & The Tenants
Mess Around
Kind Turkey (2011)
There’s a garage-pop movement afoot in Wisconsin and Trent Fox & the Tenants are just one of the torchbearers. Their five song debut EP, Mess Around, is a quick burst: part ass-shaking party music, part beer-pounding sleaze. The band plays a familiar style with enough attitude to pull it off without making the usual namedropping comparisons.The single is under 15 … Read more
Trial
Reunion / Retrospective
Panic (2008)
If there were one band that I felt characterized both the sound and ideals of hardcore in the 1990's, it would be Trial. The Northwest hardcore outfit delivered a focused and aggressive mixture of hardcore, punk, and metal influences to crowds of all sizes during their original tenure. They partnered this brute, metallic music written by co-founder and guitarist Timm … Read more
Tribulation
Where the Gloom Becomes Sound
Century Media (2021)
This is not the record that I would want to be Tribulation's swan song. However, if that ends up being the album's legacy, I will not be surprised. The group started out as an above-average brigade of blackened rock and rollers with overt death metal influences on 2009's The Horror. Within the next four years, the band would learn to … Read more
Trigger Effect
Dare to Ride the Heliocraft
Signed by Force (2009)
When first opening this record, I glanced at the cover art, track titles, and album length and made the assumption that this band must sound pretty damn cocky and aggressive. And I was right for the most part. The fact that there are only two songs on the whole record that are over two minutes and considering the first track … Read more
Triple Threat
A New Chapter EP
Livewire (2005)
This record is so funny I almost shat my pants. Not ha-ha funny, mind you, but "fuck, this is so fucking old school" funny. Well, maybe not even that. Maybe more like "god, this is so old" funny. If you were hoping for innovative or experimental, you will not get it from A New Chapter. One might say this is … Read more
Triptykon
Melana Chasmata
Century Media (2014)
In his long, storied, and in this mind, legendary career, Thomas Gabriel Fischer (Tom G. Warrior) has been a man of dark talent and darker vision. Where I think he has always been separated from his peers however, is always being able to show the listener the beauty in that darkness. From Hellhammer to Celtic Frost to Apollonyon Sun to … Read more
Tristan Clopet
Purple EP
Sussex (2011)
Whenever anyone is described as a blend of Jeff Buckley and Anthony Kiedis like Tristan Clopet is an alarm goes off in my head, having been a Jeff Buckley fan for years and back and forth with the Chili’s as I like most of their overall catalog. I must admit after my first listen I was surprised by pretty much … Read more
Trouble
The Distortion Field
FRW Music (2013)
There are few bands that can boast ever having made one of the heaviest albums of all time.Trouble can make that claim not just once, but twice. Those albums being 1984’s Psalm 9 and 1985’s The Skull. Trouble had the market of doom cornered for quite a while. Due in large part to guitarist Rick Wartell’s down tuned riffs and … Read more
