Norska, "Too Many Winters"
Portland band Norska combine elements of doom metal with parts of noise rock, which means I am very much interested in their ideas and would like to subscribe to their newsletter. And it pretty much delivers on that promise, with the stretched out songs of doom and guitar patterns of noise rock. The various side projects of Yob (their bassist Aaron Rieseberg is in Norska, their singer is in VHOL for example) continue to explore what metal can do when cross-polinated with other genres, an exploration that gets me excited.
Zion I, "Mind Blow"
Speaking of combining genres, here's Zion I once again merging electronic music with hip-hop. This is from their second album, Deep Water Slang V2.0, an album that doesn't hit as hard as their first record.
Craw, "Cobray to the North"
No genre hopping here, this is just pure noise rock. FINE BY ME
Pavement, "Black Out"
I shift around my preferences among the five proper studio albums from Pavement. Depending on the day, my favorite album might be any one of three albums. There is consistency among the bottom: Terror Twilight second from the bottom, and Wowee Zowee at the bottom. And the thing is: I actually really like a lot of Wowee Zowee! It starts off so promising that when it falls off, I think it disappoints me more than it should. And just to be clear, I think it's a worthy album and people should still listen to it. Anyway, this is a song from it. It's good!
L'altra, "Lips Move On Top Of Quiet"
From Music of a Sinking Occasion, the debut album of Chicago band L'altra. Best understood as a post-rock band, in the rough vein as other Chicago bands like Tortoise, L'altra is pretty restless even for that scene. Drawing form a wide range of influences, they put together a fascinating album that doesn't really sound like much else.