A string of acoustic rock tunes loaded with romantic hooks and melodies make up Waz's latest EP "The Secret." Consider these songs made for hearts longing, mending and trying finding their way.

Lyrics run nostalgic--not stale--and are reminiscent of times when the singer/songwriter's past love was fresh and new. Waz's calming voice adds a sensitive--not feminine (don't you love our disclaimers?)--touch to each song that evoke images of a live and intimate acoustic set, with an added elegance to his grey vest, white blouse and black tie.

Evidently influenced by artists such as Neil Young and The Pretenders, opening and highlight track "Ordinary Girl" starts with merry up-beats infused with happy chords backed on piano and acoustic guitar. With its clingy chorus and those never-old, bigger-than-ourselves questions, it's no surprise Waz has been forgivably licensed "Grey's Anatomy." The five-track EP proves poignant, albeit beguilingly commercial, and deserves a full-length cinematic effort. -Christine Hernandez

In an age where musicianship can be artificially created and perfected by a computer, it's easy to forget about the subtle charms and ambiances that great musicians can create and make you feel; you know, the essential heart of what makes you connect with a piece of music. In their new album, "Broken Bridge," Ragsy does just that. The album is a tumultuous venture into the passionate lives of the once upon a time married Kelly Barnes and Sutton Althisar, with the added help of Justin White on bass and Smitty's drums to fill in the cracks of Ragsy's musical story telling. Barne's raspy vocals guide the listener through her trials and tribulations of misguided love ventures as she starts off in "You and Them" with, "I've had too much to drink. Too much to walk. Should have taken the car to the bar but I need these streets so I can straighten out." accompanied with a wrenching back beat that pulses like the beat of the broken hearted. The album continues on to other great highlights like "Say" and "The Better Part" which exemplify the subtle dynamics that make Ragsy so interesting to experience. The album plays like a familiar road that any passionate lover has found themselves walking through, with a seasoned musical prowess that is hard to find an equivalent to. -Julianne Vazquez - website

Archways' first full-length album, "Lest We Forget" has all the musical intricacy of a Kevin Shields project mixed with an alluring pop Morrissey-like sensibility. The album plays pleasantly discordant, with it's heavy emphasis on thickly dark bass lines that open up the songs with a caliginous tone. Ray Argyle's softly sweet tenor adds a contrasting complexity to t he pulsating undertones of the music holding strong beneath Argyle's voice. A lonely voice calls out "All messed up after the party/ Not fall down drunk, but falling apart/ I should be happy " on one of the album's haunting highlights, "Jinx" that recalls the austere honesty of Elliot Smith with a darker foundation. Relatively new to the L.A. music scene, their first album is an impressively mature amalgamation of classic sounds and throbbing beats which foretells a rich exploration of musical landscapes for a band so young. With such an impressively haunting first album, the Archways prove themselves as one of the must-watch bands in the city of angels.-Chris Castanon - website

"Don't Dance." Well, it's hard not to when the best thing The Monolators know how to do is set your body into apoplectic motion. The third, ten track album from this L.A. based four set shows that this band has come a long way from the bands origins of a husband and wife duo. The songs are rambunctiously raw, in manner of something you might find on Television's Marquee Moon (Eli Chartkoff's fueling the comparison with his raspy tenor endearingly reminiscent to Tom Verlaine's nervous vocals), while keeping a softening charm to their punk pulsations with an infusion of 50's rock, as cleverly illustrated on "Heart's going Steady." An infectious dance anthem for any love weary apathetic east-sider, as Chartkoff crows, "can i tell you lots of pointless things, 'cause I guess you own my heart." The album's strongest moment comes with the climactic "Don't Dance (Reprise)", as the track is remixed and guest synth appearances from The Sweet Hurt's Wendy Wang and Ashley Jex help make it an energetic riot of sound that commands you: DANCE! - Christine Castanon - website

With the soft melodic intro that paves the way for Mark Slevin's raspy vocals on the albums first song "The Big Idea", Slevin opens the door for summer and delivers us a perfect soundtrack to underscore the sweet lazy hazes of summer afternoons. Slevin's intricate and gentle guitar parts have an aching beauty about them, most apparent in the song "Mouth Full of Fleece," which has the haunting honesty of the folk music that has clearly influenced its creator. But the album isn't just a tribute to melancholy moods. The album's varied dynamics are apparent from the first track, when a minute and twenty-four seconds into the song the sound comes to its fruition as guitars, banjo, drums, and lap steel come together, unleashing a tirade of country rhythms that make your toes start unconsciously tapping. If you're looking for the perfect album to keep on hand for the last lazy days of summer to keep the moods pleasant and the heart high, then look no further. - Christine Castanon - website

Xu Xu Fang's new CD, The Mourning Son, is a wave of sonic beauty that washes over the listener from start to finish, ensnaring them in a cacophonous underworld of musical textures. With a lead in by crashing waves and thundering skies, the song "These Days" ominously builds with layered textures of reverb driven piano, languid guitar, and bass; never really coming to any kind of climax, in turn heightening an eerie irony to Bobby Tamkin's soft repetition of "These days, things are just okay." The rest of the album continues through a dark mellow landscape, with songs like the title track, "The Mourning Son," a quietly melodic tune built with a controlled artistry, which consciously subdues all surplus emotion to a harrowingly evocative effect. The album is a beautiful soundtrack to to a dark dream you never want to get up from; concluding with the 13:56 minute "Terra Scura," painting the ending scene to the dark landscape that we've been meditating through, with falling rain, distant thundering, and chilling synthesizers; bringing to conclusion an immaculate end to an immaculate album. - Christine Castanon - website

The Sweet Hurt's latest EP, In the Shade of Dreams, is a sonic version of stargazing, late summer afternoons, and the peaceful surrender right before falling asleep. Its five gems range from confessional lullabies to indie pop, carried by Wendy Wang's gorgeous lucid vocals and her band's ethereal interwoven accompaniment. "Dreams for a While" captures the album's delicate balance between love and loss (let the wind take hold at a thousand miles/and all that's happened beneath us defeats us in the end). And the gentle acoustic guitar and tranquil harmonies on the title track are reminiscent of Paul McCartney's "Blackbird". The EP's real sweet hurt is "Where Would You Go", which whispers of that epiphanous night spent staring at the ceiling before leaving your lover (if it's time for me to go then I'll start packing now). To hear In the Shade of Dreams awake, check out The Sweet Hurt at Saint Rock August 17 and Eagle Rock All-Star Lanes August 21. – Jaime Pannone - website

The Henry Clay People's latest EP, Working Part Time, captures the restless energy and desire not to conform or grow old that define being in your twenties. Each song begins with a hard hitting drum groove and explodes with choruses that sound like a bunch of roommates gathering on Friday night to sing and drink away the work week. "Working Part Time" is an anthem for minimum wage survival partly because employment is hard to find (I was broke but still alive) and partly because being in a band and trying to hold down a job can feel like caging an animal (We got drunk but called in sick whenever we felt like it). "Andy Sings" continues the theme of reclaiming your youth when on the verge of adulthood (We were old enough to know better but we were young enough to not care) with a sweet bridge that showcases the vocal range of the band's three singers. Equal parts The Replacements and The Clash, Working Part Time is exactly what you want to hear driving home at 5pm as you're ripping off your tie or at any other liberating moment during the work week. Jaime Pannone - website

Ah, Submarines! These menacing, dark and sneaky war machines have picked up a psychedelic, colorful, innocuous meaning thanks to one the most hideous Beatles songs - hey, HUGE fab four fan here! "We all live in a Yellow Submarine..." -blah! LA's own Submarines obviously exploit this pop association, offering us a light, vaguely psychedelic indie rock, with plenty of wavy melodies and inventive, sometimes quirky arrangements. Even the cover of their new EP "Honeysuckle Weeks" is slightly reminiscent of the Liverpool band's colorful underwater cartoon. Blake Hazard's mellow and somehow innocent sounding vocals will surely find fans among those always on the lookout for a new interesting next door kinda girl. This is perfect indie pop for that summer vacation we desperately need. - PDG - website

When embodying a free-spirited music, a band’s reputation oftentimes pays the price in coming off as oblivious, ambitious, or flat-out pretentious. Long Beach's Codpiece buries these creative myths by producing a clusterfuck of confusing noises on their highly entertaining (and in no way arrogant) EP, Epic Code. Conflict is seldom this fun.
Codpiece have a gift in not giving two shits about your presumptions -- and one gets that impression from the dismissive attitudes in the punk influenced "They'll Dine on Your Remains" as well as the defeat-laden "I Know." It's a mess of rock noises that range from comfort organs and bells to terrifying tribal toms. Epic Code's success is in leaving their 20-minute tale open-ended with more unanswered questions than a season finale of Lost.
The Epic Code EP is loud and unfiltered. It teases you with bottomless potential of this local rock trio. You can pick it up at Long Beach’s famed indie store, Fingerprints, and bask in the missing closure. - Hugo Gomez - website

Sea Wolf’s fall release from Dangerbird Records, Leaves in the River, is an attractive example of how Indie rock and poetry can meld.
“…to want to live and move…If it were not for this, life would be dead.” – Jack London
Alex Church, who began this concept three years ago, brings together his own experienced musicianship with an ever-evolving group of others. Though, technically, he is the only ‘permanent’ member, Alex seems to have no interest in calling himself a singer-songwriter, though he is his talents lie in both. A group dynamic allows for each musician to bring different skills and sounds to the table of talent that is Sea Wolf.
Sea Wolf has an extensive tour lined up, and it would be a good idea to get on it. Friday night Sea Wolf will be at the Glass House in Pomona at 8pm, then on to San Francisco at the Fillmore on Saturday. If you can’t make it up there, on the 25th Sea Wolf will be in Sacramento at Harlows. Have a lick from the Sea Wolf lolly: - Mean Dean - website - buy it now