After joining Grizzly Bear, touring with them, and then recording what would become their “break-through” album Yellow House, Daniel Rossen’s former band Department of Eagles seemed to be sliding by the wayside after a failed recording session that became known as the “January Sessions.” Little hope remained amongst the two members. That hope, according to Nicolaus, was the song “Balmy Night,” a song that was recorded at the end of the “January Sessions” and eventually showed up on their second release In Ear Park. “Balmy Night” stuck as a constant reminder that the ideas, talent, and resources were there for them to keep the dream of a fully realized DOE record alive. This delicately structured time in the band’s history is on display in the release of the accumulation of the material surrounding and filling the “January Sessions,” now titled Archive 2003-2006.

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During the days of my deviously energetic youth, I sought music that complimented my heightened emotions; I searched for music that propelled and alleviated everyday confusions and epiphanies. Along with various other forms of music, the genre of metal has always held a special place in my arsenal of music knowledge. Growing up in South Jersey, I was surrounded by a budding “metalcore” scene. Although most diehard fans of metal tend to dismiss this and other new forms of metal, metalcore introduced to me the vast expansiveness of all areas of metal, and for that I am thankful. If it wasn’t for bands like Converge, Dillinger Escape Plan, and Between the Buried and Me, I most likely wouldn’t be able to appreciate the other forms of metal that I love to this day.

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Black metal has been a genre of scorching emotive outbursts. The music is fast and abrasive; the singing is akin to the sounds a tortured demon might make. It is a dark and creepy section of the metal genre. Bands like Emperor, Xasthur, Dimmu Borgir, and others bring a sense of doom and destruction to their music. Another aspect that is usually felt when listening to this style of music is despair. Soaring guitars strike out melodies that seem to evoke plaintive, introspective feelings as opposed to the cathartic, anger management treatments usually associated with this stye of music. No band, that could be considered “black metal,” has done this greater than Alcest. A French band made up of one man, Neige, Alcest has structured beautiful songs around the combination of two almost completely separate genres of music.

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Image is something that is taken into account no matter what kind of music you are creating these days. Even the absence of an image is an image of it’s own. Every genre of music, whether it be popular music or indie music, develops an image that suites the scene and the people within it. Sometimes the artists will create their own image, as was often done in the indie scene, or some executive of a record label will decide what image is the best to sell the product, as is with popular music. What popular music has done, and what Chris stated in his Justin Beiber review, is taken the meaning out of the art, which in effect diminishes the power of the art, and the level with which it effects those who listen.

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I gradually came under the charms of The Apples In Stereo through my usual source of new/good music information, Chris Rambo. On a trip to Florida, I was introduced to The Apples immediately on the ride from the airport to his house. Being a little put-off by Robert Schneider’s nasally falsetto and even more put-off by his creepy, giant, mountain-man baby looks, I was understandably skeptical as to the level of their power pop standings.

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