Lollipop Magazine

The Aluminum Group – Plano – Review

June 1, 1999

So tastefully appointed, so artfully/craftily arranged, so very adult-sounding, that I expect most will have cleared the room by the end of this sentence.

Beck – Mutations – Review

April 1, 1999

Soaked in an ambience as warm as an old tube amp, Mutations knocks off seamless collages of organic source material with his trademark nonsense-as-wit.

Prolapse – The Italian Flag – Interview

April 1, 1999

An (email) interview with the Band

Sebadoh – The Sebadoh – Review

April 1, 1999

Fear not, sensitive males and the females who break up with them, Barlow’s still cranking out the most sincere nice-guy rock in the land.

VVV – Endless – Review

April 1, 1999

Vega’s “return to roots” album (if the misshapen, denuded weedlets that sprout from the cracks of Avenue A can be considered roots).

Jerry Seinfeld – I’m Telling You for the Last Time – Review

April 1, 1999

To my knowledge, no one’s ever noted this before, but to me it’s quite obvious: Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld were the Lennon/McCartney of comedy.

Fuck – Conduct – Review

April 1, 1999

Although Conduct is a somewhat more plugged-in affair than their previous disc, Pardon My French, the rockier moments lack the thrust of macho metallurgy.

The Sugarcubes – The Great Crossover Potential – Review

January 1, 1999

You know we were getting desperate for leper messiahs when we started looking for them in Reykjavik.

The High Llamas – Lollo Rosso (Remix EP) – Review

January 1, 1999

Obsessive fans of one or more of the artists should enjoy this agreeable exercise in pointlessness. The rest of us: wave politely, no flash photography.

The Charlatans U.K. – Melting Pot – Review

January 1, 1999

Ah, yes, a seventy-five-minute stroll down Hazy Recollection Lane. The stuff of Electric Lucozade Acid Tests U.K.-wide.

Stereolab – Aluminum Tunes (Switched On, Volume 3) – Review

January 1, 1999

At the rate Stereolab pumps out these rarities collections, one has to wonder whether the Marx-Moogs-and-magic collective allows themselves any sleep.

Bauhaus – Crackle – Review

January 1, 1999

Far from being bleak and forbidding, Bauhaus was inclusive, their cold blood a warm sacrament for the scrabbling weevils crawling over the teenage underbelly.

Silver Jews – American Water – Review

January 1, 1999

About halfway through American Water, the music begins to warm to the words’ expansive wit and well-tempered calibration.

Robert Pollard – Waved Out – Review

January 1, 1999

Truth is, as reflexively brilliant and endlessly prolific as Pollard remains, for a guy that puts out as much as he does, he’s the biggest rocktease around.

Morrissey – My Early Burglary Years – Review

January 1, 1999

How much longer will his dwindling cult put up with this cynical reconfiguration of songs that all of them already purchased before the light finally goes out?

Kahimi Karie – Review

January 1, 1999

A little retro, a little neo (space-age bossa nova lounge trip-pop, for those keeping score), and contributions from many one-named sound hybridizers.

Jimi Hendrix Experience – BBC Sessions – Review

January 1, 1999

Should you kiss the sky on your first date? How did a Black guy from Seattle track down the only two pale English guys with higher, kinkier hair than himself?

Janis Joplin with Big Brother and the Holding Company – Live at Winterland ’68 – Review

January 1, 1999

Vulnerability crossed with a paint-peeling wail, a rare distaff stone on the Texan misfit trail. This kinda stuff’s in short supply today.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience – BBC Sessions – Review

January 1, 1999

It’s the mark of a truly seminal artist that, even thirty years after his death, you discover something new with every new vault-scraping from the archives.

Frank Black and the Catholics – Interview

January 1, 1999

An interview with Frank Black

Marvel Kind – Mini – Review

November 1, 1998

The new EP from Marvel Kind, an amalgam as curious as any I’ve chanced upon in recent months, again and again shoves many questions to the fore.

Skyward – Review

November 1, 1998

A startlingly diverse supporting cast helps Skyward bring his vision to fruition, from members of his former bands to drop-ins.

Loud Family – Days for Days – Interview

November 1, 1998

An interview with Scott Miller

Sonic Youth – A Thousand Leaves – Review

November 1, 1998

“Sonic Youth,” I intoned. “The edifice upon which much of the significant musical graffiti of the last two decades has been sprayed.”

Pulp – This Is Hardcore – Review

November 1, 1998

They’re poppy without being derivative, literate without being pretentious, Jarvis Cocker has that sexy-nerd thing happening like no British musician in years.