local cd reviews

Expatriate folk/pop
Matt Pond PA
Winter Songs
(Altitude)
Brooklyn is a lot colder than Philadelphia, so it makes sense that ex-local indie guy Matt Pond has winter on the brain more often in his new home. His recent Winter Songs was recorded in August, for example, and if you're already missing the snow and ice, its seven cuts are just the trick to revisit them. Mostly covers, the EP deals with hibernation season through lyrics (Neil Young's "Winterlong"), a chilly ambience (a dead-on stab at Neutral Milk Hotel's "In The Aeroplane Over The Sea"), or both (Lindsey Buckingham's "Holiday Road"). Pond's own contributions include two minute-long instrumentals scoring icy lakes and snowy roads, and the whispering gem "Snow Day," which is perfect for zoning out by a window and watching flakes fall from the sky.
—John Vettese

funk/rock
Blivit
Unhand the World
(Crimson Five)
Ripped from the loosely jointed jazzunk of Fathead, singer-keyboardist-tabla guy Jeremy Dyen, drummer Jay Horvath and bassist/vocalist Dave Palan find themselves making sumptuously soulful songs in a tighter, faster formation. That is, without trimming the Fat's improv and groove factor. There's still Dyen's usual mix of swerving Steely Dan-like chords and fuzzy Zappa-frenzy within the coolly complex "This Condition" and the rumbly drummed ballad "Lower Me Down." But they're tighter as a trio, with quicker access to the heart of their circling melodies. Bridges and choruses reveal themselves with haste through the stuttering crunch of "Spinning" and the new wave funk of the title tune, allowing Dyen's absurdist witticisms to find sharper focus.
—A.D. Amorosi

rock/pop/electronic
Run Away From The Humans
We Exist
(Exo 11)
Emo isn't the right word. Let's make one up. Earn-tronica: (n.) earnest, aching electronic rock. That's what this dreamy Philly/Jersey trio does best. Theirs is an airy sound plunged between the dry, icy hum and the slow rush of melody made by OMD during its David Hughes-height, with the quietly clicking symphony of The Sea and Cake, too. You can see your own breath as programmer Jason McBride noodles through the chill of "Wake Up, Wake Up." But McBride's sentimental vocals and Marc Chartier's tangled web of guitars spiral toward something dearer throughout, lending what should have been a cold front a pastoral vision of sun-dappled warmth.
--A.D. Amorosi