Kiss it dudely.

Torche's 2005's self-titled effort on Robotic Empire had everybody making the obvious comparisons to the last echoes of Floor still floating around. Meanderthal was 2008's breakthrough as far as finding a unique voice distancing from the band members' individual pasts (besides Floor, Cavity, Shitstorm, Mehkago N.T., Ed Matus' Struggle, Panda Bite, Tyranny of Shaw, Tunes for Bears to Dance To, etc...) and then a slew of EPs and splits kept the appetites whet and the band in the spotlight.

This is good. This is what you expect. And while those sourpusses over at Pitchfork might want to wield their "mighty" cool swords all over town, remember this: Steve Brooks was setting up his mastery of the "guitar bomb" for the very bands these people went gaga for when they were in diapers and the internet was Al Gore's feverish dream. It's true.

So now comes the band's new album, Harmonicraft. And if those cranks at Pitchfork feel like "predictability" is at play on this album, I posit the following: This is new guitarist Andrew Elstner's first ride on the bull that is Torche, and here you have everything that you need for a solid album: soaring vocals, gruff guitars, a well-gelled rhythm section, and varied compositions that work together symbiotically to create a full and ethereal aural experience.

Indeed!

Without galvanizing sentiments about WWII and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, let's just, for the sake of music, assume that "kamikaze" is a bomb of sorts mired in gloomy suicidal thoughts. Okay. Today we have the newly released One Crown Productions video for HYPE's track "Kamikaze" and it's everything you want in a southern hip-hop song.

With a twist.

Gone is the usual glamour of hip-hop in which the bling is idolized and the women look like CGI dreams come true. There's no Gucci here, no Escalade with accessories that cost three times my year's salary. No, this song goes down in a trailer park and if you're not jonesing for an ice-cold Steel Reserve afterwards, then you're not having as much fun as the flag-waving puro in the beginning.