Whatever sense of unity bound a hodgepodge of underground American punk sounds in the 1990s like a Duct-tape wallet began to come unglued by the end of the decade. A couple years into the new millennium and the emo scene that once had enough space for a band as brazen in their fusion of slowcore, jazz, and post-hardcore as Boston's Karate would barely be reflected in a cookie-cutter style commercialized by major labels and mid-level indies that acted like the majors. The part of punk that overlapped with indie rock would begin a slow ascent from it's comfortable home on college radio charts to the soundtrack of American Apparel shops and eventually the Billboard charts. In this strange, stratifying milieu, Karate, a band that seemed to thrive by cleaving to a nether-zone between several sounds that otherwise never touched, delivered an engrossing constantly shifting shot of rock that covered three sides of 12-inch vinyl: Unsolved arrived in 2000. Karate spent much of the ' 90s wrestling punk aggression and volume into svelte shapes and often condensed what felt like a generation of scuffed-up intensity into whispers. The quiet moments carried much of that unbridled intensity throughout Unsolved -the fuzzy guitar squawk and snatchet of machine-gun drumming on "Sever" aside, things hit a little more sharply the moment the trio pivoted into their subdued jazz melodic interplay on that song. Karate's transition into indie-rock maturity had become so complete by the time they dropped Unsolved that you could play the coffeehouse soul of "Halo of the Strange" and sultry jazz of "Lived-But-Yet-Named" to an unsuspecting punk and spend an entire evening trying to convince them that, yes, this band had made their bones playing the same DIY circuit made of bands that sounded like they wanted to harm their audience. But few bands other than Karate played like they understood the musical lingua franca of scene godheads such as Fugazi and Unwound, and knew how to make that language evolve, and nearly every song on Unsolved made that clear. If you didn't get the memo by the end of the elegiac 11-minute closer "This Day Next Year," which gained an irrepressible power from a plaintive guitar melody cycling through the song's back half like a yearnsome cry for the divine, you might've been better off buying a ticket for Warped Tour and waiting a decade or two to figure it out.
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Recommended equipment and accessories
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Ortofon 2M Blue Premounted
Mounted on the SH-4 Black Headshell, this setup delivers exceptional clarity, dynamic range, and accurate sound reproduction.
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Technics SL-1500C Turntable
Features a direct-drive motor, a high-precision tonearm, and a premium MM cartridge, delivering exceptional sound quality
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Denon DP-400
Featuring a high-precision, belt-driven mechanism and an adjustable tonearm that ensures optimal tracking and minimal resonance
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HumminGuru: Ultrasonic Vinyl Record Cleaner
Advanced ultrasonic technology with customizable cleaning cycles and a large tank capacity to thoroughly remove dust, dirt, and contaminants
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Nagaoka MP-110H Cartridge
Features a high-quality elliptical stylus that provides excellent tracking and minimizes distortion, delivering a detailed sound reproduction with an output voltage of 5.0 mV
Featured Upcoming Vinyl
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Yazmin Lacey Teal Dreams
Virgin Music International
October 24, 2025 -
Cut Copy Moments
Cut Copy Touring Pty Ltd
September 5, 2025 -
Citizen Everybody Is Going to Heaven (10 Year Anniversary Edition) [2xLP]
Run For Cover
October 10, 2025 -
The Aces Gold Star Baby (Gold)
Vector
October 24, 2025 -
Saint Etienne International
Heavenly
September 5, 2025 -
Agriculture The Spiritual Sound
Flenser
October 3, 2025 -
Atmosphere Jestures [2xLP]
Rhymesayers
September 19, 2025 -
Internal Bleeding Settle All Scores
Maggot Stomp
October 17, 2025 -
DJ Haram Beside Myself (Fern Green)
Hyperdub Records
August 29, 2025 -
Christian McBride Big Band Without Further Ado, Vol 1
Mack Avenue Records
August 29, 2025 -
Chuck Berry St. Louis to Liverpool
Elemental Music Rec.
August 29, 2025 -
Demonstealer The Propaganda Machine
Black Lion Records
September 5, 2025 -
Oasis (What's The Story) MORNING GLORY? (30Th Anniversary; Deluxe Edition) (Exclusive) [3xLP]
Big Brother Recordings Limited
October 3, 2025 -
Gwenifer Raymond Last Night I Heard The Dog Star Bark
We Are Busy Bodies
September 5, 2025