From this week's muisc lead, Fright On for the Darkness:

Diminished Men, Corespondents

(Poggie Tavern) Diminished Men's new album, Shadow Instrumentals (Abduction Records), partially draws on the fantastical Italian horror-flick genre known as giallo for sonic inspiration. The band's jagged, hard-charging, reverbed riffing evokes images of slit jugulars and accelerated heart rates, all the while swathing you in a velvety claustrophobia. If soundtrack maestro Ennio Morricone became possessed by guitarists Duane Eddy and Cliff Richard, and then the three cut a record in a Roma mansion spattered with ectoplasm, it would sound like the new Diminished Men opus. DAVE SEGAL

From Up & Coming:

Propagandhi, MDC, the Rebel Spell

(Neumos) Most bands get soft with age. But Winnipeg's premier anarchist punk band Propagandhi lost their poppier and more personable attributes with the departure of bassist John Samson after their sophomore album, Less Talk, More Rock. Samson went on to front the bookish and heartfelt Weakerthans, while Propagandhi recruited hardcore veteran Todd Kowalski to take his place. The result was a pronounced departure from the band's earlier blend of SoCal punk and premillennial emo to a more ferocious metal-influenced take on melodic hardcore. While the first couple of albums will always have their devotees, it's reassuring to watch a punk band grow angrier and grittier over time. BRIAN COOK

Lucero (cancelled), Jack Oblivian, John Paul Keith & the One Four Fives

(Crocodile) Jack Yarber (aka Jack O and Jack Oblivian) is an underground hero—a well-respected, longtime member of garage rock's top royal family. The Memphis-based singer/songwriter/guitarist has been around since the early '80s, playing with Mississippi punks Johnny Vomit and the Dry Heaves, Memphis new wavers the End, garage rockers the Compulsive Gamblers, and, of course, the influential Oblivians. Yarber continually reinvents himself, mashing all his influences—a lil' bit country, a lil' bit Southern soul, and a whole lot gritty rock—into something all his own. His new album with the Tennessee Tearjerkers, Disco Outlaw on Goner Records, is an A-plus, rock-solid collection of songs. Maybe this unsung Memphis heavy will finally get some props on this side of the Mississippi. KELLY O

Soulico Crew, WD4D, DJ Collage

(Chop Suey) Tel Aviv hiphop quartet Soulico Crew are not revolutionary. The crew's blending of Jewish, Arabic, Jamaican, and black-American popular music has no real surprises. It's been done before; it will be done again. The value of Soulico's work, and why it's worth recommending, is not in the number and variety of musical forms they bring together, but in the skill with which they fuse these forms into a whole. While listening to this or that tune, one starts to feel and be impressed by the seamless unity of the music. None of the different parts feels out of place; each form fits perfectly with other forms—on one track, the Dirty South style of rapping is perfectly set to klezmer horns. True, nothing is new with this crew, but they do know how to do what they do. CHARLES MUDEDE

Midday Veil, Cursillistas, Paintings for Animals

(Josephine) Cursillistas—Matt Lajoie and Dawn Marna—trek from Portland, Maine, to play their stoned strain of ooze-on-down-the-road sigh-chedelia. As always with music of this stripe, some will find it tediously dawdling while others will revel in the liquid blissfulness of it all. Overall, though, Cursillistas conjure an eerie, rural vibe that will cause folks to freak—very gradually and naturally. Seattle's Midday Veil have become one of the city's most reliable sorcerers of slow-building psychedelia, with one fashionable boot in beauteous songcraft and a bare foot dangling in deep, krautward-bound jam space. I recently described Paintings for Animals' music as "a weird party soundtrack at the microcosmic level or a score to your most mystical, baffling dreams." I'm sticking with that story until further notice. DAVE SEGAL

And there's always more in our complete music calendar listings.