Gamingforce Music Exposure Club™

Journey - Dream After Dream
Columbia, 1980
Rock, Soundtrack




1. "Destiny"
2. "Snow Theme"
3. "Sand Castles"
4. "A Few Coins"
5. "Moon Theme"
6. "When the Love Has Gone"
7. "Festival Dance"
8. "The Rape"
9. "Little Girl"

Out of place in Journey's large body of work and completely dissimilar to their cheesy, radio-friendly hits, "Dream After Dream" is the soundtrack to a Japanese film of the same name. Vocals are sparse, but the vocal tracks are actually my favorite. If you're a casual Journey fan who hasn't heard of this, give it a listen. And if you think you hate Journey, you may be in for a surprise.

Dream After Dream

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Marvin Gaye - What's Going On
Label: Tamla, 1971
Genre: Soul




Side A

1. "What's Going On" – 3:52
2. "What's Happening Brother" – 2:44
3. "Flyin' High (In the Friendly Sky)" – 3:49
4. "Save the Children" – 4:03
5. "God is Love" – 1:49
6. "Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)" – 3:14

Side B

1. "Right On" – 7:31
2. "Wholy Holy" – 3:08
3. "Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)" – 5:26

Most have heard one or two of the singles from this album, notably the title track, but the entire thing is truly remarkable. What's Going On is considered one of the greatest albums of all time and was certainly a landmark soul recording. This is actually the Deluxe Edition; the first nine tracks (listed above) comprise the original album.

What's Going On

There's nowhere I can't reach.

The Flaming Lips - At War With the Mystics
Label: Warner Bros, 2006
Genre: Psychadelic/Space Rock





1. "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power)" – 5:22
2. "Free Radicals (A Hallucination of the Christmas Skeleton Pleading with a Suicide Bomber)" – 3:39
3. "The Sound of Failure / It's Dark... Is It Always this Dark??" – 7:18
4. "My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion (The Inner Life as Blazing Shield of Defiance and Optimism as Celestial Spear of Action)" – 5:01
5. "Vein of Stars" – 4:58
6. "The Wizard Turns On... The Giant Silver Flashlight and Puts on His Werewolf Moccasins" – 3:45
7. "It Overtakes Me / The Stars Are So Big... I Am So Small... Do I Stand a Chance?" – 6:55
8. "Mr. Ambulance Driver" – 4:21
9. "Haven't Got a Clue" – 3:23
10. "The W.A.N.D. (The Will Always Negates Defeat)" – 3:44
11. "Pompeii am Götterdämmerung" – 4:19
12. "Goin' On" – 3:44

Spoiler:

This album is seriously underrated. By most fans' standards, it doesn't compare favorably with their other albums. It's definitely heavier and more guitar-driven than past offerings, but maybe that's why I like it so much. The following is an excerpt from the Pitchfork review:

...At War With the Mystics is a grab bag of musical styles, without ever seeming like a retread of any particular album or sound they've explored during the course of their 20-year career. Though the themes are cut from the same cloth as the last few records-- meditations on fear, death, love, one's place in the universe, and so on-- musically, the band is up for experimenting. The production is distant, queasy, fuzzier, and less direct than any of their recent outings; the vocals are often manipulated and toyed with-- Coyne goes from singing in a register so low you can hardly recognize him (the single "Yeah Yeah Yeah Song") to one so high that he sounds like Beck doing Prince ("Free Radicals"). Musical mastermind Steven Drozd even sings his first lead, on "Pompeii Am G�tterd�mmerung", one of the record's better songs, a peculiar amalgamation of several strands of krautrock and Pink Floyd's "One of These Days". - Pitchfork Media

At War With the Mystics

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Portugal.The Man - Church Mouth
Label: Fearless Records
Genre: Indie, Experimental





1. Church Mouth - 3:13
2. Sugar Cinnamon - 3:04
3. Telling Tellers Tell Me - 3:10
4. My Mind - 3:50
5. Shade - 3:58
6. Dawn - 3:17
7. Oh Lord - 3:23
8. Bellies Are Full - 4:08
9. Children - 5:03
10. The Bottom - 3:46
11. Sleeping Sleepers Sleep 3:59
12. Sun Brother (excerpt) - 2:11

Will's Comments: The Mars Volta Lite? If you like this or Led Zeppelin let me know, I've got something for you.

Spoiler:

"'This band is from Alaska.' How often do you hear yourself uttering these words? You’d be saying them a lot more if you listened to Wassila Alaska’s own Portugal. The Man.

Situated just inland from Anchorage, Wasilla, the 'Home of the Iditarod,' does not inspire visions reminiscent of rock and roll extremes – or any extreme other than cold for that matter. But given time, they might just be able to proudly tack 'Home of Portugal. The Man' up onto their website right next to 'Alaska’s First Tree City, USA.'

Portugal. The Man is one of those bands is that either the subject of highly exaggerated praise or unmitigated scorn by rock critics. Staking claims as to the potency of their “esoteric, shape-shifting” rock certainly doesn’t help. And while the band may be unfounded in many of their claims to mind-boggling complexity, they admittedly do offer a unique vision in their music that is definitely worth exploring for fans of Indie rock.

Carefully carving around any classically defined rock ‘genre,’ it’s probably best to file Church Mouth under ‘rock, prog’. If variety is the spice of life then Church Mouth is a spicy meatball - bluesy hard rock, driving arena rock, and modern day alternative Indie sounds abound to create a musical diversity steeped in contemporary and classic progressive rock traditions in short form, replete with easily marked influences that can be named in nearly every track. The leadoff title track is White Stripes with a Mars Volta time signature. For some reason the chorus of 'Telling Tellers Tell M' sounds like Blood Sugar Sex Magik-era Red Hot Chili Peppers and 'Shade' takes a page from the TV on the Radio playbook. 'Bellies Are Full' and 'Children' take a turn for the Zeppelin, minus the pseudo-mystical Lord of the Rings lyrics.

Church Mouth’s influences may be easily identified, numerous and diverse as they are, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Portugal. The Man has much to offer in the way of originality, too. The schizophrenic “Sugar Cinnamon” goes from pseudo-drum and bass verses to electro-boogie stomp choruses and back again. But “My Mind” is the radio-ready standout track. A perfect musical diorama of disaffected, yet privileged youth, I can see this song used as the track over the opening title sequence of a new dramedy on the CW – the camera tracking sweeping beach vistas as front man John Baldwin Gourley wails the plight of the principal cast – “my mind is all/gone.” My intention is not to undercut the seriousness or effectiveness of the song, but it does reek a little melodramatic. However, “My Mind” has universal appeal with a great chorus, and there’s still plenty of weirdness buried within the track to satisfy the audiophile in you.

There’s a lot going on within Church Mouth, but the listener isn’t bombarded with zithers and mandolins. None of the songs have long instrumental passages symptomatic of prog and the production has an elusive textural feel, which is so important to a band with such a frenetic sound. The result is that Church Mouth is radio-friendly, but not necessarily tailor-made for radio – something that is deceptively hard to pull off and I applaud the band for this achievement.

With Church Mouth, Portugal. The Man has chosen timely influences and wisely at that. Fans familiar with bands such as White Stripes, Queens of the Stone Age and Silversun Pickups will find plenty to like about this album, if they don’t mind a little flair for prog. One can only speculate as to the album’s lasting appeal, but it’s a very ‘now’ sound and one that is worthy of attention by both the casual and the serious Indie fan. - Kory Lanphear

Church Mouth





The Slip - Eisenhower
Label: Bar/None
Genre: Indie, Jazz Fusion





1. "Children of December" – 4:49
2. "Even Rats" – 5:33
3. "If One Of Us Should Fall" – 5:26
4. "Airplane/Primitive" – 6:55
5. "Suffocation Keep" – 5:21
6. "First Panda in Space" – 2:20
7. "The Soft Machine" – 4:21
8. "Life in Disguise" – 3:45
9. "Mothwing Bite" – 3:29
10. "The Original Blue Air" – 2:24
11. "Paper Birds" – 8:19

Will's Comments: I have no idea where I found these guys, but even my dad likes this album. They're definitely more into indie at this point, but with a song named after The Soft Machine, they're awesome in my book.

Spoiler:

"Seeing them live was amazing...I instantly felt a bond with these three guys. You see so many tired, boring rock acts doing the same thing over and over, but these guys are reaching out...They're taking what we know of music and trying to twist it to a different place." - Jim James, Sunday NYTimes, July 2, 2006

Brad Barr is the band’s core songwriter and one of the great rock guitarists of his generation. He is also looking to join an adult softball league. Brad is the troubadour who’s absorbed it all, from Blonde on Blonde to Bitches Brew. He has the ability to do almost anything on six strings, yet consistently plays with taste, context and humility, understanding the awesome power of three chords and a simple melody to bring people in.

Marc Friedman is mission control on bass guitar, the foundation keeping it all together. He brings the wide-ranging and eclectic interests - from Gershwin to Madonna - that result in many of the trio's most enduring arrangements, as well as many of the high-concept production elements on Eisenhower. Marc brings the nutmeg and the cinnamon. He’s the virtuoso who has literally invented new ways of playing his instrument yet also represents the band’s brick wall; constant and comprehensive in his support.

Andrew Barr is the engine and the source of the band’s chaos and primal energy, often forgetting where he put his shoes, and dreaming up elaborate beats that tell real stories. Andrew's drum parts are practically their own complete songs, adding thunder and lightning to the intimacy of a heartbeat. He rocks like Bonham and listens like your best friend." -JIVE

Eisenhower

How ya doing, buddy?

Pharoahe Monch - Internal Affairs
Label: Rawkus Records, 1999
Genre: Hip-Hop




1. Intro
2. Behind Closed Doors
3. Queens
4. Rape
5. Simon Says
6. Official
7. Hell
8. No Mercy
9. Right Here
10. The Next Shit
11. The Ass
12. The Light
13. God Send
14. The Truth
15. Simon Says Remix

Will's Comments: I was kinda surprised that no one responded to my comment in the Hip-Hop thread...but then again, since his release this year, Pharoahe Monch hasn't put out an album since 1999. His delivery is so good he didn't feel the need to put out another record, so he's been writing for other artists ever since. This is his first solo release, which is out of production. I also *highly* recommend the new album, Desire, which should be very easy to get, and is quite different than Internal Affairs. I'll put it up if requested.

Spoiler:

"If you're not already familiar with the name; "Pharoahe fuckin Monch - ain't a damn thing changed." That's probably how most people know the verbal lyricist featured herein - that line and several verses of ill raps on the underground and club hit "Simon Says." Pharoahe has chops in hip-hop though - he and partner Prince Poetry released three albums as the duo Organized Konfusion; and their self-titled debut album is rated by most experts as one of the 50 greatest rap albums of time.

After their debut, the waters got a little bit more murky. "Stress: The Extinction Agenda" was an underground classic that got largely ignored commercially, and the follow-up album "The Equinox" was a conceptual journey on par with Prince Paul's "A Prince Among Thieves" but which fared even LESS well compared to the sophomore album. Perhaps sensing that he needed to recapture the spark with the rap world and build on the legion of underground heads who jocked his lyrics and flow, Pharoahe decided to sign with Rawkus Records and release a solo album. Pharoahe has said all along that it is not the end of Organized Konfusion, just a period of transition for the group. When you hear this LP, you may think differently.

From the verbal spitfire stuttering of the "Intro" right into the ominously macabre track "Behind Closed Doors" Monch is clearly pulling no punches. Pharoahe is an MC's emcee - the kind of rapper who exudes confidence and pulls off mindbending breath control while spitting scientifically superb lyrics at any choice of tempo; often speeding and slowing at will. He is literally a magician on fat beats - able to pull any rabbit out of his hat and leave you wondering just what the trick was. Just peep the arsenal he displays:

"Bananas is the unaninmous way we choose to live scandalous
Even with doorknobs you couldn't handle this
Pharoahe's the host, the audience, and the motherfuckin panelist
My mic's equipped with laser sights so that the man'll miss"

Alliteration, punchlines, assonance and meter are all in his bag of tricks. However, being gassed off his own skills may have led him to make this album's only controversial track - "Rape." Lyrically and conceptually sound, the song nonetheless stirred the ire of men and women alike for the fact his rhymes were likened to the male phallic and the beats to a woman's privates which he took at will, with or withour her consent. It's up to the individual listener to decide, but to this reviewer it certainly wasn't of itself enough to impact the overall quality of this album.

Even the strongest lyricist would have trouble rocking 15 tracks on the sheer ambition of his verbal ferocity - a fate which for most critics felled albums like Ras Kass' "Soul on Ice" and Chino XL's "Here to Save You All" (though I don't share their opinion). For Pharoahe though, the line-up of talent assembled is not slouching. Both the sports metaphor "Official" and the internet inspired Canibus duet "Hell" are ably produced by Lee Stone, who also rocks the Organized reunion "God Send" as well as lending production assistance to several tracks. Perhaps crunchiest of all though is The Alchemist laced "No Mercy" featuring M.O.P., a hard-stomping New York anthem with unabashed male machismo. Quite simply, any cojones having man will get AMPED UP by this cut.

There is also subtle beauty hidden in these bars too. The much missed musical mastery of D.I.T.C. don Diamond (D) pleases the aural canals with the sublime beauty of "The Light." If you've heard the track of the same name by Common, please, get off it. There is simply no comparison for the sheer sonic pleasure of this cut's simple smoothness as Monch macks to make moves on a mate. The beat is so dope it makes even Pharoahe's marginal singing talents on the chorus come off like the smoothest R&B soul. Of the two, this is the song that SHOULD have blown up, and didn't.

"It was like the earth twisted around her
She shifted the ground I was like, 'Ohhhhh.. SHIT!'
She's off the hook, I would dress her decently
but look her body is immaculate I'm attackin it from all positions
of thinkin inside my mind-ah
Hopefully it won't be too inappropriate if I walk over there and say,
'Excuse me, can I have your number please?'"

The album is closed by an all-star "Simon Says Remix" featuring everyone from mediocre rappers Shabaam Sahdeeq and Lady Luck to rap top guns Redman, Method Man, and Busta Rhymes - the latter in particular drops one of the hardest cameo verses we've ever seen from him. In one verse he not only threatens to put a "picture of your autopsy up on a web site" and then sell you out like "British civil servants pass secrets to the Soviets." Ouch! Busta also duets with Pharoahe on a bouncy uptempo cut called "The Next Shit" but he clearly saved the best for last. Apparently, Pharoahe Monch did too. Those who knew he had skills before clearly could not have the atomic bomb he dropped with this album. As great as Organized Konfusion was (clearly one of rap's best duos ever) this solo album proves without a doubt Pharoahe has 'nuff skills to rock it for delf. Hopefully there will be another Pharoahe album which builds on this one's strengths (and they are many) and raises the stakes another notch." - RapReviews.com

Internal Affairs





Rocky Votolato - Makers
Label: Barsuk Records, 2006
Genre: Indie/Singer-Songwriter





1. "White Daisy Passing" – 3:07
2. "Portland Is Leaving" – 2:45
3. "The Night's Disguise" – 3:17
4. "She Was Only in It for the Rain" – 3:09
5. "Uppers Aren't Necessary" – 2:55
6. "Wait Out the Days" – 2:43
7. "Streelights" – 2:29
8. "Tennessee Train Tracks" – 2:25
9. "Goldfield" – 3:32
10. "Tinfoil Hats" – 2:39
11. "Where We Left Off" – 5:38
12. "Makers" – 3:18

Will's Comments: I heard "White Daisy Passing" because of the iTunes free songs thing on Facebook. It's just different than everything I usually listen to, and I really like his voice.

Spoiler:

"Take away the bass and drums, and most rock songs lose their mojo. But on his Barsuk debut, the former frontman of indie-rock band Waxwing lets the guitar do the driving and strings together some of the most memorable melodies I’ve heard in the past few years. Compared to the auto-tuned nature of so many pop records today, Makers’ raw authenticity belongs in a vinyl collection next to Gram Parsons. More than anything, it’s Votolato’s voice that stands out and demands attention. On “Tennessee Train Tracks” it sounds a bit like a raspy Ryan Adams, while the three-part harmonies of “White Daisy Passing” recall Iron and Wine. Most of the tunes are propelled by acoustic-guitar strumming and have an urgency that underscores stories about restless people anxious to escape trailer-park life in old mining towns. Though death and regret are recurring themes, the dynamic melodies and predominantly brisk tempos give them an uplifting energy. Peppered with mandolin, harmonica, and pedal-steel riff s, the arrangements are sometimes reminiscent of alt-country forebears like Richard Buckner. But the melodic choruses have as much in common with label mates Nada Surf and Death Cab for Cutie. Like Votolato himself, the songs sound like they are rooted in Texas but blooming in Seattle." - acousticguitar.com

Makers

I was speaking idiomatically.

Mew - Frengers
Label: Sony/Epic, 2003
Genre: Indie





1. "Am I Wry? No" – 4:54
2. "156" – 4:55
3. "Snow Brigade" – 4:22
4. "Symmetry" – 5:39
5. "Behind the Drapes" – 3:40
6. "Her Voice Is Beyond Her Years" – 2:48
7. "Eight Flew Over, One Was Destroyed" – 4:48
8. "She Came Home for Christmas" – 3:55
9. "She Spider" – 4:44
10. "Comforting Sounds" – 8:58

Comments: I included the single "Special" from their latest album just for kicks, because it's what initially drew me to the band.

Spoiler:

"The best thing about disasters is the beauty that follows. Volcanoes have that lush firefly rain and glowing goo rivers. Avalanches have that muted minute of absolute silence. And pop has had the Reality-TV glut, the rebirth of the ‘70s, a general lack of new bands to really believe in. But then, from outta nowhere (or Denmark as it's usually know), along comes a band like Mew: pop band of the moment.
"What you on about hacko? They ain't pop-u-largh yah bucktoof fool!"
Rap your jive all the way to the zoo, bucko! You'll soon stop the moment ya hear this band. And when ya discover they've got Alan McGee in their camp... come back, don't run away!

Let's get one thing straight: pop ain't a popularity contest, it's a state of mind. Pop is meant to define the day, stain history, act as a vehicle for revolution or simply internationally link the youth of the day! Pop today has been taken away from us by the tweenies (Think: S Club Jnrs, tATu, et al). Pop sucks. Pop is evil. Pop is a paedophile’s cum-encrusted world (steady on! - SubEd).

On the cherub face of it this album is a soaring, triangle tapping, kitten cuddling, debut; Mew have playground innocence down - lunchbox in hand, toothpaste on tie and scabby knees, all set for a day of holding hands with the pigtailed girl. Mew could market this to my 6-year old cousin to dance around to whilst munching her Sugar Puffs, and they'd sell a billion. Pop is Universal... aaaaaaah, that's the cookie, that's what everyone has forgotten!

Saying that, this coulda been the soundtrack to the cult flick ‘Kids’. And there are Pumpkins’ shadows that obscure moments of this record and split seconds when you forget this isn't the newie from Sparklehorse. Not to mention the distinct tones of Stina Nordenstam sitting pretty on a couple of these 'ere tracks.

Don't be fooled. No matter how many clouds Jonas' vocals reach out to, average angels, they is not. Amongst the mood-shifting time changes and throbbing bass lines, are disjointed swollen moments of joy, where the Sigur Rós-like one-man choir, melts into almost teary monologues about stalking a girl from a boat, in the middle of a lake.

The death of youth is the disaster dealt with throughout this album. Anyone who's woken up to the reality of overdrafts, insurance, been to the clinic and had people asking if you have a pension plan, know exactly what that's all about. This album touches on those feelings, impulses, fears, blood rushes, moments of utter confusion and feeling like all you want to do is sit around, suck on lollies, read pop-up books and be a kid again.

This is a Northern European mongrel of dizzy lo-fi with pop hooks to help you escape the everyday. After year upon year of ‘big’ bands being incapable of making genuine and concise summaries of the feelings of the day, Mew are a breath of fresh air. It's an album with longevity and throughout it’s an uplifting joy.

If you don't get this record first time around, come a projection drenched live set or one of their amazing videos, Mew are gonna getcha. Soon." (8/10) -Drowned in Sound

Frengers

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Beirut - Gulag Orkestar
Label: Ba Da Bing, 2006
Genre: Indie/Folk/World




1. "Gulag Orkestar" – 4:38
2. "Prenzlauerberg" – 3:46
3. "Brandenburg" – 3:38
4. "Postcards from Italy" – 4:17
5. "Mount Wroclai (Idle Days)" – 3:15
6. "Rhineland (Heartland)" – 3:58
7. "Scenic World" – 2:08
8. "Bratislava" – 3:17
9. "The Bunker" – 3:13
10. "The Canals of Our City" – 2:21
11. "After the Curtain" – 2:54

Comments: I guess I'm just continuing my trend of putting up an older album once I realize that a new one's out. I heard the title track while watching the last lunar eclipse. It was weird shit. Think Miranda, That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore.

Spoiler:

"Beirut's received quite a bit of pre-release buzz. He deserves some of it. His tuneful Balkan stomp is fairly unique within the indie realm, an aesthetic shared with Man Man, Gogol Bordello, and Barbez but few others. That, and for a 19-year-old from Albuquerque (now living in Brooklyn), he sounds like an old man sipping vodka and humming along to Tchaikovsky while the neighborhood kids play stick ball or drink egg creams. The sound is there, but beneath the atmospherics his themes of war, fallen curtains, bunkers, life on the Rhine-- his song titles are more fixated on Germany (and Slovakia and an imaginary Eastern Bloc) than Russia-- and Gulags, are vague and sometimes less than effective. That makes sense: He doesn't have the lived experience for those situations. Perhaps he studied W.G. Sebald to add some color, and in a very Sebaldian move the album's anonymous cover photos were found in a library in Leipzig, Germany. In the liner notes, Condon asks if anyone knows the photographer's whereabouts.

Beirut's brassy In the Aeroplane Over the Sea-like instrumental accents have garnered Neutral Milk Hotel comparisons. There's also guilt by association-- ex-NMH player Jeremy Barnes and his A Hawk and a Hacksaw compatriot Heather Toast contribute accordion, violins, and percussion. But while Condon writes generally spare, pretty tableau that can lodge themselves in your ear like hazy memories, his words aren't as intellectually, emotionally, or erotically invested as Mangum's feverish, tear-jerky lyrics. And that's OK-- it's unfair to hold a debut record up to one of the bona fide indie classics of the past 10 years. I mention it only to squash the impulse at the root, because exaggerated expectations shouldn't dissuade anyone from enjoying Beirut's best work, chiefly the gorgeous triumph "Postcards From Italy", an infectious, Rufus Wainwright-tinged love/death story accented by loping majorette drumming, a menagerie of horns, and a plucky ukulele lilt that mixes perfectly with Condon's airy croon.

Elsewhere, "Bratislava" is a celebratory march for the Slovakian capital-- a sweaty, saw-dusted cabaret jam with Gogol Bordello. It's at moments like these, his vocals placed further back in the mix, that you realize the kid sounds truly authentic and captivating. In the bubblier chill of "Scenic World", Condon arms the troops with dinky Six Cents & Natalie Casio drum machines and brings them into Magnetic Fields and Jens Lekman territory. It's two minutes of pretty pop, plain and simple. At the end, amid horn flourishes, accordion, and doubled vocals he sings, "I try to imagine a careless life/ A scenic world where the sunsets are all breathtaking"-- he holds the last word, letting it swoon and flutter, like Morrissey with a hammer-and-sickle Band-Aid on his nipple.

Time and again, the most powerful element of Gulag Orkestar, and what ought to be emphasized, is Condon's acrobatic, powerful, emotionally nuanced voice. It could carry any style of music. Fixate for a second on the stuff he's doing on "Rhineland (Heartland)". The lyrics are dopey, but his trills and whirls are mind-blowing. Pairing these melodies with Eastern European accouterments in lieu of standard guitar-pop creates an obvious appeal. Still, the question ought to be asked: Are the songs really so incredible or do they simply mimic and mine musical traditions unfamiliar to the average indie rock fan? That said, the best songs here are a joy and the average and ho-hum tunes even have a thick and aesthetically appealing atmosphere-- in other words, it's an impressive and precocious debut. -Pitchfork

Gulag Orkestar

FELIPE NO

Yesterday's New Quintet - Sound Directions: The Funky Side of Life
Label: Stones Throw, 2005
Genre: Jazz/Hip Hop/Electronica





1. "Directions" – 1:07
2. "Dice Game" – 3:48
3. "Wanda Vidal" – 2:17
4. "Fourty Days" – 5:08
5. "Play Car" – 3:19
6. "A Diving Image" – 2:19
7. "The Funky Side of Life" – 2:59
8. "Theme For Ivory Black" – 3:33
9. "The Horse" – 2:49
10. "One For J.J. (Johnson)" – 2:23
11. "On the Hill" – 3:18

Spoiler:

"It's been another banner year for production powerhouse Madlib. Not content to rest on his amazing albums of the recent past (Madvillain and the sophomore Quasimoto LP), he dusts off the jazz crates, calls a bunch of studio cats and puts together this serious set of blunted sessions. The Beat Conductor is not half-stepping at all - he emerges himself fully into the mythical five members of YNQ, culminating in this smoked-out homage to the true school jazz scene. Sprawling, freeform jams like his cover of David Axelrod's "A Divine Image" work wonderfully alongside more straightforward jams (check the organ-heavy riff on Billi Brooks Fourty Days"). Madlib's perfectly grimy production values are in full effect, as he turns up the horns "The Funky Side of Life," "The Horse") before closing out on the acidic organ head-trip that is "On The Hill." Once again, Madlib proves why he's the man now, dog." - URB

The Funky Side of Life

Most amazing jew boots

St. Vincent - Marry Me
Label: Beggars Banquet Records, 2007
Genre: Indie Pop



1. Now, Now – 4:25
2. Jesus Saves, I Spend – 3:56
3. Your Lips Are Red – 4:41
4. Marry Me – 4:41
5. Paris Is Burning – 4:20
6. All My Stars Aligned – 3:47
7. The Apocalypse Song – 3:47
8. We Put a Pearl in the Ground – 1:10
9. Landmines – 5:07
10. Human Racing – 3:48
11. What Me Worry? – 3:56

Spoiler:

"The most powerful weapon to conquer the devil is humility. For, as he does not know at all how to employ it, neither does he know how to defend himself from it."

-Saint Vincent de Paul (b. 1581 - d. 1660)

Maybe that explains it. Maybe that quote from the real Saint Vincent, namesake of multi-instrumentalist Annie Clark's nom du rock, explains why, rather than step right into the spotlight, Clark instead chose to spend so much of her time as an oft-befrocked member of both Sufjan Stevens and the Polyphonic Spree's flock.

One might have assumed that, hey, maybe she was just more comfortable as a group utility player, but like most assumptions it's simply not borne out by the imposing reality of her various talents. As her St. Vincent debut immediately asserts, Clark's more than ready to be out front. In fact, it's amazing she didn't step into the spotlight sooner, considering the countless ideas swirling about Marry Me, an art-rock album at times redolent of prime Kate Bush and Lodger-era David Bowie.

Maybe "humility" isn't the first word that springs to mind when you read the liners crediting Clark with "voices, guitars, bass, piano, organ, Moog, synthesizers, clavieta, xylophone, vibraphone, dulcimer, drum programming, triangle, percussion." Triangle? Is that really something to boast about? Then again, with its brilliant production flourishes and impeccably left-field arrangements, false modesty does not behoove the disc.

In the case of music like this, the devil to conquer is preciousness and indulgence. No doubt, in lesser hands Clark's quirks and eccentricities would mark the St. Vincent project a no-go from the start. But at every turn Marry Me takes the more challenging route of twisting already twisted structures and unusual instrumentation to make them sound perfectly natural and, most importantly, easy to listen to as she overdubs her thrillingly sui generis vision into vibrant life.

Clark's hardly alone in the endeavor. Not to be out-Spreed, Marry Me features, among other helpers, a chorus (used mostly as melodic and rhythmic counterpoint), Bowie pianist Mike Garson, and Polyphonic Spree/Man Or Astro-Man? drummer Brian Teasley, a wiz at picking the right beats for all the perfectly wrong places. But from the frenetic first half of the disc, where the ideas are coming fast and furious and Clark lets her inner prog run wild, to the mellow second, Marry Me is clearly the product of one person's fertile-- and clearly very well organized-- subconscious.

"Now, Now" dances around a tricky little guitar pattern and Clark's sweet vocal melodies-- her big-girl voice a welcome respite from indie rock's lame habit of faux naivety-- as bass and drums push and pull the song taut then loose again. The grace of the track suddenly gives way to explosive guitar, the previous precision dissolved into distorted passion. "Jesus Saves, I Spend" bounds along in 6/8, with the chorus and sped-up vocals countering Clark's own coo. "Your Lips Are Red" mutates from throb to tribal freakout, a croaking, scraping guitar and sinewy lead hinting at the chaos that never quite comes. "Apocalypse Song" features a polyrhythmic voice, drum and handclap breakdown that vies with strings and more skronking noise.

The war-is-not-over "Paris is Burning" is a woozy Weimar-esque waltz filled out by phased effects, a martial groove and sneaking, cynical lines like the Shakespeare allusion "Come sit right here and sleep while I slip poison in your ear." Elsewhere Clark slips in a few other memorable lyrics as well. In "Your Lips Are Red" she complains, "Your skin so fair it's not fair." In the title track, Clark gets off the lasciviously blasphemous come-on "we'll do what Mary and Joseph did...without the kid."

The slower vibe of the last few tracks isn't as immediate as what came before it, but that doesn't make it any less impressive. "Landmines" is like "Subterranean Homesick Alien" redone as a torch song. "All the Stars Aligned" plods along like a pleasant Beatles outtake, at least until Clark's mini-orchestra briefly (and curiously) quotes John Barry's "James Bond Theme". "Human Racing" begins as a gentle bossa nova before blossoming into a hypnotic pulse for its fade-out. The jazzy final song, "What Me Worry?" is as traditional as the disc gets, except for the fact that Clark picked it to end an album that spends most of its previous minutes exploring the unconventional.

"Love is just a bloodmatch to see who endures lash after lash with panache," Clark sings, without coming across nearly as precociously as she could have. "Have I fooled you, dear? The time is coming near when I'll give you my hand and I'll say, 'It's been grand, but...I'm out of here.'" And then she's gone.

Oh, and the final sound you hear before you inevitably press play and listen to the whole beguiling thing again? A triangle. Guess those lessons paid off after all.

-Joshua Klein, July 27, 2007

Marry Me

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Yeasayer - All Hour Cymbals
Label: We Are Free, 2007
Genre: Indie



1. Sunrise - 4:07
2. Wait for the Summer - 4:53
3. 2080 - 5:23
4. Germs - 3:13
5. Ah, Weir - 1:21
6. No Need to Worry - 5:27
7. Forgiveness - 3:40
8. Wait for the Wintertime - 4:52
9. Worms - 4:07
10. Waves - 4:57
11. Red Cave - 4:59


This was a bit more obscure when I bought it. =p

Spoiler:

"Brooklyn's Yeasayer are the latest entry to this group of Byrne disciples, and one of the better bands to put a new spin on his polyrhythmic convulsing. The band gained recognition earlier this year for their fantastic first single "2080", possibly because of its sonic similarities to Midlake's buzzed-about 2006 single "Roscoe". Both share a woozy, woodsy ambience, but where "Roscoe", set in 1891, was nostalgic for a rustic world, Yeasayer gazes ahead-- and not optimistically. "I can't sleep when I think about the times we're living in," Chris Keating sings, continuing, "I can't sleep when I think about the future I was born into." After two preternaturally smooth choruses, the band lives up to its name. All new age elements temporarily vanish, and the group breaks through into communalism. The sudden, fervent "yeah yeah!" pulls from the same crowded Anglo-ethnic trough as the Arcade Fire, Animal Collective, and Danielson, and establishes the band's own link between the ritualistic and the futuristic.

-Eric Harvey, October 25, 2007

All Hour Cymbals

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Chick Corea and Bela Fleck - The Enchantment
Genre: Jazz Fusion, Bluegrass
Year: 2007
Label: Concord Records



Track List
1. Señorita
2. Spectacle
3. Joban Dna Nopia
4. Mountain
5. Children's Song #6
6. A Strangle Romance
7. Menagerie
8. Waltse For Abby
9. Brazil
10. The Enchantment
11. Sunset Road


Review

Spoiler:

It is not obvious that music is always musical. Formulaic repetition of past innovations quickly become recognizably trite and, to most ears, off-putting. The duo setting presses a brutal honesty between musicians that has historically not only kept curdled tendencies at bay but has also pushed forth innovation. Jazz musicians of the finest reputation, including guitarists Jim Hall, Joe Pass and Pat Metheny, and pianists Bill Evans and Brad Mehldau, have forged platinum grails of the jazz tradition in this setting. Pianist Chick Corea and banjoist Béla Fleck’s The Enchantment is certainly no aberration.

Like the most successful duo pairings, Corea and Fleck burnish their well-deserved credentials through sensitivity. The careful inter-instrumental echoes of the melody on Corea’s “Joban Dna Nopia” is an impressive example of the musical relationship rather than what the album could have been—a mere amalgamation of two musical giants stomping through tunes together but separately.

And yet, much to the album’s benefit, the pair stretches past mere harmonious collaboration to make this record an arresting success. From Appalachan tip-toeing to ponderous laments and striding sambas, The Enchantment’s stylistic variety is scintillating and harmonically titillating. The album possesses a wider reach and accessibility than it otherwise would have as an esoteric product of musical brilliance. The record is immensely listenable while also being immeasurably intriguing.

While the album’s most laudable merits are earned collectively, Corea and Fleck’s individual playing is just stunning. Corea shines forth in his proclivity to drift convincingly between jazz accompaniment, Brazilian musings, and fluttering improvisation. Fleck’s right-hand alacrity is as mesmerizing as his gargantuan melodic presence.

As is the case with the most magnificent duo performances, each musician brings a career’s worth of experience and innovation to these eleven tracks. The fusion of these two luminaries on this one disc is just as fascinating a result as it is an idea. Anyone with a musical palate—a sense for the beauty of consummate musical expression—will find this record, in many ways, a perfect synthesis of two of the greatest American musical traditions. One could not ask for a more shining and worthy project. -Stephen Wood

The Enchantment

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

John Legend - Once Again
Label: G.O.O.D. Music/Columbia/Sony Urban
Release: 2006
Genre: Contemporary R&B



Track Listing:

1. Save Room
2. Heaven
3. Stereo
4. Show Me
5. Each Day Gets Better
6. P.D.A. (We Just Don't Care)
7. Slow Dance
8. Again
9. Maxine
10. Where Did My Baby Go
11. Maxine's Interlude
12. Another Again
13. Coming Home

I can't say that I find what passes for R&B these days the least bit interesting, but this guy really caught my ear. It was easy to dismiss him back when he was getting a lot of mainstream buzz, but now I'm hooked.

Obligatory review:

Spoiler:

On 2004's Get Lifted John Legend stood out from the R&B pack -- and scored a Best New Artist Grammy -- with a piano-driven throwback sound and an all-star lineup of collaborators that included Kanye West and Will.i.am. Legend's famous friends are back for the bigger, better follow-up, which blends lush, elegant band arrangements with stylish synth parts and cool samples (including one of Hendrix backing Lonnie Youngblood). Over thirteen tracks, Legend ranges from strummy rock ballads (the excellent "Show Me") to McCartney-style love songs ("Where Did My Baby Go") and Temptations-channeling R&B ("Slow Dance"). Often the tunes take surprising, oddball turns -- near the end of the sprightly first single, "Save Room," a dark organ freakout emerges for a few measures before quickly disappearing. Too quickly, actually: Those moments leave you wishing Legend had indulged his weirder instincts a little more. But it's possible Legend is just too polite -- even the awesomely titled "P.D.A. (We Just Don't Care)" turns out to be a crooned ballad, complete with Vince Guaraldi-esque piano, that wouldn't sound out of place in a Nora Ephron movie. - Rolling Stone

Once Again


Omar Rodriguez-Lopez - Se Dice Bisonte, No Bufalo
Label: Gold Standard Laboratories
Release: 2007
Genre: Jazz Fusion, Experimental



Track Listing:

1. The Lukewarm
2. Luxury of Infancy
3. Rapid Fire Tollbooth
4. Thermometer Drinking the Bussness of Turnstiles
5. Se Dice Bisonte, No Búfalo
6. If Gravity Lulls, I Can Hear the World Pant
7. Please Heat This Eventually
8. Lurking About in a Cold Sweat (Held Together by Venom)
9. Boiling Death Request a Body to Rest Its Head On
10. La Tiranía de la Tradición

Notable track would of course be "Rapid Fire Tollbooth", which showed up as the heavier "Goliath" on The Mars Volta's latest album.

Spoiler:

Thankfully though, Rodriguez-Lopez occasionally leaves the major label budget behind for some home recordings like the ones on his latest solo offering, Se Dice Bisonte, No Bùfalo, one of four albums recorded while visiting Amsterdam in 2005. Fortunately handed-over with no over-arching themes or alienating concepts or questionable Mars Volta artwork (other than the once again possibility of being a soundtrack), his third album under solely his name is an intriguing affair of mid-fi Latin-jazz-grounded psyche-rock that vastly improves on the foundation laid with A Manual Dexterity. The regular cast of characters remains involved: Cedric Bixler-Zavala’s high-pitched croon is utilized on three of the tracks (exceptionally on “Rapid Fire Tollbooth,” haphazardly on “La Tirania de la Tradiciòn”), Volta contributors Juan Alderete de la Peña, Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez and Jon Theodore all chip in, and of course the now expected two-cents from John Frusciante and Money Mark. All the musicians involved sound very much attuned to each other and provide ample palettes for Omar to riff and wail and rip over with his so ably proficient electric guitar.

After two doodling ambient pieces (the kind that made up the majority of A Manual Dexterity), the first proper tune is “Rapid Fire Tollbooth,” a patient psyche-funk number narrated by Bixler-Zavala that should have been what the Mars Volta was doing all this time. With Bixler-Zavala’s unearthly, echoing yelps undercut by drowned soprano sax flourishes, Rodriguez-Lopez first riffs with consciously sloppy wah-wah funk before releasing the kind of finger-bleeding solo that has instigated so many Santana parallels. A slightly more developed ambient piece bridges into the title track, a slowly blossoming song of Latin-jazz piano, mindedly eased electric guitar and un-enunciated vocals from Bixler-Zavala. It mostly sounds like a Tremulant cast-off, which is absolutely a compliment. Another continuously developed ambient number (a pattern is appearing) before we get to the original studio version of “Please Heat This Eventually,” a limited-edition 12-inch collaboration with Can’s Damo Suzuki from earlier this year. Though Suzuki’s growling vocals aren’t included on this version, Money Mark’s Joe Zawinul impression accentuating the urgent, exuberant piece certainly takes it to a new, welcomed dimension. In between the culmination of this every-other-track-pattern of slow-burning, ambient pieces, “Lurking About in a Cold Sweat (Held Together by Venom),” and the questionable psychedelic-punk of “La Tirania de la Tradiciòn,” is my favorite number, “Boiling Death Request a Body to Rest Its Head On.” Like a b-side to Love Devotion Surrender, Rodriguez-Lopez submerges his guitar in watery effects-pedals and lets Adrian Terrazas Gonzales wail on an equally recordingly-restrained soprano saxophone in a Pharoah Sanders-spiritual-jazz manner. With the light percussion and just right marriage of pedals and distortion, it’s the Latin-psyche-jazz excursion I have always hoped for from Rodriguez-Lopez.

So is Se Dice Bisonte, No Bùfalo the best Omar Rodriguez-Lopez solo offering to date? Yes. Is it more rewarding than most of the Mars Volta output? To me at least—yes—but mostly because it just seems devoid of the pretension they have established with that outfit (which seemed like a good idea at first, but hasn’t really panned out). Will it prove as remarkably sustainable selling-wise as A Manual Dexterity? It should from a music standpoint, but the prairie-toned artwork certainly doesn’t have the same mesmerizing appeal as the light refracting hoopla of Dexterity. And finally, the must-be-answered hypothetical question: “I am more of a fan of the idea of the Mars Volta than the actual music, will this suffice my tastes?” Yes, and I’m right there with you buddy. - Audiversity

Se Dice Bisonte, No Bufalo


The Mars Volta - The Bedlam in Goliath
Label: Universal, Gold Standard Laboratories
Release: 2008
Genre: Progressive Rock



Track Listing:

1. Aberinkula
2. Metatron
3. Ilyena
4. Wax Simulacra
5. Goliath
6. Tourniquet Man
7. Cavalettas
8. Agadez
9. Askepios
10. Ouroboros
11. Soothsayer
12. Conjugal Burns

Bonus tracks:

1. Back Up Against the Wall (Circle Jerks)
2. Birthday (The Sugarcubes)
3. Candy and a Currant Bun (Pink Floyd)
4. Pulled to Bits (Siouxsie & The Banshees)
5. Memories (Soft Machine)
6. Things Behind the Sun (Nick Drake)

Fucking awesome. The third listen solidified it as my new favorite Volta album. I've included all the bonus covers, some of 'em are cool (Soft Machine and Nick Drake!). Just for laughs, let's see what Pitchfork has to say...

Spoiler:

The Mars Volta discography carries an astronomical risk/reward potential, and so it is no surprise that the band's latest record, The Bedlam in Goliath, is yet another all-or-nothing entity. Pitchfork has tended to be in the "nothing" camp: Their first three studio LPs bombed but did so in entertaining and spectacular fashion, clusterfucks of Cedric Bixler-Zavala's incomprehensible lyrical jabberwocky and Rock Band feats of strength. But every now and again, even we'd catch a glimpse of their undeniable upside. Few bands in popular modern rock share their technical prowess, super-adventurous listening habits, or K2 conquering ambition. If they could somehow manage to channel all of it into something other than a tribute to their own excess, even we believe it would probably be totally fucking awesome.

Despite its surface similarities to 2006's Amputechture (decoder ring title, Street Fighter II cover art), it's possible that Mars Volta were finally willing to meet non-converts halfway. First single "Wax Simulacra" clocked in shy of three minutes without a single edit, and while they're still using a compact disc's capacity as a starting point, this time it's broken down into a relatively manageable 12 tracks-- most of which begin with a vocal riff of instantaneous impact. Of course, this is still Mars Volta's idea of accessibility; having left the earth's orbit sometime in 2003, they can only go further into the cosmos. If you can commit any of these attention deficit disorders to memory, you're probably in Mars Volta. If you can explain the concept (something about a cursed Israeli ouija board) without having read any of the pre-release materials, you've recently done drugs with Lil' Wayne.

The general "pro" argument for Mars Volta is that they're a true anachronism of the iPod age, but The Bedlam in Goliath goes great lengths towards actually rewarding short attention spans. Between Bixler's preposterous lyrics (no need to quote them, you've already gotten the idea by now), the fractious time signature switcheroos of "Metatron", and Ikey Owens' keyboard globules on "Agadez", you'll find plenty of moments worthy of high-fiving, but they lack any sort of meaningful big picture context or contrast. (Oh, excpet for that Israeli ouija board stuff.) It used to be you could rely on them to toss in some aimlessly ambient smoke breaks for variety's sake, but save for the turgid wolf cry of "Torniquet Man", Bedlam plays like the true soundtrack to Katamari Damacy, indiscriminate consumption set to a relentless beat.

Opener "Aberinkula" is typical of the dynamic assault, erupting like it was in a stepped-on firehose for the past year and proceeding to just get fucking louder and louder until the free-time saxophones confirm the scent of apeshit. I swear there's a legit funk-metal groove in "Ilyena", but Thomas Pridgen doesn't agree. Ignoring the basic drumming priority of keeping time, Pridgen solos for about six minutes-- or as much you can "solo" while the rest of the band does their own thing. "Goliath" has an appropriately mountainous riff and lumbering rhythm, but guitarists John Frusciante and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez deface it with rote pentatonic wah-wah soloing in the same manner people use the word "like" in conversation. And in the most preposterous production trick you'll (likely not) hear in 2008, 90 seconds into "Cavalettes", the mix gets fried and then sounds like it's being sucked down a toilet before spitting back up. And then they squander any WTF impact by repeating it every two minutes.

Bixler comes off the best here; not since Chris Cornell on Superunknown has there been a lead man who can do a more convincing job of peddling obvious hokum through sheer force of primal will. He isn't as interested as testing the boundaries of his falsetto this time around, and it results in some of the most melodically satisfying tune fragments the Volta have ever come up with. But he can't leave well enough alone, and whatever restraint he shows on the mic fails to make it to the production board, as Bixler filters his vocals through the last 30 years of voice-manipulating technology. Obviously, recent developments have caused for reassessment of the effect, but once again, it's a matter of context. Whereas the robo-pimping of T-Pain or Snoop Dogg at least is juxtaposed with the smoothness of their backing tracks, here it's just another wanky sound effect from a band that can't get enough of them-- Bixler's most recurring guise has him sounding like an insectoid clone of himself.

And I suppose none of this should've been a surprise, but whether it's At the Drive-In's enduring goodwill, a fear of preemptively dismissing the band that could be seen as the premiere 21st century schizoid men, or the brazen conviction with which Mars Volta sell their shtick, they always manage to make you at least second-guess your own instincts. But consider what the similarly constructed virtuoso collective of Battles have accomplished with their chops this past year-- embracing technology, humor, groove, and concision into something that actually sounds like the future as opposed to the refrying of decades-old noodles in dry ice and snake oil. I'm sure defenders of the band will champion Mars Volta as a keeper of the prog-rock flame, but The Bedlam in Goliath renders the term meaningless-- the result couldn't be more averse to actual progress in rock music. -Ian Cohen

Get fucked by Goliath

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Shark Quest - Battle of the Loons
Label: Merge Records
Release: 2003
Genre: Instrumental Rock



Track Listing:

1. Blake Carrington
2. Kool's America
3. Bali
4. Ellen's Theme
5. Lunch at Sara's
6. Dead Turkey Gulch
7. Armadillotron
8. In a Dive
9. 5 Dollars

This is the second album I'm putting up from this outfit. It's good instrumental rock...duh. Not a lot of info out there though, so bear with the review.

Spoiler:

To those who aren't geeks that get hung up on various terms used to categorize music, I owe an explanation as to what I mean by "math rock." I couldn't resist using the term, because it best describes the type of music Shark Quest plays on their 1998 debut effort Battle of the Loons. My interpretation of the term "math rock" is various busy instrumental parts interlocking into one sonic canvas...similar to prog-rock in its intricacy, but prog usually has a rhythmic bedrock with true "solos," on top. In math rock, all the sounds mesh together.

Shark Quest is an all-instrumental manifestation of the "genre." Their lack of a vocalist may bother some listeners, but truthfully, I can't picture vocal melodies floating on top of this music...there's too much going on in the mix already.

The band's "sound" is tough to describe. I've read reviews that have pegged them as "surf," and to a certain extent that's appropriate. The production has an "underwater" feel, and the music is dominated by guitars soaked in dreamy reverb. I also hear a classical chamber music influence, and not just because the band features a cellist (Sarah Bell). The songs' arrangements and "feel" remind me of the chamber music I played with small groups of students in my high school orchestra...Battle of the Loons has the same prim, stately beauty. Finally, I hear a folk/bluegrass influence in the busy picking of guitarists Laird Dixon and Scott Goolsby.

Sounds interesting, no? Battle of the Loons is rarely dull, and the musicians strum, pick, bow and pluck with a reasonable amount of passion. But something is missing here. The resulting music itself just isn't terribly moving or evocative. I didn't get that sense of dramatic tension or emotional involvement I expect from classical-oriented instrumental music (or any kind of music, for that matter).

To be fair, there are some stirring moments on Battle of the Loons. I was briefly swept away by the moody cello melody of "Blake Carrington," the lovely, sun drenched, Olde English folk picking on "Ellen's Theme," and the frantic, fiery banjo runs of "Dead Turkey Gulch." But the rest of the songs (dominated by layered, intertwining, arpeggiated guitar lines) fall curiously flat...they provoked reactions in me like "Wow, that's interesting" and "Neat, that's really cool sounding" but they didn't tug at my heartstrings, and I could barely remember them after they stopped playing.

Part of the problem is that Shark Quest are too Prim, Polite and Academic sounding on their instruments. As I had mentioned before, they play with passion, but it's a controlled passion that prevents the music from making a sustained personal connection with the listener. The musicians need to "sink their teeth" into their parts a little more.

I can appreciate this album solely for its uniqueness and because I have a certain element of Cold Technical Geek Musician in me...I can be fascinated simply by musical arrangements and the way instruments fit together. But the fact that the album has trouble making a lasting impression on, and most importantly, making an emotional connection with the listener makes this a difficult album to recommend. I will be checking out Shark Quest's other releases though... - some dude

Battle of the Loons


The Parlor Mob - And You Were a Crow
Label: Roadrunner Records
Release: 2008
Genre: Rock



Track Listing:

1. Hard Times
2. Dead Wrong
3. Everything You're Breathing For
4. The Kids
5. When I Was an Orphan
6. Angry Young Girl
7. Carnival of Crows
8. Real Hard Headed
9. Tide of Tears
10. My Favorite Heart to Break
11. Bullet
12. Can't keep No Good Boy Down

I had been anticipating this for a couple years, based on what they had on their myspace page ("Bullet", "Tide of Tears"). Imagine The Mars Volta doing straight rock 'n' roll. I bought it on iTunes, I don't think physical copies are being sold yet.

Spoiler:

The Parlor Mob burst onto the rock scene in 2006 with an attitude reminiscent of 60s rock n’ roll and a free self-titled EP. Originally known as What About Frank?, the New Jersey rock quintet has won the hearts of local rock addicts since 2004 and only recently broken through to the mainstream by signing on with rock giants Roadrunner Records. Their debut album, And You Were A Crow, was released digitally in March. It displays a more refined style than their EP, but with all the talent, promise, and energy that the band is known for.
Sticking True

From the beginning of the album, The Parlor Mob lets you know what to expect. The opening track, “Hard Times”, opens with a quick drum fill by Sam Bey that gets backed up by explosive guitar riffs by Dave Rosen and Paul Ritchie and Mark Melicia’s shrieking vocals. This sums up a large portion of the album which is dedicated to honoring previous rock legends such as Led Zeppelin with driving rhythms, lengthy guitar solos, and a coarse singing voice.

This call for a rock n’ roll revolution is made a great deal easier by the two incredible guitarists Rosen and Ritchie. These two play well together; they often share solos and play around with melodies. This style makes for an experimental rock sound that is reminiscent of their self-titled EP and their self-released What About Frank? By establishing a decisive and innovative style of rock n’ roll, the band is sure to win both fans of classic rock and fans of experimental or progressive rock.
Making New

As was previously stated, The Parlor Mob does take liberty with a number of rock conventions. Their progressive rock influences lead them to create songs like “Real Hard Headed” and “Bullet,” which jump between time signatures and melodies almost as fast as the guitars can shred. Their experimental style allows for the bass-heavy eight minute long “Tide of Tears” to succeed; the song is an interesting fusion of rock ballad and blues, although it is admittedly a task to listen to.

Blues rock also rears its beautiful head in songs like the breathtaking “Everything You’re Breathing For” and the slightly hokey closer “Can’t Keep No Good Boy Down”. This blues influence allows listeners to catch their breath for awhile while still enjoying the powerful rock The Parlor Mob brings forth. The band’s musical spectrum is most prominent in the ending “Can’t Keep No Good Boy Down”, where the only instruments are foot stomps, voices, country-style guitar, tambourine, and piano. This off-beat closer shows the band’s playful charisma and showcases their diverse influences at the same time.

At the end of the album, there are no real problems other than aesthetics. Some of the songs drag slightly, such as “When I Was an Orphan”, and some of them just don’t connect, like “My Favorite Heart to Break”. The minor problems in the album are slightly accentuated by the lack of a distinct bass line (except on “Tide of Tears”), although this is also never a real problem. Despite its minor flaws, the album displays all of the boyish charm and energy that they promised on their EP, hones it, and drives The Parlor Mob’s rock revolution home. - James Blake

Bite the Bullet


More coming...

I was speaking idiomatically.

Mahavishnu Orchestra - Birds of Fire
Label: Columbia
Release: 1973
Genre: Jazz Fusion



Track Listing:

1. "Birds of Fire" – 5:50
2. "Miles Beyond (Miles Davis)" – 4:47
3. "Celestial Terrestrial Commuters" – 2:54
4. "Sapphire Bullets of Pure Love" – 0:24
5. "Thousand Island Park" – 3:23
6. "Hope" – 1:59
7. "One Word" – 9:57
8. "Sanctuary" – 5:05
9. "Open Country Joy" – 3:56
10. "Resolution" – 2:09

I thought someone had this up, but it's not indexed...I just bought the CD (as much as this shit demands vinyl), so I guess I'll post it anyway. Review (which I did not bother reading):

Spoiler:

This album has enough energy and power to have been recorded in the birth of a supernova. Only the inner sanctum of guitarists had known a few years earlier of McLaughlin's arrival from England as a living legend, but the message quickly flew to the general public. The Orchestra featured McLaughlin's double-neck blinding speed; Jan Hammer's keyboard outcries; Jerry Goodman's electric violin playing both classical themes and twin lead lines; Rick Laird's trembling bass, and Billy Cobham's super-speed percussion and footwork. If you need any more help, think of the legendary live Fillmore track of "Elizabeth Reed" and consider that as close kin. Pure kinetic outbursts of notes and turbulent rhythms whip and rage on these 10 cuts, but there's also a few brief glimpses of relative calm in the eye of the hurricane.

It's perhaps appropriate that Cobham's gong splashes and rolling percussion alongside Goodman's chanting violin herald the title song with an Asian Indian-like mantra, as McLaughlin awakens with a piercing, rising flurry that sounds like a peacock in a courtship frenzy. The ritual reply comes back from Hammer's synthesizer, and then it's back to the guitar and violin as they weave and intertwine like DNA strands. "Miles Beyond" (dedicated to the late trumpeter) emerges slowly from the jazzy fog of electric piano, and then watches as Laird and Cobham raise the curtain for an opening statement by McLaughlin and Goodman. What follows next requires headphones-as much as you want to believe it's muted electric guitar, it's really a fascinating pizzacato on Goodman's violin, supported by more electric piano musings. The band then throws themselves into a brief summary, only to have McLaughlin and Cobham devastate the landscape, sounding like a ferocious firefight from the worst days of warfare, with machine gun-like guitar bullets flying in front of a bombardment of cymbal-and-drum mortar explosions. The song ends as the opening phrase is once again firmly planted in the ground like a waving banner.

Like a scurrying swarm of ants in action (or New York City in rush hour), "Celestial Terrestrial Commuters" features more electric guitar/violin duets and twin lead lines, swept along by the pace of Cobham and Hammer like two men with push brooms in a hyperactive frenzy to clean up after the crowd. It's followed by the brief (23-second) bit of electronic chatter of "Sapphire Bullets of Pure Love." The M.O. then offers one of the most delicate electric pieces ever recorded, "Thousand Island Park," with McLaughlin's flamenco-like acoustic performing a jazz ballet movement with Hammer's piano as his partner, praised by Laird's bass. With almost poetic resolution, "Hope" builds in what can be best considered grandeur, strengthened by Cobham's percussion and Laird's upright bowed bass, capturing some of the rich arrangement ideas that George Martin used so effectively with the Beatles on albums like Magical Mystery Tour's "I am the Walrus."

Track seven, "One Word," was born in the deep realms of space in a galaxy that contains life-forms unlike any found on Earth. Beginning with Cobham's skintight inside-out snare solo, the band frantically careens through the narrowest of channels like a bobsled race without brakes. They miraculously arrive unharmed with the rescue effort of Laird's solo, only to mutter and fuss behind his melodic tumbling notes. However, it's too easy to be safe, and in a three-way argument of "my opinion, and yours-be-damned," McLaughlin, Hammer, and Goodman take turns venting their thoughts and gestures with dramatic, flamboyant phrases. The climax is reached as each man/creature tries to shout down his colleague with overlapping statements that sound like a marriage counselor's nightmare day in the office, and Cobham steps up to clear the brawl. A muscular drum solo follows as he rolls effortlessly back and forth on his tom-toms, and the double bass drum pedals thump like a dangerous blood pressure reading. A series of staccato notes signals that the band is ready to snap its chains again and breaks into a final exhausting sort of cosmic orgasm.

Something is sure needed to calm down the fury, and it's time to seek "Sanctuary," a song that must be a eulogy from the casualties of all this turmoil. Hammer's grief-stricken synthesizer solo weeps behind the wails of dual violin-guitar lead, and there appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel. However, this isn't the case, as "Open Country Joy" (a song that Kottke did on Dreams and All That Stuff and the newly-reissued 1971-1976: Did You Hear Me?) awakens like the first warm day of spring. Gliding violin and 12-string guitar preface the false ending, which bursts into full bloom behind McLaughlin's electric warbling, Hammer's return calls, and Goodman's ecstatic freedom. Cobham unleashes a summer shower while the sun shines, then pulsates away, switching to brushes while the others frolic and dance. All these adrenalin rushes have to find the time to regenerate, and "Resolution" closes out as the band redoubles its intention and vigor with a "you haven't seen the last of me" conviction that is almost patriotic in its foundation. If anything is needed, it's a towel and a shower as these five musical massage therapists have just finished pummeling the daylights out of your mental muscles.

Do not, under any circumstances, give this CD to anyone who is under a doctor's supervision and requiring bed rest. On the other hand, if you need to paint the entire house in one day (or build one) and don't mind doing the job yourself, the Mahavishnu Orchestra will gladly haul any gear or heavy construction material you need with the pure power of sound at its best-and it could move a mountain. I'll bet they don't require a ladder, either, because they know your speakers will use anti-gravity to get the job done. Crank it up and watch! - amazon.com review

Birds of Fire


Faust - Faust
Label: Polydor
Release: 1971
Genre: Progressive Rock



Track Listing:

1. "Why Don't You Eat Carrots?" (Faust) – 9.31
2. "Meadow Meal" (Faust, Sosna) – 8.02
3. "Miss Fortune" (Faust) – 16.35

...because we all need a little krautrock.

Spoiler:

Ah, Germany in springtime. The leaves have returned, and the air is cool and of noble weightlessness. You can clearly see what the past has left behind in the medieval town squares, and hear the music of Bach's day playing continually from the opera houses and churches. Germans, like most of us, enjoy admiring nature. And since their cities have many parkland areas, it's no surprise to find the tourists crowding shops while the locals gaze in an auburn splendor. This is a country of quaint Bavarian villages and major metropolitan centers, majestic mountains and beautiful waterways, castles and culture. So, wouldn't it be nice if we dropped some acid, holed up like trolls and made an album?

Faust's records have never been the kind you dissect. The band seems to have some kind of plan at work, but not the type of plan left for others to follow. It's not the kind of algorithm that bears any scrutiny; yet, 30 years later, the music remains. And given the state of the boys in der Gruppe, that alone makes it worthy of reissue.

After spending several months in 1970-71 lazing, smoking, and existing rather superfluously (on Virgin Records' dime, of course), Faust moved their commune to W�mme in western Germany and decided to get serious. By serious, I mean they decided to put to tape the sugarplum visions in their heads. By sugarplum visions, I mean the acid-damaged prototypes of the New Solution for Music. By music, I mean their self-titled 1971 debut album and its contents, which consist of the music they played and processed using Kurt Graupner's infamous little black boxes. And by Kurt Graupner, I mean Faust's engineer, the sound wave savior who, perhaps more than any other, was responsible for bringing the group's adventures in hi-fi to acetate.

"Why Don't You Eat Carrots?" gets the movement underway with a knall ("bang," my kliene Kinder). Actually, it's more like the wake of a small jet whose engine roar is panned out all over your speakers. In the jet's cockpit, we have "All You Need is Love" and "Satisfaction" blaring, if only to remind you that Faust were at one time human and listening to your music. Upon reaching an altitude of about 120 decibels, our captains decide to let the aerodynamic vehicle coast, dropping a vaguely Bill Evans-esque piano interlude before launching a vaguely Zappa-esque groove that features some vague kind of shinai solo (or maybe one of their homemade synthesizers). I wish I could translate the sheer romantic terror of the thing, but it's all rather vague.

"Meadow Meal" follows, and though the intensity has died down a bit, Faust still resides in the hall of mirrors. There doesn't seem to be much reason behind the stuff (other than the "wonderful wooden" variety), and though the by-product may be skewed art-pop along the lines of Throbbing Gristle or Nurse with Wound, the overwhelming vibe here is of playful curiosity rather than oppressive abstraction. After a mystical incantation ("And the guess I get it/ And the gate I get it/ And the game I get it"), they break into a trashy rock joint, shimmying like Monkees on parade. I suppose they couldn't have kept it down if they'd tried.

And that ends the program as Faust planned it: a total of about 18 minutes of music before running out of steam and/or money. What to do, then, but jam out the mother of all documented freak-outs. "Miss Fortune" is probably not Faust's greatest legacy, but it is a testament to some fairly unadulterated haze-charisma. Recorded live, it consists of two rock-esque instrumentals (again filtered through Graupner's little black boxes), and one fantastic piece of prose set to a ghostly backdrop of acoustic guitar and admirably understated shakers. "And at the end, realize that nobody knows if it really happened." And at the end, I say "amen."

Faust wasn't a hit by any stretch, but it was freakish enough to garner a cult following. So, with a small sect of the world waiting, the band retreated to W�mme again, presumably with the intention of making an album that you could at least play while sober. That album would turn out to be So Far, their 1972 sophomore release, and the record with which the press (or whomever it was covering them at the time-- probably just the NME's Ian MacDonald) caught up.

Within seconds, the change is obvious. The steady tom toms and insistent rhythm guitar of "It's a Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl" aren't the work of the voodoo shamans on the last album-- or maybe they are, but under pressure, perhaps Faust just betray their VU roots more readily (and simultaneously earn their Krautrock merit badge). But where there had been chaos, there was now tranquility; where there had grown paranoia and Dadaism, suddenly there sprouted mystique and atmosphere. A good start, but stay tuned.

After "On the Way to Abam�e," we're given signs that all is not well in the Faust camp. "No Harm" begins with a drawn-out crescendo that leads into a horn-driven instrumental. That's about as much as I can say about it. It's sort of indistinct, but in the context of the album, and coming from this band, it seems either very campy and strange, or oddly comfortable. In any case, the feeling doesn't last long, as three minutes in, the tune transforms into feverish blues-rock, with the phrase, "Daddy take the banana, tomorrow is Sunday," repeated ad nauseam. You know Faust, right?

The funny part about Faust was, no matter how far out they got, they always came back. And on the title track, they trade in their acid wisdom for pure Kraut trance groove-- though very different from Can's avant-funk or Neu's motorik beat-- via horn punches and a galloping rhythm. And, like clockwork, just when you think they've managed the whole acid situation, "Mamie" introduces the buzzsaw of doom, replete with an intimidating synth force field and Moog vomit. Then, the chanting returns. The chanting! It's like some kind of game that only the Boredoms have figured out how to play since.

I could tell you that the next song goes back to sounding halfway normal (you know, that "kids in a dark studio with bipolar musos to the tune of a DeVry commercial" kind of normal), and that the last track tells you how many toes and ears you have, but you get the picture. It also asks, "I wonder how long this is gonna last?" and if I didn't know it lasted two or three more years, I'd say about ten minutes. In the end, history and I were wrong, because both of these albums have outrun all the detox statistics by maintaining a permanent place in the hearts of seemingly normal people everywhere. Okay, so it's probably mostly greasy lo-fi musicians and acidheads, but there are times when it doesn't pay to know the difference. - Dominique Leone

Make a pact with the devil!


The Soft Machine - Fourth
Label: Columbia
Release: 1971
Genre: Jazz



Track Listing:

1. "Teeth" (Mike Ratledge) 9:15
2. "Kings and queens" (Hugh Hopper) 5:02
3. "Fletcher's blemish" (Elton Dean) – 4:35
4. "Virtually part 1" (Hugh Hopper) – 5:16
5. "Virtually part 2" (Hugh Hopper) – 7:09
6. "Virtually part 3" (Hugh Hopper) – 4:33
7. "Virtually part 4" (Hugh Hopper) – 3:23

Maybe a weird choice for your first Soft Machine album. But it fits with the other shit in this post.

Spoiler:

The Soft Machine's collective skill is hyper-complex and refined, as they are extremely literate in all fields of musical study. Fourth is the band's free purging of all of that knowledge, woven into noisy, smoky structures of sound. Their arcane rhythms have a stop-and-go mentality of their own that sounds incredibly fresh even though it is sonically steeped in soft and warm tones. Obviously there is a lot of skillful playing going on, as the mix of free jazz, straight-ahead jazz, and Gong-like psychedelia coalesces into a skronky plateau. Robert Wyatt's drumming is impeccable -- so perfect that it at times becomes an unnoticeable map upon which the band takes their instinctive direction. Mike Ratledge's keys are warm throughout, maintaining an earthy quality that keeps its eye on the space between the ground and the heavens that the Soft Machine attempt to inhabit. Elton Dean's saxophone work screams out the most inventive cadence, and since it's hardly rhythmic, it takes front and center, spitting out a crazy language. Certainly the band is the preface to a good portion of Chicago's post-rock output, as they undoubtedly give a nod to Miles Davis' Bitches Brew experiments, which were going on in the U.S. at the same time. - Ken Taylor

Naked Lunch

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Adrian Quesada & Ocote Soul Sounds - El Niño Y El Sol
Label: Eighteenth Street
Release: 2006
Genre: Jazz/Electronic



Track Listing:

1. Tamarindio
2. Dedication T.V.
3. Esto no se Acaba Aqui
4. Divinorum
5. Ora Como Rey, Manana Como Guey
6. Justicia
7. Vals de la Despedida
8. La Lucah Sigue
9. Where Is the Love?
10. Learn to Let Go
11. Grenudos
12. Look Sharp
13. Paz y Alegria

I realized there's an extra copy of the first track in there. Deal. The following is not a review, because reviews are boring. The slightly awkward English on the inset of the CD, on the other hand, is not.

Spoiler:

Co-producer Martin Perna, travelling in Mexico in a vegetable-oil-powered Mercedes, fell into some deep mechanical troubles and had to rely on a loan from a local narcotraficante to pay the mechanic. In exchange, Perna agreed to produce a film in memory of the narco's missing son, and left to shoot the film on the coast of Michoacan, where the boy disappeared. After six weeks of filming, Perna headed north towards New York where he would edit the film and finish the soundtrack. On his way back, he was detained at a police roadblock, where they confiscated all the film, equipment, and audio tapes. Empty handed, he headed back towards New York miserable and deep in debt.

His car broke down once again just south of Austin, Texas where he called on Adrian Quesada. Adrian invited him to stay for a few days at his apartment, and Perna begged him to help finish the soundtrack. At least then he would have something to pay back to the narco, who had already sent people looking for him. Perna had found a cassette tape of three songs he had started to compose for the soundtrack that had jammed in the tape deck as the police tried to pull it out and a few polaroid still photographs under the seat. Working from these materials, they began to recreate the soundtrack to "El Niño Y El Sol".

Andele!

FELIPE NO

Anathallo - Floating World
Label: Nettwerk
Release: 2006
Genre: Indie



Track Listing:

1. "Ame" – 0:49
2. "Genessaret (Going Out Over 30,000 Fathoms of Water)" – 5:32
3. "Hoodwink" – 5:48
4. "By Number" – 5:08
5. "Dokkoise House (With Face Covered)" – 6:00
6. "Hanasakajijii (Four: A Great Wind, More Ash)" – 4:44
7. "Hanasakajijii (One: The Angry Neighbor)" – 3:10
8. "Inu (Howling)" – 1:20
9. "Hanasakajijii (Two: Floating World)" – 4:57
10. "The Bruised Reed" – 6:04
11. "Yuki! Yuki! Yuki!" – 1:14
12. "Hanasakajijii (Three: The Man Who Made Dead Trees Bloom)" – 4:26
13. "Cuckoo Spitting Blood" – 3:05
14. "Kasa No Hone (The Umbrella's Bones)" – 2:08

It's taking a lot to catch my ear lately, but these guys really did...

Spoiler:

The brilliantly inconsistent ambiance on Floating World meets somewhere between a tribal symphony and modern theatre. While delicate shifts between trombone toots and piano chords flow exquisitely, therein lies an orchestra of vocals, not just male, not just female, nor just singluar or group but a combination of all, breeding an inventive composition that encapulates art, spirituality and redemption. For the youthful group, their maturity transcends through their music with the ability call upon Japanese culture, Judeo-Christian and biblical stories and modern American application. - Absolute Punk

Floating World


Woven Hand - Consider the Birds
Label: Sounds Familyre
Release: 2004
Genre: Alt-Country



Track Listing:

1. "Sparrow Falls" – 4:45
2. "Bleary Eyed Duty" – 4:30
3. "To Make a Ring" – 4:33
4. "Off the Cuff" – 3:31
5. "Chest of Drawers" – 3:53
6. "Oil on Panel" – 5:36
7. "The Speaking Hands" – 4:00
8. "Down in Yon Forest" – 3:08
9. "Tin Finger" – 3:54
10. "Into the Piano" – 3:38

I decided I had to find something likable in country music. This was not what I expected. It's alternative, that's for sure. The review sums it up pretty well...I didn't even notice the religious aspect until I read it.

Spoiler:

hile the quote unquote Evangelical religious right continues to seemingly alienate all under the epithetical label of "non-believers", somehow a branch of no less fervent believers has emerged and had success in the atheism-drenched alternative rock scene. Somehow these artists have managed avoid sacrificing even an iota of their beliefs, and at the same time appeal to an audience notorious for hostility towards the Christian faith.

Take, for example, David Eugene Edwards, lead singer of the band Sixteen Horsepower and who’s third record under his solo moniker of Woven Hand, entitled Consider the Birds, is easily the most Christ-influenced work he has conceived of yet (which, for those familiar with his past work both solo and with 16HP, is quite an accomplishment.) The grandson of a fiery Nazarene preacher in Colorado, it can be assumed that the only book allowed in his house as a child was the holy one. Thus, Edwards has an intense and innate knowledge of the Bible. It's not uncommon to find at least for or five scriptural references in his lyrics, often times not references at all, but literal transcriptions of lines into song. - Stylus

Consider the Birds


Blu & Exile - Below the Heavens
Label: Sound in Color
Release: 2007
Genre: Hip-Hop



Track Listing:

1. My World Is...
2. The Narrow Path
3. Simply Amazin' (Steel Blazin')
4. Juice N' Dranks (Featuring Ta'Raach)
5. In Remembrance
6. Blu Collar Workers
7. Dancing in the Rain
8. First Things First (Featuring Miguel Jontel)
9. No Greater Love
10. Good Life (Featuring Aloe Blacc and Joseph)
11. Soul Rising
12. Cold Hearted (Featuring Miguel Jontel)
13. Below The Heavens Pt. 1
14. Below The Heavens Pt. 2
15. I Am...

This is the kind of stuff that makes hip-hop one of my favorite genres. Blu's delivery and Exile's production are a match made in heaven (ha ha).

Spoiler:

Where 2007’s other great hip-hop album, Pharoahe Monch’s Desire, dealt on a grander scale (tackling New Orleans and conspiracy theories), Blu and Exile’s Below the Heavens is very much its counter-balance. More homebound and ambitious with the excited newcomer naivety, Blu and Exile, making their auspicious debut (in an album too long for the casual listening) are more interested in the war behind their walls and in their streets. Blu might berate you (the guys figure you should have heard of the album, and if you haven’t, you’re the motherfucking idiot who put the motherfucking ‘e’ on the motherfucking poster), but when need be, Blu is more down-to-earth than cocky. Clocking in at 60 minutes, Below the Heavens runs the risk of drawing itself out to a breaking point, belittling its greater moments by surrounding them in fluff. But Blu, sticking close to the unexceptional meaning of the title, is more interested in realism while Exile is more interested in fiddling with concept, keeping things simple without making it an exercise in minimalist.

Aside from the self-indulgent album opener found in the form of ‘My World Is…,’ a catchy, sample ridden, ego stroking number devoted to Blu and his abilities as a rapper (more tongue-in-cheek than self-gratifying), Blu is content in penning and discussing real world stories. In the album highlight, ‘Narrow Path,’ he details the growing difficulties to be a young underground MC in modern times, toeing the edges of the “narrow path.” Here, in the superb chorus, diluted almost to a whisper, Blu sings, “I need a pen, I need a pad, I need a place to go to get this shit lifted off of my soul.” It’s this same mentality that plagues the chronicling of an average Joe’s routine life in ‘Dancing In The Rain;’ it’s atypical insights like these, ones that branch out from Blu’s typical topic (sometimes that of, but not limited to, religion), that fuels Below the Heavens. And even if Blu stoops to generics (his argument that it’s love not lust[!] that drives his relationship in ‘Greater Love’), Exile’s production rounds it out well (‘Greater Love’ features prominent samples of “greater love!” in an airy tone, giving a slight romanticism to Blu’s otherwise blunt delivery). He even inserts a little humour into 'Good Life,' a song that finds its protagonist a new father ("When it comes to being a man, shi, I'm barely getting my feet wet").

But really, it’s DJ Exile’s production that makes the ends meet, the key behind Below the Heavens success. ‘Soul Rising’’s production wouldn’t seem out of place in Nas’ line-up, while ‘First Things First’ slides down easy on its laid back atmosphere, riding smooth with Blu’s flirty, party mood. Mostly, Below the Heavens calls to mind the hip-hop that rose in the early ‘90s, fitting snugly with the nostalgic ‘In Remembrance’ that seems peculiar in the one-off feel of Blu’s delivery; you can almost hear others agreeing with him when he starts detailing the drama of his high school years. Below the Heavens, sorely overlooked in a wave of new, almost equally tasty hip-hop, battles its running time with consistency; it builds in both Blu and Exile’s repertoire, ending on its best foot. Beginning with ‘Below the Heavens.. Pt. I,’ the album ends gracefully with the stripped bare ‘I Am…’ that is decidedly low key after the two-part title track that throws in as much production as it can get before toppling over. It may get graphic (violence, sex, C-sections, oh my!), but it’s tighter than that, never letting itself become memorable for its shock value. - Sputnik

Below the Heavens


Thomas Dybdahl - ...That Great October Sound
Label: CCAP/EMI
Release: 2002
Genre: Pop/Rock



Track Listing:

1. "From Grace"
2. "All's Not Lost"
3. "That Great October Sound"
4. "Life Here Is Gold"
5. "Tomorrow Stays The Same"
6. "Postulate"
7. "Adelaide"
8. "John Wayne"
9. "Love's Lost"
10. "Dreamweaver"
11. "Outro"

More proof that Norwegians are good at music. =P

Spoiler:

If you like listening to guys like Nick Drake, Elliott Smith, Jeff Buckley, Becks Sea Change album....you'll cream your pants hearing this guy. He's that good. Aside from the two weak spots (Postulate and Love's Lost) every song is absolutely perfect into the very detail. It's rare to find such replayability in this type of music. I sure hope you won't be turned off by the fact that this guy is relatively unknown outside Europe...because he's definately worth checking out. - Sputnik

That Great October Sound

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?