Why Don't You Give Me Some Love?

I caught part of the new video from James Blunt, "Stay the Night", earlier today.  I haven't necessarily been inspired to look it up on YouTube yet -- despite being catching, it felt fairly samey compared to his other work.  It did, however, make me go back an listen to his second album, All the Lost Souls.  Although the songs from his first disc, especially "You're Beautiful", got incredibly overplayed, I still quite like him.  His second disc I thought was better, so, of course it got less notice.

In general, it's fairly straight-forward guitar rock.  Kind of like David Bowie, minus the weird, and dialling the ennui up to eleven.  While listening to the album, though, I did notice that backing riff for "Carry You Home" is essentially Snow Patrol's "Run".

The Land of Pretentious Symphonic Metal

A few weeks back, Therion released a new album Sitra Ahra, the conclusion to a four-part epic starting with Lemuria and Sirius B back in 2004.  Now, I generally like Therion, but I am one to admit that there are many times when they go off the musical deep end, landing somewhere in camp show tunes territory, similar to acts like Haggard, Avantasia and Ayreon.  Although there are definitely things to like about the album, this is definitely one of the ones that takes a headlong leap into cheese, layering operatic vocals upon choirs, Thomas Karlsson trying to write some sort of ariosophic musical, and Christofer Johnson trying to ensure that one of every single instrument is used at least once. 

I've been listening to it off and on for the past few weeks, and I'm honestly not sure if I like it.  The music itself is quite good, I'll give it that, and despite the complexity of the instrumentation, you'll find that there are quite a few points that get stuck in your head.  And there's "Hellequin", which is just unintentionally funny.  I can appreciate some of what Karlsson is trying to do with the lyrics, weaving through some of the myth and philosophy that surrounds his own Dragon Rouge and beyond, but taken in pieces, most of it seems silly.  One of these days, I'll probably sit down with the lyric booklets and try to put together the narrative, especially some of the bizarre transposition of different mythological pantheons.

I will commend them for their ambition, at the very least, and it may sound as though I didn't like the album, but really, you have to be in the right mood to listen to it.

I Still Hate Duran Duran

In a recent review, Chris Allen discusses the new remaster of Duran Duran's Rio.  It's a well-written piece that you should probably read, and it almost makes me want to listen to the album, it's that persuasive, however, I don't think anything can get me past one simple fact, I still hate Duran Duran.

How to Destroy Angels

While I've been listening to the work of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross on the Social Network soundtrack, I've also gone back to listen to their other project (joined with Reznor's wife, Mariqueen Maandig), How to Destroy Angels.  Their initial offering, a self-titled six-track EP, is a curious beast.  It's not quite female-fronted NIN, but the comparison is not quite incorrect.  I'm reminded of somewhat of Reznor's contribution to Jakalope half a dozen years ago, but harsher and mixed with some bizarre fetishistic dub music.

All the best laid plans

I've been quite enjoying Yoav's latest album, A Foolproof Escape Plan.  It's more upbeat than his debut disc, Charmed and Strange, but it's still strangely intoxicating.  The mix of electronic beats and the sound of classical guitar is still there amidst the labyrinthine rhythms.

I think my favourite track is "We all are dancing" which you can see below:

Gavin Rossdale is looking old...

So...is it Alejandro...or Fernando?

I watched the Lady Gaga video for "Alejandro".  I think I liked it.  Overall, I like the song more than "Telephone", with it's ABBA meets Madonna style (which is saying something since I don't like ABBA), but the video...bizarre art piece.  I love the production values, evocative use of black, white and red, but part of me is still left scratching my head thinking, "what?"

Costing an Arm and a Leg...

I like the new Broken Bells video for "The Ghost Inside". Granted I'd probably find watching Christina Hendricks watch paint dry interesting, but well...

Yeah, You Got Me Wrong

I finally got around to really listening to the Broken Bells' album, featuring Danger Mouse and James Mercer.  I'm a big fan of both The Shins and Gnarls Barkley, and my first listen through this back in March kind of left me cold.  It was alright, but there didn't seem to be much to hook me. 

Like the collaboration between Timbaland -- trying to make a rock album -- and Chris Cornell -- trying not to make a rock album -- it seemed like the things that made the individual acts special was missing.  One of the things that I liked about Danger Mouse was the incredible beats and electronic flourishes, while sampling some 60's pop, in Gnarls Barkley and on Beck's Modern Guilt - the choice to primarily use live instruments makes that largely absent here.  What I love about The Shins is the jangly pop, with Mercer's rather endearing high register whine-sing, although I suppose the Smiths-ish influence to Wincing the Night Away might point to the approach to this album.  In any event, the lack of the two things that I loved about the separate groups had me largely shelve the Broken Bells album after a couple of listens.

In the wee hours of the morning today, I decided to give it a spin again as background music.  Like many albums that have grown on me over time, I found it worked considerably better when I wasn't thinking about it.  Especially the second half of the album, which settles into a nice laid back groove.  That groove, in a way, is very similar to some of the more acoustic beats from the Gorillaz' Demon Days and the musical backbone of the Gnarls Barkley tracks.  There's also an odd old-school pop feel to some of the music, almost like something out of a David Lynch film, that adds a different flavour to some of the tracks.

Stand out tracks to me include; "The Ghost Inside" --which I think has the most similarity in terms of bass beat to a Gnarls Barkley song, although it's fronted by Mercer singing falsetto--, "October" -- which features a great opening of guitar and piano, as well as some of the best lyrics on the album--, and "Mongrel Heart" --which highlights a great 70's disco groove as well as a refrain featuring Morricone-esque trumpet work.

This Too Will Pass Away

When it comes to personal mnemonics, I tend to code most things to music.  As such, just thinking of an individual song can allow me to recall complex, lengthy information, scenes and such.  I used the technique regularly when studying in university; code a book to a CD, keep it in my short-term memory, and then "read" the book, along with the accompanying soundtrack, during an exam.  The ability to remember the entire contents of a textbook fades, but fragments remain whenever I listen to a particular song from any of the albums.  I also tend to encode memories to listening to songs, just as a certain scent, taste, or touch might trigger something.

As such, I've not been able to listen to Puscifer's "C" is for [Please Insert Sophmoric Genitalia Reference HERE] for the past few months, since it would elicit an emotional response of either tears or illness.  Overcome, I usually turn it off.  Which is sad in itself, considering that the EP is just that damn good.  I was listening to the album during the months of November and December while I was working on a short story ["22"] which I've posted an excerpt of elsewhere and the songs "Potions" and "Polar Bear" both highly influenced pieces of the text.  It would almost be funny that the lyrics to "Potions" are relevant both to the story, the roots of the story, and the resulting events following writing the story.

Reading this week's issue of Fables (#95), with the second part of its story focusing on Rose Red, also provided a contribution to a kind of perfect storm regarding memories that I'd rather not keep.  It utilizes what looks like part of the direct text from Grimm's version of Snow White & Rose Red; something that I used as a springboard for part of the aforementioned story, after one of the primary characters related a truncated narration of the fairy tale.  Roses...

I decided to listen to the EP again tonight...

Always Deny Everything

Leading on from the Jack Parow stuff, I've also been turned on to Fokofpolisiekar, an Afrikaans alterna-punk band out of Belville, South Africa. I've only had the chance to listen to Lugsteuring so far, but it's pretty damn good.  I don't have a bloody clue what they're singing about -- some of Afrikaans sounds like German words I recognise, but I don't want to necessarily translate them the same way -- but the music is entertaining.  I'd say it sounds like a cross between DC-era punk, Iron Maiden, and stoner rock.  Wikipedia compares them to Alkaline Trio and I'd say that's kind of apt, but I'd argue that their guitar sound is more open and prone to solos and more interesting recursive riffs.  Francois van Coke's scratchy vocals also add a different edge to the music.

"Dance, Dance, Dance. You can fucking, fucking dance."

Due to the fact that I have very strange friends (actually kind of goes without saying), I now have the chorus from a South African rap song stuck in my head.



It's like taking Ali G seriously and having him rap in an unintelligble mash-up of English and Afrikaans. The ginormous hat, bizarre clothes, dancing mummies, automated cat statues and overall song just makes this priceless. I think everyone needs a little more Jack Parow in their lives.

Random Funny Thing

I've been looking for a release date/pre-sale for the new Spiritual Front album, and in doing so went to the Canadian, American and German Amazon sites and came across something I found endlessly funny.  On both the Canadian and American sites, Amazon is highly featuring the Kindle.  On the German site, the main feature is a washing machine.



I did, however, manage to find that the video for the first single from the new album has been posted, "Darkroom Friendship".  It seems much more accessible compared to how dark some of Armageddon Gigolo was, nevertheless I quite like it.  It still continues with the Morricone-inspired guitar feel and I like the trumpet and accordion.

No Matter How...

The new Coheed and Cambria album, Year of the Black Rainbow has grown on me considerably over the past couple weeks, particularly the song "Far". Below is an acoustic version that I think is even better than the album track -- albeit the video and audio is kind of poor, cell phone recording likely.

We've got armadillos in our trousers. It's really quite frightening.

A little while ago I picked up Avantasia's two new discs, The Wicked Symphony and Angel of Babylon. I'm an uabashed fan of what you could call over-the-top, pretentious metal, and have a certain fondness for projects like Tobias Sammet's Avantasia and Arjen Anthony Lucassen's Ayreon. Due to the cheese and power metal aspect of Avantasia, I've not been able to get past track five, "Blizzard on a Broken Mirror", from the first disc, but I'll probably eventually put the two discs on as background noise while I'm cleaning or something and let it diffuse.

I do, however, quite like the first single, "Dying for an Angel", which has to feature the biggest, catchiest butt rock chorus this side of 1980's Bon Jovi. Check out the video above. Turn it up to eleven.

Birds flying high...

The Muse concert last night at the Pacific Coliseum was quite good. I've been impressed with their albums for quite some time, but they are indeed better live. I was slightly disappointed that they didn't play "MK Ultra", but it was more or less made up by playing "Map of the Problematique" and causing me to realise just how good is Dom Howard a drummer.

First Impressions of a Rainbow

I've been privileged to have a first listen of Coheed and Cambria's new album out April 13, Year of the Black Rainbow, and I have to say I quite like it. It doesn't come off as nearly pretentious as their previous releases, and seems to focus more on standard song structure and less on the overarching concept of the whole Armory Wars nonsense. It also features what's probably Claudio Sanchez's best work in "Pearl of the Stars". I'll definitely be picking this up when it comes out.

Best of 2009

If anyone asks you to do anything related to the Olympics, you politely say, "No." Before the year is out and I disappear until April or so...whenever the fallout from the Winter Games is over...I wanted to post a brief "best of..." for what I've been using to keep myself sane over the past year. I wouldn't say that 2009 has been a watershed year for music, but there still has been quite a bit of new material worth noting. I think the largest bands releasing anything new that caught my notice were U2's No Line on the Horizon, Green Day's 21st Century Breakdown, Pearl Jam's Backspacer and Weezer's Raditude. Canadian acts, The Tragically Hip and Our Lady Peace both put out decent efforts this year on We Are the Same and Burn Burn, respectively, always nice to listen to every once in awhile. None of them would be on my top ten, though, if that says something. This has been more of a year of those bands that aren't necessarily household names, but continue on apace releasing album after album, creating sonic delicasies for those of us with ears to listen.

They didn't make the list, but I should give honourable mention to Matthew Good's Vancouver, which has some of his best songs in years, Epica's Design Your Universe, Within Temptation's An Acoustic Night at the Theatre, Behemoth's Evangelion, Nile's Those Whom the Gods Detest, Karl Sanders' own Saurian Exorcisims, Paradise Lost's Faith Divides Us - Death Unites Us, Mastodon's Crack the Skye, Mesh's A Perfect Solution -- which makes an amazing use of the interstitials between songs to create one long cohesive piece of music -- and Current 93's Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain. All of which are decent releases from this year, worth a listen or two. Depending on the day, any of these may have made the list instead.

Them Crooked Vulture's self-titled debut should probably be on the list, but isn't. It's a hands down fun album, well-crafted with a nice groove, but for some reason it just hasn't fully clicked with me yet. I like it, but it feels like something's missing. I'll probably revisit the album in a few months, see if I can figure out why I can't get past a few listens.

10. THIS IS WAR - 30 Seconds to Mars (December 4)

A squeaker onto the list, this album almost didn't make it. Basically, it was between this album and Chevelle's Sci-Fi Crimes. I'm a fan of Jared Leto as an actor, his performance in Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream is still haunting, and by extension, I have grown a fondness for his band. I think I probably liked their self-titled debut more than A Beautiful Lie, but both were good, strong albums. This is War is a slightly different creature, more vulnerable than the other two, and it adds a sincerity and heart that I think was missing from the earlier albums. The soft-loud-soft-scream dynamic is still here, so if you didn't like that on previous releases, you still won't, but I can't help but find myself humming some of the tracks. I think "Hurricane" is probably the best track on the album. The version that made it, without Kanye West's collaboration, is better without it, somehow more atmospheric. Other stand outs are "Search & Destroy", "Night of the Hunter", "Kings and Queens" and the song that I almost swore could have been an homage to The Cure, "Alibi".

9. TWO SUNS - Bat for Lashes (April 7)

I find new things, new sounds on this album each time I listen to it. Natasha Khan herself makes me think of a musical love-child of Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush and Tori Amos.

8. THE CROWN OF WINTER - Forest Stream (August 11)

Think epic, grandiose music; symphonic black metal at its finest. Although very different, Russia's Forest Stream are the first band in a very long time to remind me of black metal gods, Emperor, if, of course, you mixed in some British-styled doom. The music itself is gorgeous and lush, the only problem ever comes with Sonm's clean vocals which tend toward the pedestrian, but otherwise, this is flawless. The title track is a near twelve-minute sonic assault that throws in just about anything possible, mixing darkness and light, beauty and depression. I couldn't help but be overwhelmed when I first heard this song. Things only get better from there, soaring guitars, complex polyrhythms, and excellent use of harsh vocals -- layered one upon the other to an interesting effect. Standout tracks include the title track, "Mired" and "Autumn Dancers".

7. ABOVE - Samael (March 6)

6. PRIVILEGIVM - Secrets of the Moon (October 6)

5. SING ALONG SONGS FOR THE DAMNED & DELIRIOUS - Diablo Swing Orchestra (September 22)

4-tie. OLD CROWS/YOUNG CARDINALS - Alexisonfire (June 23)
4-tie. BILLY TALENT III - Billy Talent (July 10)

You may say that they just keep releasing the same album over and over again. I think they just keep refining it, honing their sound to precision, with each subsequent release. Benjamin Kowalewicz's vocals are still an acquired taste, but they fit Billy Talent's brand of alterna-punk perfectly. This album also allows Ian D'Sa to open up a bit more with his guitar work, leading to some nice hooks on "Rusted From the Rain" and the Muse-inspired fuzz to "Saint Veronika". Originally, I rated this one lower, but relistening to it while writing this list, I realize that there is not a single bad track on the disc. From start to finish, this album is an engaging experience. My favourite tracks on this album kept changing over the course of the year, but what still really stands out are "White Sparrows", "The Dead Can't Testify" and "Turn Your Back".

3. SKYFORGER - Amorphis (May 29)

2-tie. WAVERING RADIANT - Isis (April 21)
2-tie. MONOLITHS & DIMENSIONS - Sunn O))) (May 26)
2-tie. WHAT WE ALL COME TO NEED - Pelican (October 27)
2-tie. GENEVA - Russian Circles (October 20)


1-tie. C IS FOR [please insert sophomoric gentilia reference HERE] - Puscifer (November 10)

1-tie. NIGHT IS THE NEW DAY - Katatonia (November 10)

"Departer" is probably the best song written this year.

1-tie. THE RESISTANCE - Muse (September 14)

Then let the havoc choose to shape us all, push us to invent

Somtimes you need something sweet.  Something to leave a nice taste in your mouth; like a bottle of Coke (and I know that the American bottles of Coke with your silly corn syrup pale in comparison to the taste of the cane sugar used just about everywhere else, so you don't necessarily know what I'm talking about) or a mandarin orange.  Other times, you need something bitter, maybe a little salty; like chocolate peppered with chilis.  Some days, you may feel like something tart or sour; like a gin and tonic.

Now, you may be wondering why I'm going on about flavours, especially in what is ostensibly a review of an album.  Well, I'm currently suffering through a certain amount of pain in my mouth; the second of my upper wisdom teeth is coming in.  I know, I could just go to the dentist and get it pulled, however, as he's said previously, there's enough room on my upper jaw to hold it, and sometimes I'm just stubborn.  To weather out the pain, I've been listening to the new Chevelle album, Sci-Fi Crimes.  I picked it up earlier this month, but until now, really haven't paid it much attention.  I needed something to listen to that could be aggressive, but wasn't necessarily the level of napalm that much of the black or death metal to which I listen.  I needed something that had a certain undulating rhythm and bite to it; but I wasn't in the mood for Agalloch or something as pretty as Nest.  I didn't want doom or drone.

I'm an unabashed fan of Tool, and sometimes it's just too long between albums.  Unlike their cookie-cutter clone, Earshot, Chevelle manages to sound a wee bit like Tool -- certainly in Peter Loeffler's vocals, but different enough that it has a flavour of its own.  With Sci-Fi Crimes, I think I've finally figured out what the other influences -- aside from the obvious in Tool and Helmet -- might be; late 80's/early 90's grunge.  Especially a band like Pavement.  Coming from me, that's a compliment.  It also dawned on me the overlap that exists also with bands like the Deftones and The Mars Volta.  Strange to come to that conclusion just listening to this album.

Random Amusements

This month sees the release of several different albums that have grabbed my attention.  With all the buzz surrounding this week's release of the two remastered Beatles' box sets, the Beatles Rock Band compilation and more Beatles, Beatles, Beatles, other things may have flown under the radar.  Tuesday sees the release of Muse's new album, The Resistance, while later in the month we see new releases from Pearl Jam, AFI and Alice in Chains.

I've heard the entirety of both new Muse and Pearl Jam albums and am suitably impressed by both.  AFI's first single, "Medicate" is equally impressive, while I think AiC really should have died with Layne Staley.  I'll probably post full reviews of the Muse, Pearl Jam and AFI discs when they come out.