I thought Sahg was going to play a much harder bran do fmetal than was present on the opening moments of “Sahg I”. There is a heavy Ozzy influence during this track, as well as dollops of influence from acts like Monster Magnet and (even) Fu Manchu. The only thing that I can hear that distinguishes Sahg from the rest of the rock and metal acts that are plastered all…
There are some intense tracks on Ugly Animals. The average runtime of the tracks on this album seems to be about a minute, but Retx crams everything that they can into this time frame. Whether it is metal, hardcore, punk, or even funk or folk, Ugly Animals has a little bit of everything. A super-group of sorts, Retox links together The Locust, Cattle Decapitation, Festival of Dead Deer and Holy…
Rachael Sage sounds like Tori Amos during “Alright, OK”. The whispered-out vocals and the bouncing of the composition through a number of styles ties eir to Amos’s early work, before the latter petered out (during “Strange Little Girls” and all that followed). The freshness of Sage during the early going of “The Blistering Sun” means a few things: that individuals will have a great role model since both Tori and…
The emotive content that is present on Ghosts Upon The Earth is simply stunning; I believe that this album covers the extend of human feelings, compassion, and pain better than any album that we have heard so far this year. While Let There Be can be understood as an introduction for the types of styles and approaches that Michael will ultimately use over the course of Ghosts Upon The Earth,…
Starting out “In The Key of D” with forceful guitars and Claudio-like guitars, Safety in Number provide three clear paths for listeners: they can either listen to the vocals, the guitars, or the bass which are all viciously forcing their way into the heads of listeners during “You’ll Find A Way”. Moving into a much more oft-heard style of guitar riffs and vocal delivery in “Lusic”, Safety in Numbers deviate…
From the beginning of “Mozartia”, there are two distinct strains of music that Sacriversum creates. There is a very melodic type of black metal that is dominant, and there is a classical type of music (along the style of whom the album was named) that struggles for dominance. The styles clash messily during the opening bars of “Born To Be The Best”, but Sacriversum quickly rights their ship. The inclusion…
Sabrosa Purr really purveys a style of hyper-emotional dream-pop that is as bipolar as it is impressive. “By The Water” starts with a guitar line that does not shine, but rapidly moves into a psychedelic, trippy style that also gives away to a distorted, screamed-out type of rock that has much more to do with Marilyn Manson than Sixpence None The Richer. The continual shifting through genres present during “By…
I find what Bearfoot does on their American Story to be tremendously interesting. This means that the style of music that they play is tied to 19th and early 20th century America, but has been updated to really become germane to listeners in the current era. Bearfoot thus creates in the 10 tracks on American Story a title that will be appreciated by fans of different stripes, touching upon roads…
The vocals that Ryan starts out “From A Late Night High-Rise” are painful. “Follow The Leader” sounds as if Ryan has smoke twenty packs of cigarettes a day for fifty years. I might be exaggerating, but the contrast that eir vocals show against the slightly electronic instrumentation on the track is a little irking. The track would be stronger if Ryan did not force the vocals quite as much. While…
“The Owls Stare” shows Rusty Like as the supreme purveyors of catchy rhythms, as an opening salvo will make true music fans salivate. The strung-out guitars present on this track do not scream with a current type of sound, but they (along with the vocals) really bring a sixties type of sound. It is not one specific brand of sixties sound, but rather an amalgamation of surf and lounge that…
I thought Kate Russell was a movie star? Maybe I’m just thinking of Kurt Russell and Kate Winslet? Anyways, that has nothing to do with what is present on Kate Russell’s album “Powerful Stuff”. The album cover does not immediately clue individuals in to what style of music that Russell would be creating for this album; current country is what individuals will get when “Powerful Stuff” is put on the…
The style of music that The Ruse plays is a more smoothed out version of U2 and Oasis; “Everything Comes With A Price” is a vocal-dominated track. This is not to say that the instrumentation is nothing less than impressive; the guitar lines on a song like “Everything Comes With A Price” is something that can be calm and collected even as they bristle with energy. The Ruse is a…
A little bit of Screeching Weasel, some Queers, Ramones and Misfits, and one has an idea what The Runs sound like on their “Wet Sounds”. The tracks run into each other, making the fourteen cut “Wet Sounds” blast through at a Flash-like speed (it ends before the twenty-seventh minute). The production of the disc is well above another achieved by the early Screeching Weasel albums, and tracks like “Rancho Slutadero”…
Immediately reminiscent of The Postal Service, Phiadelphia’s Run Away From The Humans have created a strong sound and style for themselves only after a year of exist. Everything is sequenced and the first track “Wake Up, Wake Up” gains its energy for dreamy vocals and Aeffect-style synthesizers. The synthesizers, played by also-vocalist Jason, are crisp and clean, sounding at times like “Good News-era Modest Mouse, incorporated with a life act.…
Trying to come up with a shoegazer type of rock band that doesn’t sound pretentious or over-the-top is a hard thing to do, especially since the rapid rise of popularity of The Flaming Lips as a viable band with no talent. The Rum Diary does have talent, no questions about it, but there is virtually no soul behind this music. Take “Killed By The Cowboy President”, for example, a track…
The transformative power of music is something that really transcends boundaries, whether human created or naturally made. This means that what Astrid Williamson does on Pulse is something that speaks more generally to humanity. The specific genre and styles broached during this album do not matter as much as eir honest and earnest approach, something that is refined over the course of the album’s 10 tracks. What results with this…
There have been two distinct forms of country music that have been splitting apart over the course of the last 15 or 20 years. While the line between pop and country has been blurred by a great many of the current wave of country artists, there are still a number of practitioners of the older country and western style. Of current artists, there are not many that attempt to join…
The interplay that is created by Goese and Neill on their Songs For Persephone ensures that the CD will remain in a purchaser’s player for months to come. This is not noticed only in the instrumental side of things, but also through the whole effort that follows from the disc’s initial track, Roma. The stylistic choices that are made during Songs For Persephone are nothing less than inspired; blending together…
Listening to Pink Floyd’s three decade spanning, 14 song catalog, two things are clear; One: they were more than a tad bit pretentious at the beginning. With droning organ solos and album titles like A Saucerful of Secrets and The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, you can almost imagine that scene from Spinal Tap with the little people dancing around the replica of Stonehenge actually came from the acid-soaked…
The type of music that issues forth during Naked Truth’s Shikaru is incredibly interesting, even more so considering the breakdown of the members. Both the Pat Methany Group (Cuong Vu) and King Crimson (Pat Mastelotto) are represented, while Roy Powell is the pianist and Lorenzo Feliciati rounds out the act on bass and guitars. What results on Shikaru is a mélange of the different influences and styles that each member…