After some disappointing live albums Earth returns with an album to quash all doubts as to who is king of the extended riff. However, instead of trying to out-drone the youngsters trying to recreate Earth2 Dylan Carlson has steered his guitar playing away from fuzzed out extended chords to a pared-down country picking. |
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After some disappointing live albums Earth returns with an album to quash all doubts as to who is king of the extended riff. However, instead of trying to out-drone the youngsters trying to recreate Earth2 Dylan Carlson has steered his guitar playing away from fuzzed out extended chords to a pared-down country picking.
10920 Hits
The Campfire Headphase sees the Boards of Canada returning to the long, spacious melodies and funky but not too-heavy rhythm work of Music Has the Right to Children, but with enough of an update to make the album not only welcome, but essential.
11310 Hits
LTM benevolently continues to dredge the ponds, lakes, and rivers ofthe British Isles for the lost or forgotten bands of the '80s and early'90s,this time coming up in Glasgow with a triad of compilations featuringthe recorded output of The Orchids. I remember the first timehearing them and being a little intrigued by their music but a littledisgusted by the stiffness of the vocals. It took me a while toappreciate it and I am genuinely interested to see how others reactsince I reckon the vocals to be a polarizing part of the band's music.
13768 Hits
On the latest two track release as Cathode, Steve Jefferis explores vocals and tries topack as big an electronic journey as possible into the four minutelistening experience as gently as he can. Whichever way thesongs seem to twist Cathode keeps melody at the heart of the music.
7469 Hits
I have largely looked with unenthuseddisgust at the so-called "folktronica" sound that has played out inrecent years. Growing up with my parents' Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, andWoody Guthrie records provided me with an appreciation for real mastersof the craft, and, comparatively, some moody dipshit's grandiose laptopmeets guitar experiments hardly garners my respect. The only possiblething worse than the typical album in this half-assed subgenre wouldhave to be one that also incorporates that desperately pretty latenineties IDM sound. Sadly, that's just where Gonglot fits in.
7019 Hits
The Plop label out of Japan has been my favorite discovery of 2005 so far. From what I can tell, FilFla is composing tracks primarily out of fragmented guitar loops, and while this ground has been covered ad infinitum by now, Frame is still an intimate and beautiful record that brings out the promise of computer-aided guitar composition.
6654 Hits
Best known for his No Fun festivals and collaborating with anyone hecan get his hands on Carlos Giffoni has finally finished his solo debutLP, Welcome Home. Recorded over three years and across severalcontinents, it’s the sound of electrical things gone against theirdesign to make something more of themselves and given time could wellbe his most pleasant piece of deformed improvisational composing yet.
9965 Hits
Maybe I’m just not in the mood for slow-burning, Neil Young and CrazyHorse-inspired rock and roll. Echo-laden guitar rock just isn’t doingit for me like it used to: a development that probably speaks to thestyle's limited possibilities. Into my newly discovered apathycomes Everything is Fine, a band that takes most of their cues from theGalaxie 500 playbook and runs with it.
6012 Hits
As Edgey, Knight has released hard-pounding and visceral drum n bass andbreak-oriented music, but as Stephen James Knight he strips away most of theaggression and furious beat smashing to focus on something altogether moredelicate.
6337 Hits
Its not polite to kick someone when they’re down but sometimes certain things need to be put out there and while Urmericaisn’t totally explicit in its outright disgust with the current stateof affairs in the US, it certainly intimates a fair level of defeat andbetrayal.
12453 Hits
Composed of spacious flute tones and the buzz of unseen action, the central 38 minute piece achieves what Mirror always seems to be aiming for: the frozen beauty of a moment.
8374 Hits
The newest release by Uwe Schmidt’s alter ego Señor Coconut is ahandpicked collection of so called “Legendary Latin Club Tunes.”Schmidt has selected from many styles and genres from across LatinAmerica. However fans of Señor Coconut’s particular brand of Latinisedrock songs will most likely be disappointed.
9220 Hits
Rhys Fulber (best known as the number-two man from Frontline Assemblyand Delerium, and as the guy who brought the grindy thrash of FearFactory into the 21st Century by way of industrial breakbeats and synthproduction) may be a better producer thansongwriter and a better engineer than singer, and it just may be thecase that he's got more to offer the world by enhancing the work ofothers than by creating his own.
6083 Hits
In the period between Haha Sound’s releaseand Tender Buttons, Broadcast have undergone a fair amount of change.Vocalist Trish Keenan and bassist James Cargill are the only remainingmembers, causing them to significantly pare down their sound. Whatremains is a collection of some of the most haunting, minimalistelectronic pop I’ve heard in a good long while.
9135 Hits
I'm not entirely certain whether CocoRosie should actually be considered a musical group, or just a collection of willful, calculated eccentricities clumsily juxtaposed with each other.
25491 Hits
Though I always search in vain for anyindication that the Legendary Pink Dots front man is resting on his laurels, phoning it in,or "taking the piss," as they say, each new release tends to hold to animpressive level of quality control.
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Gene and Dean Ween have a huge catalog of unreleased demo tracks, and the Shinola seriesis their way of inflicting them on the rest of the world.
10181 Hits
Bissonnette's compositionsburn slowly and coldly, not because the record is particularlyunwelcome nor is it difficult to listen to, but his sound choices areundeniably of the modern age.
6371 Hits
Greh of Hive Mind and Mike Connelly of Hair Police and Wolf Eyes have released a monster of a record that collects two previously limited cassette releases with a new 38 minute opus dedicated to dysfunctional machinery of all kinds.
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Adding to my theory that producers shouldn't write and release records of their own is this gem of an "ethnic" electronic record. Scott Solter is a name some might identify with Spoon, Court and Spark, or Tarentel, but don't let their better records fools you: The Brief Light is a mess of an album with few strengths to speak of.
7146 Hits
