Darkest Hour

Wow... It's been such a long time since I posted. Funny.
So anyways... I shall now rant about a band called Darkest Hour (obviously).
The band goes under a melodic death metal/metalcore label...
And I don't have much to talk about. Go figure.
Awkward post right here.
The music itself has a mixture of calm stuff and raging stuff, as do a lot of songs in the same genre. Darkest Hour has a somewhat distinguished sound, although it does get a bit repetitive throughout the albums. I found that a lot of their songs are in C minor, which probably doesn't make a huge difference to the general public.
And it sounds kinda cool... One thing that separates this band from other death metal bands is that the singer actually kinda sings sometimes. Their songs have a distinguished melody line combined with the death metal growl, which is pretty cool. Also (random), this is probably one of the nerdiest-looking death metal bands. Ever. That isn't a bad thing, by the way. And yes, I was too lazy to include an image so you'll just have to search yourself.
... That was a short rant.

Multiverse - Widek

So, got-djent.com offers a lot of free downloads which I browse through very frequently just to see what new releases there are. The great thing is, it's all djent, so you're pretty much guaranteed it's going to be quite awesome if you're into that sort of thing. Multiverse is one of the albums that I recently downloaded and was quite impressed with, so I'm going to talk about it. That was phrased really awkwardly... ANYWAY, without further ado, let's begin.

The first track, "Injection" is really short with this heavy riff that really sets the mood for the rest of the album to come. It also is followed by some screams which was, unexpected, but original. "Multiverse", the next track, follows in a similar fashion. Heavy intro riff with lots of syncopated rhythms that are typical of djent. Once that kind of gets rooted, an ambient melody jumps in which is unexpected, but well paired with the original riff. "Ghost ressurection", the penultimate track, is probably my favorite one. It has this amazing heavy introduction followed by ambient melody which is, in turn, followed by another riff. Almost like a trade off between rhythm central music and melody central music. "Enter through the Sun", the final track, is extremely different from the rest in structure. While the others immediately begin with this "hit hard" feel with the heavy riffs and then transitions into ambient melodies, this one is almost the reverse. The melody is brought out in the beginning and the building up of a song is done. Almost like a layer cake. The melody remains almost completely unchanged throughout the song, like bell tones, while the guiltar, bass, and drums come and go.

This was an extremely enjoyable listen. You should all go check it out here. http://widekmusic.bandcamp.com/track/multiverse

Noel

So as an early Christmas present to myself, or as some say an early "noel" gift, I bought Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds'deluxe edition (I couldn't resist, Noel as a Noel present...beyond perfect) and Florence + the Machine's Ceremonials. As the year grew to it's close, I figured it was high time that I bought some more new music for the holidays. Yeah, I'm not too big on your Christmas music (Sinatra is nice and Josh Groban, sure. But after a few years it gets old. Really quickly. Especially after hearing "Santa Baby" for the ten thousandth time. But I do love  The Killers' or Julian Casablancas' take on Christmas music). Instead, I usually listen to a collection of songs that just feel right for this time of year.

My (short) playlist for this Noel:

1. The Lightning Strike, Part 1 - Snow Patrol (Arguably, the best Snow Patrol song. Ever.)
2. Never Let Me Go - Florence + the Machine
3. Don't Shoot Me Santa - The Killers (My perennial favorite)
4.Breaking Down  - Florence + the Machine (The heavy choral sound feels especially "christmas-y")
5. Bittersweet Symphony - The Verve (Again, very orchestral)
6.  March of The Toys - Tchaikovsky (Can't resist - I mean, it's the freaking NUTCRACKER.)
7. Called Out In The Dark - Snow Patrol (Quirky, sure. But awesome? Of course.)
8. Wish List - Neon Trees (Yes, a Christmas song.)
9. Dream On - Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds

11/11/11

It's been almost 2 weeks since any of us last posted. We're lame, I know. But we're all also busy. So, in honor of 11/11/11, I've decided to post 11 of my favorite songs that came out in 2011. It's kitsch-y, I know. Bear with me.
 (in no particular order)

1. "If I Had A Gun" - Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds
 2."Life is Simple In The Moonlight" - The Strokes
 3."Hurricane" - Panic! At the Disco
4."Called Out In The Dark" - Snow Patrol
5. "What The Water Gave Me" - Florence + The Machine
6. "Black Treacle" - Arctic Monkeys
7."Arlandria" - Foo Fighters
8. "Stop The Clocks"  - Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds (not exactly "new", but it was on Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds)
9."Up In Flames" - Coldplay
10."Games" - The Strokes
11."Breaking Down" - Florence + The Machine

Open A Tuning Rocks

If it's used on "Left Of The Dial" and "Alex Chilton," it's good enough for me. Funny thing is that almost every song I've written so far is about a different girl. Why? Cause they're easy. Writing the song lyrics, I mean.

Don't Call Home

So I didn't get to see Shellac today. Fuck. So I got to go to a record store. And was so excited when I found the "I Will Dare" and "Sliver" vinyl singles. But I couldn't buy them. There were so many bootleg CDs it was ridiculous. There must have been 10 Zeppelin ones and maybe 3 or 4 Pixies. So I got a cheap Breeders one. So not a total loss.

Hello Baton Rouge! - The Breeders. Pretty cool. I was a bit nervous about how the sound quality was going to be, but it's a pretty crisp digital audience recording. It's a 1994 Last Splash show, and the setlist is split pretty well, mostly relying on Last Splash standards (nice doubled vocals on "Divine Hammer," like every performance), with the rest of the songs mostly spit between Pod and their multiple EPs (although it would have been nice if they played "When I Was A Painter" or "Opened"). Kim seems out of breath on most of the songs and has to breath in deeply, especially on "Fortunately Gone" and "Happiness Is A Warm Gun." But unless someone ripped her tongue out, there's no way her voice is going to be bad. Am I right? (The CD also has some split second dropouts between tracks, or maybe that's just me)

Title TK - The Breeders. Recorded by the brilliant Steve Albini, using the All Wave philosophy. So of course the album sounds fantastic. Everything sound warm and intimate, like vinyls supposedly sound (I don't know how they sound, but they're bound be good). Even though Josephine and Jim are sorely missed, Kelley is still onboard, leaving Kim as the only original member. "Off You" is usually pinpointed as the best song on the album, and right now, I think it is. It's nice and peaceful, just Kim and an acoustic guitar. And some weird synth thing at some point.

Alien Lines - Guided By Voices. There are 28 songs on this album. And it's only 41 minutes, since none of the songs (if they're even long enough to be called songs. "Cigarette Tricks" is only 19 seconds!) only breach the 3 minute mark. This is one of GBV's more popular "lofi era" albums, and for good reason. "Game of Pricks" (NOT thrones) is one of those songs that makes me wish I lived in a simpler time. Where you actually had to meet with people to finish work. And where gossip wasn't posted on Facebook. Where the internet never existed. Lo-fi can do that to you.

Hold On Hope - GBV. These are demos for the "Do The Collapse" album (one of their cleaned up albums), produced by Ric Ocasek. I'd rather listen to Alien Lines right now. The EP's probably pretty good though.

Pleased To Meet Me (Deluxe) - The Replacements. I kept telling myself I was going to get this (for the bonus tracks), but I never did. I also told myself I was going to get Chinese Democracy but that didn't really work either. Most of the bonus tracks are already on the Flowers in the Dark booleg, albeit sped up and lower quality. The funny thing is that there's only 6 new songs on the Tim reissue, and 11 on the PPTM one. The highlights are "Photo," which is way better than some of the songs actually on the album (comparison to "Nowhere Is My Home"), a demo version of "Valentine" (interesting factoid; according to the liner notes, "Valentine" actually got rejected for the album, but was later quickly finished up and hastily pushed onto the album, so it would be for sure classfied as an album and not an EP), a rawer alternate take for "Alex Chilton" with a failed beginning (but sadly without the solo), and a stripped down version of "Can't Hardly Wait," which is not as good as the full band version on the Tim reissue, but much better than the overproduced crap version that made the album.

EMA

So here's one modern artist that I actually like. Finally. Her name is Erika M. Anderson, aka EMA. She's the girl that did this fabulous (such a phony word. So sue me) cover of "Endless, Nameless."

Most Nirvana covers are pretty crappy. That's a fact. But this one is rather great (even though the drummer is no Dave Grohl). Most of EMA's other songs are kinda weird and spacey. And she puts so much emotion into them that it's almost embarrassing (like her "California" video). But I like her for some reason. She gets a lot of comparisons to Kim Gordon, and it's easy to see why. (As a side note, a few days ago Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon announced that they're divorcing. Very sad, they said Sonic Youth was going to continue, but it's not going to be the same.) And look! EMA plays a Mustang!

What pisses me off is that they played San Francisco on October 12. And I missed it. It was a weekday. But tickets for that show were 18 and over. Boo. At least Shellac this Saturday is "all ages." Cause Shellac is totally family friendly.