Honeyblood’s debut reminds me of Veronica Falls’ Waiting for Something to Happen, some Icona Pop, Widowspeak, and a splash of The Breeders and Yuck. It’s a mish-mash of sounds and ideas while still maintaining a really cool sound that should be praised but falls under the umbrella of most household names in indie pop.
The sound is praise-worthy and the production for most of the songs sounds like the crunch of leaves from fall; it’s brittle, it’s loud and it’s something to marvel at. The drums crash and the guitars have a great dynamic between the grind of the tracks themselves and the chorus effect staple. You can hear the little influences with the slow, headbobbin’ grooves of the guitar and the vocals that seem angelic and juxtaposed with the devilish production.
The songs have an immediate punch to them- while they don’t get as loud as bands like The Men and My Bloody Valentine, they have a power to them that makes you feel “just punk enough”. “Biro” and “(I’d Rather Be) Anywhere But Here” take it a bit smoother with catchy indie-pop lyrics talking about the problems of the past and the overall ennui of life, love and hometowns. But that’s where the umbrella comes in.
Most indie pop has had these lyrics about leaving home and missing someone and complaining about no change and complaining about change, the whole spiel is getting very old and I want a little edge and variety with my indie pop nowadays. “Fall Forever”, “Killer Bangs”, “Choker”, “No Spare Key”, “Joey” they all have just about the same theme and if you’ve never heard of Honeyblood you’d just think it was the indie pop Pitchforked flavor-of-the-month.
Final Verdict: As amazing as it is to listen to the instrumentation and clever breaks and vocal melodies that fill this album, digging any deeper isn’t going to yield a diamond. You’ll find some garnet and some cubic zirconium, but nothing that’s worth as much as it was years ago.
Many think of Heavy Metal or any of the subgenres like Progressive Metal, Technical Death Metal, Sludge Metal, Serbian Turbo-Folk Metal and the like as an acquired taste. Some are right to think that way, but it gives us the chance to laud some of the albums that let us enter into another world of music without being punched in the face with some of the deeper cuts in the genre. The only reason I’m saying this is because Mastodon’s “Once More ‘Round the Sun” is an accessible metal album that also delivers for the fans who want to hear more of the sludginess and technicality.
If you’re coming from albums like Blood Mountain, Remission and Leviathan then this is going to be a bit weird. The vocals are a lot cleaner and the production value changes IMMENSELY from Mastodon’s earlier stuff. There are some gruff moments like in the title track “Once More ‘Round the Sun”, “Tread Lightly” and “Feast Your Eyes” where the vocals seem to growl with the fury of the Metal Gods. But the main thing to praise throughout this entire album is the technicality in the instrumentation. The drums have never felt so evil and blasting with quick snare hits, and the use of the ride in almost every song swoops in and takes you in the talons of a winged beast. And “Halloween” has that punk rock energy that has an original Mastodon flair to it, progressive in every way down to the end.
But heavy metal mythology aside, the songs that are brimming with influences on its sleeves are fantastic. Songs like “Chimes at Midnight” have that Avenged Sevenfold-like doom looming over it and the vocals seem to take the same road without being so 7th grade, whereas “Asleep in the Deep” takes the Soundgarden (yeah, I said it) aesthetic of alternative rock that’s so prominent in the chorus that you wouldn’t be able to tell who was playing. “Ember City” also continues the soft vocals with a catchy chorus that pleads “And it was slipping away! What do I say to you? What do I say to you? And if I want you to stay? What do I say to you? What do I say to you?” It almost rivals the little “I need a little escape” on “Black Albino Bones” from Fucked Up’s The Chemistry of Common Life.
There might be a few moments on here that don’t quite hit the mark. “Aunt Lisa” sounded a bit noisy and scatter-brained and although it had QOTSA-like choral vocals, the music itself was way too distracting for me to pay attention, just like “Floating Coffin” from Thee Oh Sees’ album last year. And the last track “Diamond in the Witch House” is just another one of the final tracks that I utterly ignored. Not only is the length daunting, but it’s almost constant in terms of the beat and it’s forgettable in my opinion.
Final Verdict: This is easily one of the most catchy, accessible, and yet well-crafted metal albums I’ve heard since Kvelertak’s debut. It will entertain even the most novice of metalheads and the most devout of alterna-rockers. With its clean production but sludgy and progressive technicality, it has some of my favorite songs of the year so far and will be going in my book as a near-perfect metal album.
If you want to talk about musical progression by album, I don’t think there’s a better example than Southend-on-Sea’s The Horrors. Since their debut, these guys have been changing up their style, experimenting with new ideas, expanding their instrumentation prowess, and overall having no comfort zone. They’ve gone through straight creepy, haunted house garage punk on Strange House, noisy and wavy shoegaze/post-punk on Primary Colours, and Tame Impala-like psychedelic pop and rock on Skying. I’ve been waiting on this release since it’s announcement back in early 2013, it’s been pushed back 15 months and now I’ve got the chance to see what it has to offer.
Within the first burst of sound that comes from “Chasing Shadows”, you hear that the sound has been slightly altered from Skying with the synthesizers being the prominent instruments rather than the traditional drums, bass, and guitar. It takes a while to get into the opener, which is a give-or-take thing when it comes to intros, but when it finally builds up, it delivers. Throughout the album there are sounds that are familiar from other artists that these guys add in rather well. Strums reminiscent of 70’s and 80’s krautrock, cascading synths from Lonerism, and simple but grooving basslines from bands like Peace.
“First Day of Spring” and “In And Out of Sight” have that energy that The Horrors have been known for since Primary Colours and paired up with the danceable synths that come right out of a Cut Copy B-Side, it’s refreshing to hear them not be so somber. “I See You”, the lead single is bursting with pop potential as a summer anthem. There is so much 80’s cheese that it’s perfect for today’s hipster audiences. “Mine and Yours” has a really cool wah-wah guitar sound that’s completely psychedelic and packs a lot of noise in a short song. It’s like what Dumbo Gets Mad’s LAST ALBUM should’ve been. “Sleepwalk” is a beautiful, soft rock closer that leaves you falling back to bed with a catchy chorus. Most of these songs are very well written and have their own unique production tricks, but there are a few elements of each that either don’t sit well or are kind of shocking to hear.
For example, “I See You” would have to be cut down to a radio edit because of the 3 minute outro that detracts from the fun rather than adds to it. “Falling Star” is enjoyable but the production is a bit wonky at times with the effects on the main guitar lead. It’s a cool sound, but I don’t think it would go over very well with a lot of listeners. A moment that freaked me out was when “Jealous Sun” started and it sounded like a discount My Bloody Valentine’s “I Only Said”. The chorus on “Jealous Sun” is great, but the rest of it seems like a rehashed shoegaze sound, relaxing but it’s been done. There are also times on here where I wished I heard less of Faris’ vocals. “Change Your Mind” would be nice if they had the guy from Film School do the vocals, but it doesn’t fit Faris. Slow and sultry isn’t his style, especially once you’ve heard “Sheena is a Parasite”.
Final Verdict: The album is very solid even with the little nitpicks of the influences on it’s sleeve. The tracks are dreamy and it didn’t stray too far away from Skying, which was one of my favorite albums of 2011. The synthesizer leads and production tricks bring it together, making the album feel a lot grander. It’s as if this dream pop is inducing a dream of flying cities and bright bursting lights and gorgeous cloudscapes that you remember just as you wake up and you can’t wait to write it down. If you want to relax, if you want to dance, if you want to escape to somewhere while taking a walk, if you want nostalgia, this album has it all and it was well worth the wait, despite its flaws.
NOTE: Tackling this album as a whole would be insane. The entire album with both discs is over 4 hours long, so I decided to put them up as their own individual discs and compare them later. But, the show must go on, and this is what I have to say about disc one.
I didn’t think I’d like anything released by house artists since turning on the radio lately, but Deadmau5 always comes out and surprises me. As much as I dislike the overplayed hype of EDM on z100 or any other top 100 station, it’s nice to see some diversity album-wise. I haven’t heard most of while (1<2) on the radio lately, instead I’ve heard some David Guetta and that one song from Disclosure but not the rest of the album (seriously guys, come on, Settle is godlike), but no real notoriety for Deadmau5. And if this first disc doesn’t show you what mainstream house producers are capable of… I don’t know what to tell you.
The first disc starts off with your standard house jams like “Avarita” and “My Pet Coelacanth” just to get you into the mood, but when you hear his remix of “Ice Age” by How to Destroy Angels you know he means business. It’s a lot different from these house jams but still has a subtle intensity that slowly fills the track. The varied instrumentation and electronic blips seems more like a Boards of Canada remix rather than what we’ve come to expect from the mau5. “Infra Turbo Pigcart Racer” jumps straight back into the fun before it takes a dark turn with “Terrors in My Head” and “Creep”, which is a gorgeous piano-led electronic saunter through dark glitches and bitcrushed snares. This is the saddest I’ve seen Deadmau5, and he knows how to convey that emotion well in his music.
The sadness continues as “Somewhere Up Here” comes into play, but the piano seems to lighten up the mood, like finding a light at the end of the tunnel and being mystified on what you’ve stumbled upon. It’s slow, it grooves, and it’s sexy with the voices whispering incoherently in the background. “Phantoms Can’t Hang” is a good single for those just getting into electronica and house music, but to be honest, I’m not a huge fan of it. But the final track “Gula” is a great mixture of what we’ve heard from this disc. Smooth piano and the most booming bass this disc has to offer, it’s the borderline of sanity and insanity.
Final Verdict: Although it lacks some of the more intense moments that >insert album title here< had, it makes up for it by the sheer diverse moments that are on the first part. The piano parts that are scattered throughout do give a sense of dread and somber seclusion, but it’s nice to hear it have the pacing of a traditional album and still be interesting for house artist today. I don’t know what the next disc will bring, but I’m hoping for the best.
In Do the Shuffle, one of our team members puts their iPod on shuffle and makes a playlist out of the first ten songs that play. It’s a great way to find new music or rediscover the old stuff. Enjoy!
I really, really didn’t want to dislike this album… When I heard that there was gonna be a follow-up to Blunderbuss, I was excited for more of the same, or at least a little more experimentation that could push forward the evolution of the Jack White sound. What I got was really… false advertising. When the first snippet of the title track came out it sounded PUNCHY, it came out with a bang. Distortion, grinding guitars, Jack’s signature vocals and his hilarious take on singing Spanish lyrics and the violins, OH MY THE VIOLINS. I was excited, I was ready for a weirdly delayed “Freedom at 21”, and a grindy “Sixteen Saltines”, and a soulful “Love Interruption”. And instead of that we get five or six songs straight of nothing but Jack’s attempt at country-rock.
If you’ve read my reviews before, I have absolutely no problem with artists progressing and evolving into different genres, but this wasn’t an evolution. This was an abrupt shift, a whiplash into new territory with no explanation of how he got there. When listening to stuff like “Want and Able”, “Alone in My Home”, and “High Ball Stepper” I hear that he’s channeling his childhood heroes, but I don’t hear the justice being given to them. When it does get to more message-driven tracks like “Entitlement”, it has a message yeah, but there’s not really emotion behind it, it just gets kind of preachy. If I wanted to listen to someone whine about the state of the world, I’d listen to Everyday Robots or Plastic Beach, and at least Damon Albarn does it subtly.
The thing is, I kept seeing collaborations of Neil Young and him and seeing all the different influences that he’s stated about his music, about the blues, about blues-rock, and I was thinking he could get people together to make a solid classic rock album with a star-studded cast. Instead we get something like this, Jack still thinking that DIY is something that can still be attained although you have a lot of room for production value and connections that could potentially put your album on the top of the charts.
If there’s one thing I can say was good about the album is Jack White as an artist will produce something else and maybe this is just a fluke. He’s gonna make a lot of fans with this one and will lose some, but then there are people like me who are gonna want more and are not gonna let another album ruin their good memories that they’ve had with them. He has the ability to do a lot more, and a lot of the little sounds that he’s created for this album are rather enjoyable. The distorted violin is a cool twinge to things but that’s about the only sound I really found interesting.
Sad to say that this is album is… (oh God, don’t kill me) generic, on first listen you’re almost outraged, and by the second listen you’re more like “Well, what’re you gonna do? I guess I’ll just listen to Blunderbuss instead.” I really do hope that there is more Jack White in the future with more songs from The Dead Weather and just other soulful things that he’s working on cuz this… it didn’t deliver.
The fact that the Black Keys are around in the music world and they continue to sell out stadiums and records with an old-school sound is appalling to me. It’s not because they’re bad or anything, but it’s because I don’t think a lot of people in this generation of music really appreciate the roots of where a lot of their favorite radio-played rock comes from. Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney are two people who love their roots and show it in their blues/garage-rock driven musical odysseys that bring you to a booming Nashville, or a rockin’ Chicago. And even though the rock is still here in it’s cleanest form because of producer Danger Mouse, the blues and the sadness and somberness of these songs are the elements that push it forward.
What drew me to the album besides the lead single, “Fever”, was the story behind the songwriting and Auerbach’s hard times in the past few years. Following the divorce with his wife and losing custody of his child, Carney even said that it was the saddest he’s ever seen his bandmate. But, sadness does fuel tempestuous and visceral songwriting that is heard throughout and that’s one of the strongest suits of the album. Never once do you feel as if the heartbroken songs are contrived or cliched, and instead you end up feeling for Dan more than anything. Especially on the track “10 Lovers” that says “Don’t leave us down and out again/Your little girl can’t comprehend/She had another dream that her mama’s gone/She’s all right, but you’re all wrong”.
From the start of the album we’re greeted to a heightened production value on “Weight of Love” where you’re brought this country acoustic and electric piano that just strums in like a passing cloud and this burst of electric guitar like a lightning strike in the distance, and then as soon as it gets going, the bass thumps with that familiar Gorillaz-like sound and Auerbach’s voice has a particular drab inflection with a hint of genuine soul and sadness that is accompanied by a higher-pitched Auerbach in the chorus. Actually, in a lot of these songs he decides to take the falsetto road. “Turn Blue”, “Waiting on Words”, “10 Lovers”, “In Time”, all take the high-pitched way to resemble a wail or a cry, which is effective in most of these cases. There are some times where the Black Keys actually sound like the Black Keys of lore with “Fever” and “It’s Up To You Now” which are cool tracks on their own, so for all of you purists out there who want to hear some blues-rock with more rock, there are those tracks and the closer, “Gotta Get Away”.
For the most part, I enjoyed the album. I loved the somber tone, I like the little hints of female voices in the production, the sound effects to make it like a 70’s psychedelic road trip was fantastic and when it was put in, it really worked in it’s favor. There are some songs that fell a bit under the GREAT spectrum for me, but they’re few. (Only like “In Time” and “It’s Up To You Now”) Other than that, the people who mistake the emotion for blandness and blame it on Brian Burton’s brilliant production, I’ve got no idea what their talking about. But I may be biased considering he produced a couple of my favorite albums… *cough* Demon Days *cough*
Final Verdict: While it’s not as sad or as punchy as something like Queens of the Stone Age’s “…Like Clockwork”, it’s still a great, dour album with moments that will make you look down with your eyes closed and say “sing it, brother, I feel you”. And that’s what an album is supposed to do, right? It’s supposed to make you feel something whether it be happy, sad, angry, joyful, or anything else. It’s a win for me.
For those of you who like Jazz, I commend you. It’s one of the genres that’s a passing fancy nowadays, dominated only by big, dead names like John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk and others. I grew up listening to jazz, it was my first genre I ever really explored and it still remains my absolute favorite type of music. It gets you in the mood, it helps you study, it can be fun, contemplative, and sometimes raunchy if need be. So, no doubt when I heard about BADBADNOTGOOD, a jazz trio from Toronto, I was psyched to see what they offered, not only in terms of listenability, but with what new concepts they brought to change the game. With “BBNG” and “BBNG2”, freeform hip-hop, post-punk, and even Legend of Zelda covers were found within seconds of putting the record on. But as these guys evolved they put their efforts into making some pretty decent original singles, and with that evolution comes “III”.
When “III” starts off, you know that there’s something more mature about the trio to begin with. Their production value has gone from GarageBand to full studio. Their skills in no way have decreased and instead, their experimentation with more instruments, synthesizers, and techniques do well to show progress and still keep some of the old stuff fresh in our heads. “Triangle” sounds like a traditional Monk track in the very beginning and it sort of unravels in snare hits and piano flutters that get darker with every note. “Can’t Stay the Night” does the same, with its dark atmosphere that’s brought up even more by the plucked synth bass that seems to circle around your headphones. “Confessions” is where stuff really picks up, and with Leland Whitty (saxophonist and frequent collaborator), it has this hauntingly beautiful sax motif that just goes through higher minor scales and then the choruses just burst with such sensuality that you wish this was in a love scene. Plus, to really bring in the intimacy, on the parts where it’s just Leland you can hear him just as he’s breathing into the sax which just puts me on edge, AH! So good.
If the first three tracks didn’t get you going and into their original stuff (because believe me, I didn’t like it at first listen until it got to track four), “Kaleidoscope” is going to do it for you. Combining subtle bass, shining electric piano, what sounds like a bassoon coming out of the corner of the room, and horns that these guys hit on the head the VERY. FIRST. TIME. Sounding like something out of an old 90’s courtroom drama, and then everything picks up when the bass starts belting out this 3 minute solo that keeps impressing you no matter how many times you repeat it. “Hedron” is the lead single off of this album and it brings you back to the old-school feel of BBNG with it just being about the piano, bass, and drums that bring you into this hip-hop groove and doesn’t let up when all three start going complete MAD. It may sound smooth at first, but don’t let this track fool you, this is what BBNG should sound like. These are the sounds that made me fall in love with them in the first place.
Despite all of these things though, there might be a couple moments where this doesn’t grip me in the way I wanted them to. Like I said, it takes a couple of tracks to get into with “Kaleidoscope” being the main catalyst to the album. It’s like Breaking Bad, you’ve gotta wait a couple episodes to get into it. “Eyes Closed” seems like it wasn’t even written by BBNG, it sounds like a companion piece of Interpol and Grizzly Bear, and I wasn’t feeling it too much. “Since You Asked Kindly” isn’t a mess, per say, but I would’ve let them do another “Definitely, Still” where it was smoother and more jazz-oriented than this persistent electronic odyssey. And “CS60” is just… weird, combining like 3 different genres into something that kind of ends up a jumbled mess. The string arrangements are nice, and in the first moment where it seems like an experimental 70’s contemporary jazz act like Spyro Gyra are all-around decent, but then it hits like a brick with the trap/hip-hop influence and it doesn’t do a closing song justice. This song doesn’t have the flow that some of the other straight jazz tracks do and it’s just unappealing.
Final Verdict: For their first real collection of original material, BBNG do pull off a decent amount of tricks and enjoyable tracks, but this is no hat trick. I love the first two albums more than this one, but not by much. This shows that the trio is coming into its own and pursuing something wonderful that I don’t want to miss. The World of Jazz is either going to have a legendary band or an underrated gem. Either is fine with me.
Like most so-called “Electropop” acts that are out there, Phantogram is pretty much a staple to the genre. With their release of “Eyelid Movies” back in 2010, these guys stuck their toes in the water and really wowed us with a splash of interesting sonic experiments and songs that combine soul and sadness and beauty and all of that jazz. Now with their sophomore album coming out this year, “Voices” should be that proper follow-up that we’ve been expecting. And… yeah, it pretty much delivers, though it does fall flat a couple of times, but hey, what album doesn’t?
The thing about “Voices” is that you can’t really tell if there is some new found production value, but this is one of the examples that you really have to look at the songwriting capabilities to see if there’s something worthwhile to the record other than Single Power. For those of you who don’t know, “Single Power” is when the album has the potential to push out those radio-friendly nuisances that ring in our ears over and over and over again. “Fall in Love” seems to be the only single that’s up, so that could be a good thing or just as easily terrible. If that’s the only song to be put up on the radio, then does that mean the rest of the songs are hidden gems or garbage?
Anyway, from the get go, “Nothing But Trouble” grips you with the pulse-pounding drums and the burst of what seems like a bitcrushed horn section just glitching across the whole track. Sarah Barthel’s voice is the perfect contrast to the chaos around her and the sugary softness of it offers up something in likability, but it will wane in other tracks. “Black Out Days” gives you the same thing with the buzzing synths following Barthel’s wails of “OH WAY AY YA OH WAY AY YA”. “Never Going Home” is a cool break in between craziness with Josh Carter’s vocals being a little bit less prominent. The one thing about this album that I’m not too big of a fan of is Josh Carter’s vocals which were soulful and somber in tracks like “You Are the Ocean and I’m Good” or “Turn It Off” which were my absolute favorite tracks off of “Eyelid Movies” and this time he’s kind of just pushed to the side to sing repetitive hooks.
Sadly, the 2nd half of the album is where things start to go a bit downhill. “Howling at the Moon”, although it starts like a Flying Lotus track just derails with the off-beat vocals. I’d rather have that as an instrumental. Barthel’s vocals don’t go well with the chaos because she’s trying to make it even more chaotic and her voice doesn’t fit it. Get someone like Alice Glass from Crystal Castles if you would want to do something like that. “Bad Dreams” has the same problem, a great, intriguing instrumental but pinpoint the moment where Barthel has some trouble hitting the high notes. Something that should be soulful just plummets to something screechy. “Bill Murray” sounds like a more tolerable Lana Del Ray song, and if anyone, ANYONE knows me, I don’t like her. The redeeming factor is that I can hear Barthel summoning her inner Annie Clark for the choral additions and reverberated vocals. “I Don’t Blame You” is the somewhat saving grace. The production has enough contrast that it pulls you in, and Carter’s singing is a lot more soulful than in “Never Going Home”. It sounds like an unholy union of Passion Pit and Bloc Party.
Final Verdict for this album: The production and the instrumentals are fantastic with each and every noise is in it’s right place and keeping you hooked, but the songs can get tiresome after a while with repetition or with just lackluster lyrics and forgettable hooks. If you’re going to choose an album to listen to, check out “Eyelid Movies” instead, but this does sound good, it’s solid.
Thee Oh Sees’ Drop… this is one that’s kind of hard for me to review because of all the stuff that has been going with these guys in the past year or so. John Dwyer (vocals/guitar) has gone on to do his synth-related solo project Damaged Bug, and before that it was announced that they we’re taking an indefinite hiatus to work on other things. Then THIS THING comes out of nowhere and… you get it, they’re weird. But that’s what expect from Thee Oh Sees, right? Weird, loud, fun antics that are captured through noise and shouting “woo” all the time, right? Well….
This release, surprisingly, is a lot more tame than the others. I came in listening to “Floating Coffin” and had so much fun with all the distortion and reverb and psychedelic elements while still grinding out some face-punching riffs and basslines. But to come to this, AND look at the cover of the album, it’s not as crazy as one would imagine. Songs like the opener “Penetrating Eye” and “Savage Victory” are slow meanders through weird landscapes made by off-putting effects. “Savage Victory” has this delay on a scratched guitar that makes it sound like a door creaking open to reveal something sinister in the next room.
The other moments on this album that do have a little more energy like “Drop” and “Put Some Reverb on My Brother” seem to be dying down even in their own right. The guitar solos are becoming less coherent and more noisy, but not in a very good way. Do they grind? Yes. Do they screech? Yes. But are they enjoyable to listen to? No, they’re like nails on a chalkboard. This is coming from a guy who LOVES Sonic Youth and My Bloody Valentine, but where have riffs and elements that experiment with sound, this doesn’t and leaves me somewhat deaf.
This doesn’t mean that the album is all bad. “Encrypted Bounce” sounds like Austin Powers’ pad if he lived in the 90’s and in a basement where all of his friends and swingers gathered around in That 70’s Show. “King’s Nose” is progressive enough and reminds me that these guys aren’t just noisemakers and are actually musicians. “Transparent World” takes the cake in experimentation with a 9/4 time signature and wispy vocals that seem like ghosts whispering in your ear.
The other thing I have to commend is the production on the whole album. They maintain a way, somehow, to produce songs that are grindy enough to grit your teeth, and smooth enough with the drums and the basslines that keep you swaying with a pout like you’re a bad boy.
Final verdict, is this their best? No, not by a long shot. If this is what they want to go out on, then it’s a calm after the whipping maelstroms that are “Carrion Crawler/The Dream”, “Floating Coffin”, “Castlemania”, and “Putrifiers II” If you want to go ahead and listen to some calmed-down punk (if that’s a thing?) go ahead and check this album out. But if you really wanna hear the raw power of these Californians, check out something else these guys have done.
