Year end lists are not an easy thing to do, and generally are of little interest outside of looking at others in hopes of justifying your own likes. Still, I enjoy the task and look forward to the end of each year to once again try and come up with something to share with anyone who chooses to peek. The biggest problem I run into each year (and something I hope to change in 2009) is that I never keep close track of my new discoveries each year. So, I am left to work off of my memory and take a look over what I reviewed throughout the year (and double checking their release dates). The end results for the 2008 campaign is a 22-album list. Something I noticed while going over my listenings is that I did not stray too far into esoteric stuff. Most of the titles that stick to my memory are pretty close to the mainstream. However, with that said, they should not be dismissed too easily as even mainstream bands can release good music too. Furthermore, I want to thank everyone who has recommended artists too me; I need to start keeping a list. Please keep them coming, I do not know when I will get to them, but I do appreciate them. On to the albums of 2008! They are in no particular order beyond the top 5, and remember this is not intended as a "best of" and is intended for informational purposes only. Outside of that, I hope you enjoyed some of these albums as much as I did. Warrel Dane – Praise to the War Machine. This is an album I was not expecting a lot from, but from the very first listen I knew I loved it. I have become a Nevermore fan over the years and really like Dane's voice. The material here is distinctly different from Nevermore and feels a lot more personal. Warrel Dane's voice is powerful and carries so much emotional weight that it is hard to ignore. Now, it is not only his voice that makes this album so good, but the music and lyrics as well. It really is a complete package. Favorite tracks: "When We Pray," "August," "The Day the Rats Went to War," and "Brother." Gojira – The Way of All Flesh. Ever since I first experienced Gojira live, back in 2007, I have been in love with this French metal act. They floored me with their impeccable musicianship, songwriting, and sheer heaviness. It took me a while to get a copy of The Way of All Flesh (long story), but one listen and I knew the love affair was destined to continue. They remind me of a metal jam band, a tighter version of Mastodon perhaps. I know, not a terribly good analogy, but it works. This new album shows the band improving their song writing while keeping everything heavy and brutal, even showing stronger musicianship. This is a band to definitely keep an eye on. Favorite Tracks: "Toxic Garbage Island," "Vacuity," "A Sight to Behold," and "The Art of Dying."
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January 14, 2009 - 6:49 pm
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Music
If it’s around-the-clock partying you crave, Berlin is already an embarrassment of riches. Now Germany’s club capital has a new kid on the block. Occupying an abandoned electricity station, Dice has all the credentials to rival the big players like Watergate and Berghain/Panoramabar. According to Beatportal, the club’s three rooms (including a terrace for “after hours Sunday sessions”) are installed with Funktion 1 soundsystems and lighting from the same whizzes who did the Watergate fit-out. Dice is located at Voltairestr 5 in Mitte. Crucially, the musical trimmings will be just as classy. The likes of Luke Solomon, Simon Baker, Gabriel Ananda and Aril Brikha are all locked in for Dice’s opening spell – with more on the Berlin-patented house and techno tip sure to follow. Photo from Beatportal
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January 13, 2009 - 12:32 am
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Music
Thoughts turned to my re-issue pile this week and part of me quivered in anticipation. I shall be doing my best to cull a few from the pile each week as the new release scheduled quiets a bit before the big spring push. Apocalyptica: World Collide A bit late to the party on this one, as it was released in 2007, and it seemed to have passed me by. As someone who has been following the band since its days as “cellos covering Metallica” each new album intrigues me. As is their want these days there are several guest vocalists on here including Lacuna Coil’s Christina Scabbia on “S.O.S. (Anything but Love)”. This song sounds quite a bit like her original band, but with lots more cellos than usual. Its quite a good female-fronted goth metal track and quite enjoyable. I'm not sure the collaboration with Corey Taylor of Slipknot/Stone Sour fame, “I’m not Jesus,” works as well, ditto the track with the bloke from Three Days Grace. In fact, most every song on here features someone or other from the metal scene. Then again Apocalyptica are a talented band and pretty hot at the moment, so no one worth their salt would turn them down. It doesn’t strike as their best effort, but that is not to say it's bad. This band rarely do anything awful. Still, I have to say I would love to hear more of the cellos and less of the stuff that sounds like “bog-standard” metal with a dash of cellos. A good album, but just not a great one. Scale the Summit: Carving Desert Canyons Don’t know that much about this lot and confess to never have heard of them before, but I like what I hear. I would call them a slightly heavier Dream Theater without the tendency to over-do things. Prog-metal that is, for the most part, kept to a reasonable length and with the bounds of patience (nothing 10+ minutes). This is a great sound-track to driving, when you want to think and don’t want words getting in the way. It's damn well played stuff that really does rise about the morass of similar stuff out there, which as you well know I have a major soft spot for. It is very accessible and you find yourself not missing the words in any way. It takes a while to even miss them to be honest. I love the soaring nature of the track “Sargasso Sea” which just draws you into the waves of music that flow through it.
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January 12, 2009 - 2:52 pm
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Music
“I’d like to introduce a sexier side of me,” Keyshia Cole coos on the slinky intro to her third album. True to her word, the Atlanta singer sheds her street sass for some softer tunes. “Make Me Over” is a shimmying, string-pierced vamp — break out your jazz hands! — and “No Other” pumps Spanish guitar into a Mary J.-style monogamy ode. Not everything feels fresh: The lyrics are gooey (“Touch my soul, make me lose control”), and Tupac makes a posthumous cameo. Cole does better when she keeps an eye toward the future.
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January 10, 2009 - 11:34 pm
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Music
Top UK trend bible the Sunday Times declared disco to be London’s new New Rave this week, suggesting office parties and hen nights are set to dominate the lifestyles of вЂ?cool kids’ in 2009. “Disco nouveau is here and it’s time to party,” declared Sunday Times style hack Hanna Hanra, “Whereas “cool” music scenes are often the preserve of kids taking drugs in dark corners, disco is camp and bright and sparkly and opportunist. Anyone can shake a tail feather to the anti-ageist, happy-go-luckiness of a disco tune,” she enthused. Singling out nouveau disco champions including Erol Alkan and Dan Beaumont from Disco Bloodbath, the leading London fashion DJ also name-checked Abba and the Village People, stressing вЂ?many of the tunes played are comfortingly familiar from the first time around; Which makes the trend much more accessible,” she added. The Sunday Times decision to elevate вЂ?nouveau disco’ could signal serious trouble for the nightlife niche, however, given the paper’s traditional treatment of their вЂ?next big thing’ favourites such as electroclash and new rave. Declaring вЂ?Rave New World- A bunch of crazy kids in crazy outfits is shaking up the zeitgeist,’ in November 2006, the paper interviewed Super Super magazine Director Steve Slocombe who told them вЂ?“We think about new rave on a daily basis here,” “I can look at a pot plant and think вЂ?how new rave is that?’” the Art Director added, “And can I wear it? To which the answer is вЂ?Yes, clearly?’ However, just three months later the 3 million selling newspaper U turned, with a typically brutal declaration in their in/ out fashion column in their Style magazine. “New Rave Music. Dare we say it? Yes we do. It’s rubbish,” the paper scoffed.
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January 9, 2009 - 5:29 am
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Music
For Phillips “Pip” Brown, the New Zealand-born singer-songwriter known as Ladyhawke, 1985 is not merely a year: It’s a career choice. Ladyhawke — the name comes from a Matthew Broderick fantasy film released in, yep, 1985 — is a retro fetishist, slathering her songs in synthesizer fanfares and thudding drum machines that precisely evoke the mid-Eighties sound of Pat Benatar, Kim Wilde and the Top Gun soundtrack. Ladyhawke is a skillful craftswoman, and in songs like the grandiose “Magic” she whips her synths into stormy dance-floor fun. But as with so much Eighties revivalism, there is a chilly emptiness to the exercise; most of the songs feel like fashion statements. She’d have done well to heed her own advice in “Another Runaway”: “It’s too late to call back yesterday.”
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January 8, 2009 - 5:34 pm
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Music
Ethereal Norwegian beatmakers Röyksopp have been lying low in recent times, but new album Junior is poised to change that. With its predecessor The Understanding enjoying a long honeymoon period (how long were we hearing Trentemoller’s remix of What Else Is There?), a new set of songs is very welcome. Joining Torbjørn Brundtland and Svein Berge on the new record is a who’s who of Scandinavian starlets. Guests so far revealed include Robyn, Lykke Li, Anneli Drecker and the ever-haunting Karin Dreijer from The Knife. Now, can we resume praying for that fateful Röyksopp tour? Junior is due for a late March 2009 release.
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January 7, 2009 - 10:14 am
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Music
Prior to the coming of the Spanish in the 16th century, Peru was home to the sophisticated civilization of the Inca empire. Although the Inca had managed to subjugate their various neighbours and raise exquisite cities, they quickly fell to the Spaniards due to gunpowder, disease, and deceit. Once the conquistadors had sated their lust for gold, it was time to start settling the territory, and since they had pretty much exterminated the local crop of potential slaves they had to rely on importing Africans like everyone else. As has been the case throughout the Western hemisphere where Africans were used as slaves, the African population in Peru brought with them their own traditions, including music. However, unlike North America where it became one of the key foundations for popular music, in Peru their music, like their population, has remained segregated from the mainstream. African Americans in South America are routinely second class citizens, and anything associated with them is considered inferior, including their music. So, aside from sporadic recognition from outside performers like David Byrne's The Soul Of Black Peru released in 1995, little Afro-Peruvian music has been heard outside of its own community. In 2001 four young Peruvians, Ramon Perez-Prieto, Grimaldo Del Solar, Rafael Morales, and Carlos Li Carrillo, from outside the Afro-Peruvian community formed the group Novalima as a way to experiment with their appreciation for both Peruvian and modern music, and in 2002 released their first disc, Novalima. They had invited various musicians from the Afro Peruvian community to participate and created a disc that mixed both traditional rhythms and contemporary sounds. When the disc went platinum in Peru, they realized they were onto something and in 2006, they released Afro internationally, and firmly establishing Afro-Peruvian music on the world scene as it spent ten weeks at number one on the US Collage Music Journal's Latin Alternative and New World charts. The band has now expanded to include permanent Afro-Peruvian musicians; Juan Medrano Cotito, Mangue Vasquez, Milagros Guerrero, and Marcos Mosquera, as well as renowned Peruvian drummer and percussionist Constantino Alvarez. It's this group, plus a variety of guest performers from the Afro-Peruvian music community, who can be heard on the band's forthcoming release (January 13, '09, US and Canada and Jan. 16 for the rest of the world) Coba Coba on the Cumbancha label.
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January 5, 2009 - 5:02 pm
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Music
When the house lights go down to start Ludacris’ Theater of the Mind, an ensemble cast takes to the stage and delivers a performance that is mostly comedic, sometimes sharp, sometimes funky, and often very entertaining. Unfortunately, Luda’s sixth studio album lacks a certain punch and finds the artist often forcing himself into sharp corners that don’t quite fit. At his best, Ludacris is a great rapper for creating sweltering club bangers focused around clipped beats and his Southern drawl. His contributions to pop music have been significant and have even scooped him some Grammy Awards. But on a deeper level, Ludacris struggles to escape the alcove of party rapper. Theater of the Mind doesn’t help matters. That’s not to say that this isn’t an enjoyable album, but beyond the quips and beats there really isn’t a whole lot here. As per usual, a whole array of producers is used. DJ Premier, Scott Storch, Trackmasters, and more all have their hands on tracks. And the litany of guest stars is colossal, drawing comparisons to a Paul Haggis flick. Jay-Z, Nas, Common, Lil Wayne, T-Pain, T.I., The Game, Jamie Foxx, and others are given spots to shine as “co-stars” in this Theater of the Mind. The hitch is that all of the guest stars, producers, and sound clips from Chris Rock and Spike Lee don’t help Ludacris emerge into the spotlight. After the intro warning us that “they’re about to start the movie,” Luda rolls into “Undisputed.” The cut features garrulous hype work from boxer Floyd Mayweather and includes a stunningly obsolete reference to the Pacers punch-up at the Palace of Auburn Hills in 2004. Fortunately, Luda is sharper on most of the other cuts. The self-deprecatingly wicked “Everybody Hates Chris” draws up one of the best lines on the record when he spits “still counting, still climbing the charts, and rappers still talking shit like they was rhyming in farts.” And “One More Drink," featuring T-Pain, tells a funny story about boozing too much, regrets, and taking drunken pictures on a camera phone. “Last of a Dying Breed” includes the best rapper of 2008, Lil Wayne, and bounces with a hard, speckled beat. Nas and Jay-Z show up on “I Do It For Hip Hop,” pulling together one of the album’s best cuts with quick verses and old school scratches. The usual “message” cut closes out the record, with “Do the Right Thing” filling the spot. Common is a nice choice for co-conspirator on the track, but Luda’s work leaves a lot to be desired and the song lacks thrust and impact. And that’s really the basic problem with Theater of the Mind; Ludacris has trouble as a serious rapper. Whether it’s message tracks or thug cuts like the featureless “Wish You Would” or the daft “Call Up the Homies, he simply never casts a big enough shadow to be taken for an intimidating or shrewd performer. As pure entertainment, then, Ludacris’ record works. As anything else, this is one Theater troupe that should probably leave it to the pros.
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January 4, 2009 - 5:21 am
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Music
D'Haene, Vinyl D'Haene's new disc is spring-loaded with hard-locked rhythms, chunky guitar riffing, and metalized melodies sung with a bluesy, soulful inflection. If, vocally, D'Haene tends to be a touch more convincing on more easy-going fare ("Took Me So Long"), that's because of the soulful quality that defines his vocal style. One of the CD's best points is the way many of the songs surprise you with unexpected bridges and codas, as in "Wouldn't You Like To Know," or with varied flavors like the Latin opening of "Brand New Threads!" The impeccable musicianship and harmony vocals are also a pleasure throughout. The soul influence becomes explicit with the nodding triplets and organ bed of "I'll Be Your Man," though D'Haene's characteristic guitar buzz remains, maintaining consistency with the disk's overall feel. The same thing happens in the jazzy underpinning of "Playin' It Cool," complete with muted trumpet. Bookended by the hard-rocking "Another Like You" and "My Woman," this set of solid songs and ace playing is worthy listen. June Moris, White Spot June Moris' seven-song disc is a hypnotic set; her quavery voice sounds as if it's bubbling up from an underground stream, accompanied by the hum of insects and distant bells ringing. The atmosphere ranges from a strained, thinly angry pounding, slightly reminiscent of PJ Harvey, to a techno coolness, to a thick Brian Eno drone, but Moris' fluty voice carries through all. It's an effective, even thrilling tactic through the first five songs. On the sixth track, "The Memory," Moris tries for melodramatic balladry, leaving what seems her natural, postmodern sonic habitat, and it doesn't work as well. At the end one is left, not with melodies to hang a memory on – Moris isn't about that – but with a pleasingly disturbing sense of disquiet. Shivery mission accomplished.page 1 | 2
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January 2, 2009 - 10:50 pm
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Music