30 December 2011

Various Artists - "Feu‘netik Sampler"

Very good drum & bass compilation (8/10)

With our first release we open the floodgates and fill up your ears to the brim with a vivid variety of music in order to let it be heard in the way it's meant to be: totally free of charge and as individual as those who produced it. Whether it's intricate electro, smooth breakbeats, fresh hip-hop or relaxed ambient - a personal note always goes hand in hand with the musical ones. The phonetik fellas team up with the long-legged lady to define what a colourful and interesting compilation can be. And what it should be. :)

iDEOLOGY has entered the building. Leech on!

Very good compilation of independent electronic music. This is the first release of the netlabel iD.EOLOGY and right from the start they set the bar very high. The album is oriented mainly on (but not limited to) drum & bass. Some elements of breakbeat, nu jazz and downtempo can be easily found too, making the record more diverse and interesting. There is only a one flaw - a very unfortunate hip-hop song "Late At Night" by Broke Gringos. Not only it does not fit here stylistically, but what worse it is simply bland and boring. All the others are top quality, so if you like intelligent electronic music, do not hesitate to check it out.

The album has been released by the iD.EOLOGY netlabel and is available for downloading at the netlabel's website in mp3 and ogg formats. It has been released under a specific Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivatives license described here.




SUPPORT INDEPENDENT ARTISTS

If you like this album and you can afford it, consider supporting the netlabel and its artists by purchasing goods in its shop.

26 December 2011

Grieg, E. & Brahms, J. - "Peer Gynt Suite" (Various Artists)

Tracklist:
01. Grieg, E. - Peer Gynt Suite, No. 1 Op. 46
Performed by Philharmonic Ensemble Pro Musica. Conducted by Herbert Fleischmann.
02. Grieg, E. - Peer Gynt Suite, No. 2 Op. 55
Performed by Philharmonic Ensemble Pro Musica. Conducted by Herbert Fleischmann.
03. Grieg, E. - Symphonic Dance, No. 4
Performed by Nurnberger Symphoniker. Conducted by Rato Tschupp.
04. Brahms, J. - Tragic Overture, Op. 81
Performed by Nurnberger Symphoniker. Conducted by Hanspeter Gmur.



Edvard Hagerup Grieg (15 June 1843 -- 4 September 1907) was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt (which includes Morning Mood and In the Hall of the Mountain King), and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.

Peer Gynt
Ibsen asked Edvard Grieg to compose incidental music for the play. Grieg composed a score that plays approximately ninety minutes. Grieg extracted two suites of four pieces each from the incidental music (Opus 46 and Opus 55), which became very popular as concert music. Two of the sung parts of the incidental music ended up in these suites (the famous In the Hall of the Mountain King in the 1st suite with the vocal parts omitted, and the last part of 2nd suite, Solveig's Song, the solo part now played by violin rather than sung, though the vocal version is sometimes substituted). (Originally, the second suite had a fifth number, The Dance of the Mountain King's Daughter, but Grieg withdrew it.) Grieg himself declared that it was easier to make music "out of his own head" than strictly following suggestions made by Ibsen. For instance, Ibsen wanted music that would characterize the "international" friends in the fourth act, by melding the said national anthems (Norwegian, Swedish, German, French and English). Reportedly, Grieg was not in the right mood for this task.

The music of these suites, especially Morning Mood starting the first suite, In the Hall of the Mountain King, and the string lament Åse's Death later reappeared in numerous arrangements, soundtracks, etc.

The four Symphonic Dances of the Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg, form the collection notated as Op. 64. They were written c. 1896 and draw their inspiration from the earlier folk works collected by Ludvig Lindeman. * Dance No. 1, G major, Allegro moderato e marcato * Dance No. 2, A major, Allegretto grazioso * Dance No. 3, D major, Allegro giocoso * Dance No. 4, A minor, Andante: Allegro risoluto
[Read more --->]



Johannes Brahms (pronounced [joːˈhanəs ˈbʁaːms]; 7 May 1833 -- 3 April 1897) was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period.

The Tragic Overture (German: Tragische Ouvertüre), Op. 81, is a concert overture for orchestra written by Johannes Brahms during the summer of 1880. It premiered on December 26, 1880 in Vienna. Most performances last between twelve and fifteen minutes.

Brahms chose the title "Tragic" to emphasize the turbulent, tormented character of the piece, in essence a free-standing symphonic movement, in contrast to the mirthful ebullience of a companion piece he wrote the same year, the Academic Festival Overture. Despite its name, the Tragic Overture does not follow any specific dramatic program. Brahms was not very interested in musical storytelling and was more concerned with conveying and eliciting emotional impressions. He summed up the effective difference between the two overtures when he declared "one laughs while the other cries." Brahms quotes some material from the last movement of the Second Symphony in this overture.

The Tragic Overture comprises three main sections, all in the key of D minor. * Allegro ma non troppo * Molto più moderato * Tempo primo ma tranquillo.

The work is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, and strings.
[Read more --->]


Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 3 from 29. August 2011

EAC extraction logfile from 21. December 2011, 12:00

Various Artists / Peer Gynt Suite

Used drive  : PLDS    DVD+-RW DH-16AAS   Adapter: 1  ID: 0

Read mode               : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache      : No
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction                      : 6
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out          : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks   : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations       : Yes
Used interface                              : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Gap handling                                : Appended to previous track

Used output format : Internal WAV Routines
Sample format      : 44.100 Hz; 16 Bit; Stereo


TOC of the extracted CD

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     Test CRC 53BEEEAD
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Track  2

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     Test CRC 8F5C6946
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     Copy OK

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     Copy OK

Track  4

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No errors occurred

End of status report



PERFORMER: auCDtect Task Manager, ver. 1.5.1RC4 build 1.5.1.5
Copyright (c) 2008-2010 y-soft. All rights reserved
http://y-soft.org

ANALYZER: auCDtect: CD records authenticity detector, version 0.8.2
Copyright (c) 2004 Oleg Berngardt. All rights reserved.
Copyright (c) 2004 Alexander Djourik. All rights reserved.


FILE: 04 - Brahms, J. - Tragic Overture, Op. 81.flac
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Interested? Follow this link:
http://winstonsmith.wrzuta.pl/katalog/7RIFnAYw0aB/va_-_grieg_e._-_peer_gynt_suite

23 December 2011

Religionnaire - "Religionnaire V: Des Calques Aux Manies"

Mediocre '70s rock (5/10)

La genèse ainsi que la maturation foetale de Religionnaire s'effectue sur un fond sonore 70's oscillant particulièrement entre le The Kick Inside de Kate Bush et Atom Heart Mother de Pink Floyd. La redécouverte de ces deux albums 20 ans plus tard va non seulement se transformer en révélation, mais également influencer la base de son inspiration. [Read more --->]

The usual objections still apply, more or less. The album lacks interesting melodies, the voice of the singer is not interesting, ballads are quite boring, there is too much borrowing from the stars of the '70s. The best tracks are:
1 Des Calques...
2 Oui J'Aime le Rock, Progressif (obvious copying of Led Zeppelin style of writing)
5 Bandicapé
9 Religionnaire (one more proof that the artist is far better in aggressive hard rock than in pop rock ballads - see track 6 Olga - completely terrible, although the name is beautiful)
13 ...Aux Manies

Oh, I almost forgot about the biggest disaster - a track no. 10 Come Again, which is a rock version of the famous Adagio by Albinoni. This cover is so ugly it could be considered a crime against humanity.

[Artist's Myspace]

Creative Commons License

22 December 2011

Skaut - "Mind Asylum" [EP]

Thrash is not original. And so what? (9/10)

La musique de SKAUT s'appuie sur des rythmiques guitare en béton méga-armé et un mélange de mélodies et de violences. La basse, loin de se contenter de soutenir la guitare, trouve sa place en tant qu'instrument à part entière. Le batteur, avec un jeu typé metal par excellence, martèle le tout avec efficacité. Une voix alternant tour à tour des passages chantés, hurlés façon hardcore ou encore bien grave de chez Cavalera&Co.

La musique de SKAUT pourrait se définir par un mélange intéressant de plusieurs styles. Nous avons opté pour une "étiquette" Power-Thrash suite à différentes opinions de la part du public nous ayant vu en live ou écouté notre démo. Power-Thrash pour des riffs guitares sans concessions et pour nos influences les plus communes (Sepultura, Metallica des débuts, Slayer etc).

après une année 2005 marquée par des problèmes ralentissant sérieusement le groupe (vols de matériel, départs de musiciens), SKAUT va repartir au complet dès cet été et s'enfermer pour proposer du nouveau début 2006.

This is a really great quality offer from the no-longer-existing band Skaut. This is another example of the simple truth that it is not enough to be good to get a contract with "professional" record labels. Thank gods, nowadays you may publish your music yourself and screw morons from the recording industry mafia.

What? Music? Oh yes, music. The music is great. Professional level powerful thrash metal. Just check it out - not much to add, as everything works on this album like it should. People complain it is not original, but wait a minute! Hasn't thrash metal already been invented? OK. So now nobody should play it anymore, because "it is not original"? This is so stupid. You can complain some act is not original if it obviously mimics another band. But what is wrong with playing genre music? What about classical music? Shouldn't it be recorded anymore, because it is not original?

Skaut does not copy anyone - they just play typical thrash metal. They do it professionally, with style, power and energy. They are great at it. And they deserve praise for that.

Creative Commons License




SUPPORT INDEPENDENT ARTISTS

If you like this album and you can afford it, consider supporting the artist by making a donation.

Dollar Rex - "Chromatic"

Professional recording, but not quite my style (6/10)

All tracks composed > january > december 2004 by P.Regnier
mix - additional vocals on tracks 02 - 04 by P.Regnier in june 2005
Electric bass on tracks 09 - 11 by P.Regnier
Ze Sweetie Pink House 2005

This is a professional recording, showing expertise in producing catchy techno / house tunes, heavily based on disco and to a less extent on hip-hop and funk. Some tracks heavily reminded me of the works of the French duo Air, with their vintage sound.

Disco-based house is definitely not my favorite genre and while these tracks may probably work on the dancefloor, the most of them are too primitive to be enjoyable. Still I managed to find three tracks that are quite interesting for me, despite their disco origin (nos. 03, 07 & 09). The rest is rather tiring with monotonous marked beats and uncreative and repeating sampled vocals.

Fans of disco music can safely add 2 or 3 points to my rating, as it is a quality work from the technical side.

It is strange, because this album is shared two times on Jamendo, in exactly the same versions, governed by the same type of a license. The second one can be found here. It has been also archived by archive.org.

Creative Commons License

Van Syla - "Fantasia" [SP]

What a surprise! (4/10)
HAPPY HOLYDAYS TO YOU ALL !
I dedicate this album to all my friends, fans and generous donators and I thank them for their support and encouragements.
FANTASIA was supposed to contain several tracks but unfortunately, Jamendo decided otherwise.

For unknown reason Van Syla invited me to listen to her new album. I would not do that on my own, because I have a sick habit of reviewing all music I listen to on Jamendo and the last time I reviewed Van Syla I barely avoided being lynched by her outraged fans. But it would be unkind to reject an invitation, so here we are.

The album I listened to previously was "The Death Of A Star", a very very inept take on pseudo-orchestral space music. That is why I feared the worst. And... What a surprise! This short tune is almost listenable.

Let's start with the quality of samples. On "The Death Of A Star" they sounded like they had come from the cheapest toy keyboard. And here they sound natural (a harp being particularly impressive)! Even the worst of them are listenable, nowhere near the earlier bottom quality. A really significant progress has been made here - congratulations!

Another field where a progress can be seen is orchestration. Nothing spectacular with it, but at least the instruments work together to form a melody, instead of fighting for their lives like they did on "The Death Of A Star".

Unfortunately, Van Syla's composing skills are still lacking. The melody is rough and uncreative, making for a tiring listening experience. You can almost feel the pain with which these notes have been put together. Therefore, I still would not recommend this tune to anyone.

The hard work the artist did on sample quality and orchestration deserves appreciation though, provided it is a real progress. And it is a little difficult to judge, as we have only one short track here.

The album has been released on Jamendo and is available for downloading in mp3 encoding format.

Beware!

[Creative Commons License]

21 December 2011

Plaisance, C. & Doucet, S. - "Tranquility: Sacred Forest" (1998)

SACRED FOREST is perfect for Tai Chi, massage and meditation. The CD is part of the audio series "Sounds of Nature" and "Tranquility" combining the state-of-the-art binaural recordings of Chuck Plaisance with Suzanne Doucet's music. Seven of their titles made it into the top ten environmental charts at Amazon.com, including being #1 and #2 for over two years.Suzanne doucet's 30 years in the world of New Age music have provided her with incomparable knowledge and experience. [Read more --->]


Warning! Do not buy this album through Amazon or iTunes, because if you buy it there, almost all the money will go to the recording industry mafia and will be used later for committing crimes such as unlawful harassment of fans and bribing authorities to implement changes in law, which would infringe basic human rights.

If you want to pay the artist for this work, buy their music on CDBaby. They don't have this album there, but money is money, isn't it? You know what to do, right?

Fuck Amazon & iTunes. Support independent music and channels of distribution that actually care for their artists, like CDBaby does.


Tracklist:
01. Tranquility: Sacred Forest

[Suzanne Doucet's website]




PERFORMER: auCDtect Task Manager, ver. 1.5.1RC4 build 1.5.1.5
Copyright (c) 2008-2010 y-soft. All rights reserved
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ANALYZER: auCDtect: CD records authenticity detector, version 0.8.2
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FILE: 01-VA-~1.FLA
  Size: 308069125 Hash: E2C78E04FD44D3D73BE5FDB33B93943E Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: A6EEF898745EB8FBE6F5E9CDFC72A2D81B149621



Interested? Ask Uncle Google the magic question:
VA-Tranquility Sacred Forest-(CRG-1118)-CD-FLAC-1998-EMG site:fileflac.com

20 December 2011

Celibatfighters - "Remise en ordre"

Lack of interesting melodies, too eclectic (5/10)

Second album d'une longue série: Plus guilleret, il mêle une grande partie de nos influences musicales. Parlant des choses qui nous entourent, qui nous font rire, pleurer et nous énervent. Cet album est moins intime mais reste très proche de notre état d'esprit.

I was not too pleased with this recording. It lacks interesting melodies and is too eclectic. Eclecticism must not be a bad thing, but only if it is a planned action. Eclecticism on this album seems to be a result of a coincidence: "we somehow succeeded in composing some songs, so here they are". Also technical skills and quality of recording of some of these tunes are questionable (e.g. 03 Qu'est ce qui m'arrive?).

Only two tracks are better than average:
1 Aller simple - a very dark and moody tune with an interesting melody;
10 Bande a part - a light acoustic guitar song with a funny melody.

[Artist's Myspace]

Creative Commons License

18 December 2011

Akashic Records - "Christmas Party"

Not my piece of cake, but... (6/10)

Cheerful and energetic trance based on Jingle Bells.

Definitely not my piece of cake, but I have to acknowledge that the rendition is flawless. If you are into such simple dance music, you will love it.

Creative Commons License

16 December 2011

Bownik, Adam Certamen - "Mars Global Inspiration"

Nice ambient electronica (6/10)

'Mars Global Inspiration' is my newst album in a Berlin School-style. The music is enriched with sequencers, background pads, solos and singing vocoder.

Nice ambient electronica. Especially fans of space music, the sound of 80s and such artists as Klaus Schulze and J.M. Jarre should be delighted.

However, turn off the player before the 4th track starts. It's a terrible song with a singer's voice transformed with a vocoder. The voice is very ugly and on top of that the singer has a terrible English accent. Avoid at all costs.

[Artist's website / Myspace]

Creative Commons License




SUPPORT INDEPENDENT ARTISTS

If you like this album and you can afford it, consider supporting the artist by making a donation.

Fabercut - "Lies"

Could be better (5/10)
How lies can devastate and alienate, whether at home, in love, with friends, online, etc. This is the main subject of the album inspired by those who are able to lie in order to take advantage of people's trust.

A homemade album produced in 3 months (September - December 2011) with a guitar, a bass guitar and a computer.

Special thanks to Eugenio Zazzara for the original bass.

Rock heavily influenced by grunge. The band has some potential, but they have to work hard on many aspects of their music to make it attractive. First of all, the technical side is very weak. The mix is flat, of demo quality, with the voice often hidden deep in the background (Stranger in my bed, Atto Unico). It would be hard to enjoy this recording even if everything else was perfect. But it is not. Sometimes the singer is out of tune (Atto Unico). In "My hell" the singer too obviously tries to copy Alice In Chains' vocalist's style. In "Farewell" monotonous drums are really annoying. Finally the album lacks interesting melodies or energy.

Two tracks slightly stand out of the crowd: "Yourself online" - more energetic and with nice riffs and the final track "Lies" with more sophisticated arrangement creating disturbing atmosphere.

Like I said it is not a total disaster and they may get better if only they put enough hard work into their development.

Creative Commons License

15 December 2011

Celibatfighters - "Grande erreur, la"

Very amateurish rock (4/10)
Premier opus: Nostalgique et mélancolique, il vous plongera dans les moments de réflexion et de rêverie d'un célibataire sans pour autant être pessimiste et depressif. majoritairement acoustique, entre piano et guitare, certains morceaux sortent du lot pour retrouver des coups de gueules et des pures moments de délire.

Notre premier album. Une envie folle nous a pris d'écrire et de composer nos propres chansons. Alors nous l'avons fait, et puis nous avons voulu l'enregistrer et malgrès des moyens, euh, comment dire, plus que sommaire nous ne sommes pas trop mécontent du résultat. La grande erreur, ça nous tenait à coeur. Vous comprendrez quand vous écouterez la chanson du même titre.

(On recherche des musiciens suceptible de jouer avec nous si le coeur leur en dit, batteur, bassiste, voire meme chanteur...)

Very amateurish rock album. The best song is no. 4 Humanité, which has really nice melody and if it was not played and recorded so poorly, would be very successful. Nevertheless, it is still good, compared with the rest.

Their album "Remise en ordre" is far better.

The album has been released on Jamendo and is available for downloading in mp3 or ogg format.
Beware!



Creative Commons License

[Artist's website]

Printempo - "Printempo"

A masterpiece from a very strange netlabel (10/10)
Debiut Printempo można uznać za wyraz nostalgii za czasami, gdy muzyka instrumentalna była muzyką popularną. Pomimo dużego rozrzutu pod względem doboru utworów, płyta jako całość jest niezwykle spójna – elementem scalającym jest indywidualność muzyczna artysty, którego bez wątpienia uznać można za jednego z najbardziej obiecujących instrumentalistów i kompozytorów młodego pokolenia. [Read more --->]

Estrada Nagrania, the netlabel that released this album is very mysterious, indeed. They do not have a regular website. They use a blog instead, where they publish not only their releases, but also Polish videoclips and articles on music from the 70-ties. The blog's design is stylized to resemble Polish record companies from that period. If only Internet existed in the 70-ties, one could think this is an archival website, not updated for the last 30 years. Very well done indeed - browsing their blog you feel almost like a time traveler.

Previously Estrada Nagrania released only top quality compilation albums of Polish music from the 70-ties. So this album is not only Printempo's debut, but also the netlabel's first contemporary music release.

Now to the point. This album contains instrumental downtempo / nu jazz. And the execution is just superb! If only you like the genre, this is simply a must-have. It sounds natural, with a classy lo-fi tint here and there. All instruments sound like... instruments, not cheap artificial samples. The melodies are interesting, there is a perfect chillout atmosphere. Someone in the other review compared it to Bonobo and this is a very accurate comparison. Not exactly because of Printempo's derivativeness, but because of top quality of this music. Get it ASAP!

The album has been released by the Estrada Nagrania netlabel and you can download it from the netlabel's Bandcamp store for PLN 15 (~EUR 3) in a variety of formats, including a FLAC version. You can also listen to the full album before making a purchasing decision. Please note, however, that Bandcamp release has been probably made from mp3 files (at least according to AuCDtect). Because Bandcamp requires sending them lossless material, the result is that when downloading mp3 version you end up with files that have been recoded into mp3 twice! Do I have to say what influence should it have on the quality of the music? So if you are going to buy this release, I recommend downloading and keeping a FLAC version - bearing in mind, however, that this is not true lossless, because the files are made from the mp3 source.


[Artist's Myspace]

14 December 2011

Residus Plasmiques, les - "Vie sexuelle des bonbons meles, la"

Boring rock (4/10)
Genre d'album : autour du rock alternatif, mais aussi plusieurs genre selon le morceau

I don't know French - maybe lyrics on this album would save the day. But as far as the music is concerned, this recording is simple boring rock without any interesting features that could catch the listerener's attention. The band knows how to play, but nothing more.

The album has been released on Jamendo and is available for downloading in mp3 or ogg format.

[Artist's website]
Beware!



Creative Commons License

13 December 2011

Xenophobe - "Episode 2"

One of the best bands you have never heard of (8/10)



2nd CD of 4 track recordings mastered to digital compact cassette. Transfered to CD by Brian Lipski in 1997

Very interesting recording supposedly featuring electronic reworking of music by Warfare, a metal band from the 80-ties, completely unknown to general public. Warfare's Myspace profile (yes, they have one!) says they were:

"Thrash band from the Jersey shore in the mid 80's. All songs recorded live at band practices through headphones onto cassette..."


[Creative Commons License]

If this is true, it is another proof that talent hunters at the record labels are deaf and you need just a massive luck to be accepted. Why? Because these songs are great.

Of course even in these reworked versions you can hear the limitation of the poor equipment and recording conditions. But what counts is that they are catchy and energetic and if these guys were given a chance, they could easily turn them into metal masterpieces.

OK, but what about these updated versions? Well, they are still merely of a demo quality, because they were recorded in the nineties on cheap analog equipment. Yet these tunes are so well crafted that I enjoyed them very much despite their extremely lo-fi sound. The album starts with an earthquake - an industrial metal riff of the first track "Mad". Equally powerful is the third track "Dawn Of Time". No. 4 is a little slower, as to make some room for handful of strange samples. No. 5 "Phat and Funky" seems to contain a vocal line by Les Claypool of Primus, although the album's description does not mention that. Maybe it's someone else perfectly imitating his voice, though it feels unlikely, when you know how distinct Claypool's voice is. So anyone thinking of using this music commercially, should take double care, because it may contain some copyrighted material.

From the track no. 6 the arrangements change from industrial metal into synthpop / new wave, but keeping their main feature - catchiness. Another stylistic change comes in track no. 9, where we meet hip hop, followed by rap metal in the next tune. In track 11 we go back to metal. The album ends with two crazy renditions of "Wild Thing" (probably still copyrighted too!).

The only weak track is no. 2 "Acoustic Song" - with a primitive melody, and low quality plastic-sounding samples (not that electronic sounds in other tracks are of exceptional quality, but in this one they are truly terrible).

To summarize - this album is a true gem and I recommend it to anyone ready to listen to very good music in not so good quality.

The album has been released by the NoiseCollector netlabel and is available for downloading at archive.org in mp3 and ogg format.

12 December 2011

Residus Plasmiques, les - "Chants religieux pour nouvelles religions"

Standard rock album - nothing interesting (5/10)
On raconte dans les chaumières que Dieu aurait décidé de prendre sa retraite .... Déjà les postulants de toutes sortes sur ce poste se bousculent : Fakirs, Gourous, Oursons en peluche et même la Télévivion elle-même veulent être Dieu à la place de Dieu. Et les fidèles ont remplacé les rites de jadis comme la messe par des rituels modernes tout aussi contraignants : la promenade du chien par exemple.

Standard rock album - nothing particularly interesting. The band knows how to play, but not many traces of creativity here.

[Artist's website]

Creative Commons License

09 December 2011

DJ Blackwidow - "Cosmic Spirit: The Best of DJ Blackwidow"

The Best Of... indeed (10/10)

This CD is dedicated to Jacqui More. Without her...what's the point?
Copyright 2007 BlackJaq Studios & Insomniac Machine
All songs written by DJ Blackwidow except tracks 05,08,10,15,16 co-written by, DJ Jax.
Mixed, mastered, and sequenced by DJ Blackwidow.
[...]
This CD represents an era (2002-2007). I appreciate all of you, and please let me know what you think of this music.
Blackie aka Kirk McKenna, Jr.

It's really the best of. The best mixture of various kinds of intelligent electronica, but mostly downtempo with strong ethnic/world influences. Check it out.

[Artist's Myspace]

Creative Commons License




SUPPORT INDEPENDENT ARTISTS

If you like this album and you can afford it, consider supporting the artist by making a donation.

07 December 2011

Diablo Swing Orchestra - "Butcher's Ballroom, the"

Sell your souls, people - it really pays off (10/10)

The Diablo Swing Orchestra dates back to 1501 in Sweden, where history tells the tale of an orchestra that played like no other. With music so seductive and divine that the ensemble overwhelmed audiences all over the country, and people from all social classes took them to their hearts. Their performances rapidly earned a reputation of being feral and vigorous and gained the orchestra a devoted crowd that followed them around.
[Read more --->]

Some time ago I decided to check out some albums from one of the Jamendo's popularity ranking lists. A disclaimer: I am fully aware of the fact that due to the constantly broken stats these lists do not tell a thing about true popularity of the albums - it's more or less just a random list. Still, some popularity is required to get there, so I was curious what else can be found there quality-wise, as I know one really terrible record that haunt these lists.

I probably shouldn't bother writing this review, as others wrote everything before me. But I just have to write how totally amazed I am; I can't keep it to myself - it's unbearable.

I chose Diablo Swing Orchestra's "The Butcher's Ballroom" mainly because of the great cover and because it said it's metal and you don't find many good metal albums here, so I became tired of all these electronic tunes.


Creative Commons License
And metal it is. But what kind of metal! Not some rusty iron but true gold. First of all, these guys spice up their mainly heavy metal music with influences coming from each musical genre known to man (and several more coming straight from outer space). A recipe for disaster? Yes Sir! So, do they fail? No! I don't know how they do it (selling souls to the devil obviously comes to mind), but they succeed. They can include opera singing, ethnic instruments, classical instruments, nature sounds, growling, electronic samples, super-heavy guitars and jazzy passages within one track and it all works. You don't feel it's too eclectic, you don't feel it's chaotic. You don't feel some elements don't fit. Instead, you think: "I never thought metal could sound like that but it is perfect".

And it is true. Everything is perfect on this album - singing, skills of the musicians, professional production, ability to write super-catchy and powerful tunes. The level of awesomeness of this work is inhuman (the devil comes to mind - again).

It is unbelievable that such recording is given here for free. Diablo Swing Orchestra should receive a highest praise for that. Because the place of this album is right beside Metallica on the shelf labeled "thrash metal" (OK, now Metallica plays pop, but their old albums should still be there), right beside Apocalyptica under "classical metal" label and replace Nightwish in the "best of opera metal" ranking.

Speaking of Nightwish - I was never a fan of combining metal with opera singing, as it usually doesn't work. The band plays their part, the poor woman screams for her life in the front and their efforts don't correspond in any way. It almost always sounds like two radio stations trying to jam each other on the same band - one with opera music and one with heavy metal. The result is embarrassing chaos. And here we have a miracle (or the devil's work) - I suddenly realized I love opera metal! Under condition that it's played by Diablo Swing Orchestra.

To summarize - it doesn't matter whether you're a metalhead or a fan of opera or classical music. If only you like good music - you just have to check out this recording, because it is a landmark album that should be praised as one of the greatest works in the history of heavy metal, being at the same time surprisingly accessible for people that don't listen to this genre.

PS.
Considering the quality of this album, they had to sell not only their own souls, but also those belonging to their families and friends (maybe even some of the neighbors). The devil that signed the deal obviously must have got a big raise from the Satan with month-long all-inclusive vacation in Heaven.

[Artist's Myspace]




SUPPORT INDEPENDENT ARTISTS

If you like this album and you can afford it, consider supporting the artist by buying it on CDBaby website. Do not buy it through Amazon or iTunes - not only are they evil, but the artist won't see a single penny from your purchase.

Kaczmarski, Gintrowski, Lapinski - "Mury" (1981)

Jacek Kaczmarski (March 22, 1957, Warsaw - April 10, 2004, Gdańsk) was a Polish singer, songwriter, poet and author.

Kaczmarski was a voice of the Solidarity trade union movement in 1980s Poland, for his commitment to a free Poland, independent of Soviet rule. His songs criticized the ruling communist regime and appealed to the tradition of patriotic resistance within Poles. He remains best known for his protest songs on social and political subjects ("Mury" (Walls) based on "L'estaca" by Lluís Llach, "Obława" (Wolf hunt (lit. Raid))). However, he was more a poet than a political singer, and his texts have not lost their relevance with the demise of the Soviet union and its communist bloc.

Kaczmarski was known not only for his politically motivated lyrics but also for his characteristically dynamic — even aggressive — classical guitar playing, and expressive performance style. His deep knowledge of not only his nation's history but also of classical literature gave his songs a particularly deep and multi-layered resonance (e.g. "Powtórka z Odysei," recalled Homer's Odyssey, and "Lalka," was a masterful strike at the heart of a riveting Polish novel). He often performed before contrastingly different audiences: groups of friends in their homes, campus venues, and large concert halls in Poland, the rest of Europe and America.



MURY to płyta, od której wszystko się zaczęło, pierwszy program artystyczny tria Przemysław Gintrowski/ Jacek Kaczmarski/ Zbigniew Łapiński. Mury to także tytuł pieśni dzisiaj jeszcze, ponad 20 lat później, utożsamianej z narodzinami fenomenu, jakim była w Polsce lat „Solidarności" (1980–1981) autorska piosenka literacka o kontekście historycznym i politycznym. Nikt wcześniej, ale też i nikt później, nie wykonywał tekstów tak głęboko osadzonych w tradycji kulturowej. Co więcej – absolutnie nikt nie czynił tego z taką pasją, jak Gintrowski i Kaczmarski.

To czysty przypadek, że znalazła się na tej płycie – jakże ważna dla twórczości Jacka Kaczmarskiego – pieśń Źródło, ale MURY są źródłem właśnie: zjawiska jakim miała się okazać działalność artystyczna tria Gintrowski/Kaczmarski/Łapiński oraz źródłem indywidualnej drogi obu bardów, Gintrowskiego i Kaczmarskiego. Oczywiście wkład twórczy tego ostatniego jest dominujący – Kaczmarski pisze i komponuje muzykę do swoich tekstów. Gintrowski komponuje do wierszy poetów, w tym – a w przyszłości coraz więcej – do wierszy Kaczmarskiego. Zbigniew Łapiński w niezwykle świeży i nieustannie twórczy sposób wzbogaca dość monotonną i jednolitą muzykę kolegów. Jego muzyka do wierszy Kaczmarskiego zacznie z czasem odgrywać istotną rolę.

Kilka zaprezentowanych tu piosenek Jacka Kaczmarskiego sygnalizuje podstawowe wątki kontynuowane następnie w całej jego dalszej i dojrzalszej twórczości. Młodość jest w nich niepodważalnym atutem, to z niej płynie gniew poety i pasja wykonawcy. Ale wiersze Kaczmarskiego zaskakują powagą oraz głębią przemyśleń, zapowiadają długą drogę artystyczną, a jak konsekwentna miała się okazać, zademonstrował czas.

Wizytówką Kaczmarskiego-poety jest piękny wiersz, Źródło, jedna z ulubionych pieśni barda i metafora, do której będzie wracał w dalszej twórczości: „I niech łączą się zbocza bezlitosnych wąwozów, bo cóż drąży kształt przyszłych przestrzeni, jak nie rzeka podziemna?" Młodego poetę porwie już wkrótce owa „podziemna rzeka", ale nadzieja – wbrew logice – pozostanie, dopóki źródło... „źródło wciąż bije".

Zaskakuje dojrzałością obserwacji życia wkoło piosenka Starzy ludzie w autobusie. Przy swoich szerokich zainteresowaniach historią, literaturą czy sztuką, Kaczmarski pozostał wiernym świadkiem codzienności i jej bacznym, uważnym obserwatorem: „[...] pasażerów chór nas zdławi i dobrotliwie skarci nas, dwie możliwości nam zostawi – pętlę lub do zajezdni zjazd". A rozmowa z kierowcą zabroniona...

Każda z kolejnych pieśni to początek cyklu, linii tematycznej, obecnej w twórczości Kaczmarskiego już zawsze. Pompeja to wycieczka w antyk: „Odkopywaliśmy miasto Pompeję, jak się odkrywa spodziewane lądy". Jedna z najbardziej znanych wczesnych pieśni tria, Krajobraz po uczcie, jest utworem historycznym z czasów bliskiej sercu Kaczmarskiego-historyka Polski rozbiorowej: „A w stolicy koronacja się zaczyna i król światowy pokazuje szyk, ale z obecnych jeszcze nie wie nikt, że na tortach dał napis: Wiwat Katarzyna!" Imponujący rozmachem utwór Casanova-Fellini (Scena niemiecka) – nieistotne, że inspirowana pośrednio dziełem filmowym – to przykład Kaczmarskiego epickiego. Jego poetycki rozmach zaowocuje z czasem poematami, które przerosną ramy utworu muzycznego (jak chociażby Widzenia na temat końca świata, napisane w Berkeley w 1984 roku). I dalej. Już od pierwszej, debiutanckiej płyty, Kaczmarski realizuje swój niezwykle oryginalny pomysł na pisanie utworów inspirowanych dziełami malarskimi. Pierwszym przykładem owego interesującego, konsekwentnie realizowanego wątku jego twórczości jest pieśń Encore, jeszcze raz według obrazu Fiedotowa („Mam wszystko, czego może chcieć uczciwy człowiek – światopogląd, wykształcenie, młodość, zdrowie, rodzinę, która kocha mnie, dwie, trzy kobiety, gitarę, psa i oficerskie epolety"). Ale owa obrazowość, plastyczność opisu zawsze służy metaforze. Słyszymy to wyraźnie w pieśni Pejzaż z szubienicą według Bruegela (tym razem do muzyki Gintrowskiego), kiedy z ust powieszonego padają zdumiewające słowa: „Tu jasne są przestrzenie i widzę krągłość Ziemi, gdy czasem wiatr podrzuci mnie ponad czarny las..." Na koniec wreszcie została otwierająca album pieśń Ze sceny, według Wysockiego. Jacek Kaczmarski nie ukrywał swojej fascynacji twórczością rosyjskiego barda. Zaadaptował z czasem kilkanaście jego utworów – z legendarną Obławą na czele – zawsze jednak były to przemyślane wybory i twórcze, poetyckie adaptacje tekstów. Oto więc Kaczmarski-tłumacz.

Mury to obrazowy przykład sztuki translatorskiej Jacka Kaczmarskiego. Adaptacje barda zawsze wychodzą poza zwykły przekład i to wychodzą daleko. Tłumaczenie pieśni nie ogranicza się do przekładu języka, bywa często – jak w tym przypadku – szukaniem odpowiednika dla jednej kultury w kulturze drugiej. Dla katalońskiego barda, Louisa Llacha Grande, którego pieśń posłużyła za kanwę Murów, metaforą zniewolenia jest pal, do którego przywiązuje się na pastwiskach owce i oryginalny utwór taki ma właśnie tytuł: L’Estaca („Pal"). Gdyby wszystkie owce pociągnęły postronki w jedną stronę, wyrwałyby pal – stąd metafora, ale zupełnie nieczytelna poza Półwyspem Iberyjskim. Jacek Kaczmarski zamienił pal na mur i powstała najważniejsza pieśń w całym dorobku tria Gintrowski/Kaczmarski/Łapiński, pokoleniowy manifest o przesłaniu tak samo aktualnym wtedy, co i dzisiaj.

Aż zobaczyli ilu ich, poczuli siłę i czas
I z pieśnią, że już blisko świt szli ulicami miast
Zwalali pomniki i rwali bruk – Ten z nami! Ten przeciw nam!
Kto sam – ten nasz najgorszy wróg!
A śpiewak także był sam...

Review by Daniel Wyszogrodzki


I usually discourage people from buying records issued by the majors, as almost all the money goes to the recording industry mafia anyhow and will be used later for committing crimes such as unlawful harassment of fans and bribing authorities to implement changes in law, which would infringe basic human rights.

However, in this case, the said "mafia" did a really good job at remastering all the works of Jacek Kaczmarski and helped reviving his popularity in the 90-ties, supporting him until his premature death in 2004. His works are published with all due respect and esteem that this greatest Polish singer/songwriter deserves. Therefore - you won't hear it from me often - if you like this album, I encourage you to buy it. In this case the record label (Pomaton EMI) really earned its pay and deserves to be rewarded.


Tracklist:
01. Ze sceny
02. Encore, jeszcze raz
03. Pani Bovary
04. Przyjaciele, których nie miałem
05. Pejzaż z szubienicą
06. Śmiech
07. Casanova - Fellini. Scena niemiecka.
08. Pompeja
09. Kraj
10. Krajobraz po uczcie
11. Dziady
12. Cesarz
13. Starzy ludzie w autobusie
14. Mur
15. Źródło (Wąwóz)
16. Mury

[Wikipedia]



Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 1 from 15. November 2010

EAC extraction logfile from 19. November 2011, 19:08

Kaczmarski, Gintrowski, Łapiński / Mury

Used drive  : Optiarc DVD RW AD-7240S   Adapter: 2  ID: 1

Read mode               : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache      : No
Make use of C2 pointers : Yes

Read offset correction                      : 48
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out          : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks   : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations       : No
Used interface                              : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000

Used output format : Internal WAV Routines
Sample format      : 44.100 Hz; 16 Bit; Stereo


TOC of the extracted CD

     Track |   Start  |  Length  | Start sector | End sector 
    ---------------------------------------------------------
        1  |  0:01.00 |  2:44.36 |        75    |    12410   
        2  |  2:45.36 |  4:31.42 |     12411    |    32777   
        3  |  7:17.03 |  2:09.16 |     32778    |    42468   
        4  |  9:26.19 |  3:26.04 |     42469    |    57922   
        5  | 12:52.23 |  3:43.55 |     57923    |    74702   
        6  | 16:36.03 |  3:56.49 |     74703    |    92451   
        7  | 20:32.52 |  5:06.66 |     92452    |   115467   
        8  | 25:39.43 |  3:13.67 |    115468    |   130009   
        9  | 28:53.35 |  1:49.17 |    130010    |   138201   
       10  | 30:42.52 |  3:07.38 |    138202    |   152264   
       11  | 33:50.15 |  3:00.74 |    152265    |   165838   
       12  | 36:51.14 |  2:26.66 |    165839    |   176854   
       13  | 39:18.05 |  2:19.35 |    176855    |   187314   
       14  | 41:37.40 |  2:06.15 |    187315    |   196779   
       15  | 43:43.55 |  3:39.23 |    196780    |   213227   
       16  | 47:23.03 |  4:26.45 |    213228    |   233222   


Range status and errors

Selected range

     Filename V:\temp\Kaczmarski, Gintrowski, Łapiński - Mury.wav

     Peak level 98.8 %
     Extraction speed 2.0 X
     Range quality 100.0 %
     Test CRC D7336061
     Copy CRC D7336061
     Copy OK

No errors occurred

 
AccurateRip summary
 
Track  1  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [B8E2788E]
Track  2  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [EF393CBE]
Track  3  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [67938CDB]
Track  4  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [BB14C99D]
Track  5  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [0D982376]
Track  6  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [DAEA8685]
Track  7  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [77E3EBA5]
Track  8  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [2F55716C]
Track  9  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [0B5159F0]
Track 10  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [BAF757DC]
Track 11  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [1F226FDD]
Track 12  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [9D4783C1]
Track 13  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [0A6B4CA7]
Track 14  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [6C647BB6]
Track 15  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [04A5FE53]
Track 16  accurately ripped (confidence 11)  [8ADEE545]
 
All tracks accurately ripped

End of status report

==== Log checksum 44FC2694CA664F5BA42598F234A36713899ECAF8CBFEB7B28D6AC03673F941DA ====

PERFORMER: auCDtect Task Manager, ver. 1.5.1RC4 build 1.5.1.5
Copyright (c) 2008-2010 y-soft. All rights reserved
http://y-soft.org

ANALYZER: auCDtect: CD records authenticity detector, version 0.8.2
Copyright (c) 2004 Oleg Berngardt. All rights reserved.
Copyright (c) 2004 Alexander Djourik. All rights reserved.


FILE: 16 - Mury.flac
  Size: 26131107 Hash: 9AB9D9D70849AD7D122293BEC347B092 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 5DCFB99141CBB61328031028510060898D1B239A
FILE: 15 - Zrodlo (wawoz).flac
  Size: 19256353 Hash: 11E526DA744657B3B1E2A853F939FA2A Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: DF2F3AEBAD5BA28489992C5F068663165F0250A0
FILE: 14 - Mur.flac
  Size: 10590655 Hash: CCEC8898804B7D5AD48260985028B11B Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: D443DDDC65F00E6CB25CF3A675FC70C8CEE98290
FILE: 13 - Starzy ludzie w autobusie.flac
  Size: 13237348 Hash: 6BD59E05A3DAE262352EE3425CE9B7F7 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 99%
  Signature: 0DCFCF4F05AEDCEFC9B1EBC9291F2C732E61FFA5
FILE: 12 - Cesarz.flac
  Size: 13641297 Hash: 7A7A812A7BEC931E4CC8CE133DC78E30 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 27DBAF2BF4BE72125ADE953F6585F4E8FABD96F0
FILE: 11 - Dziady.flac
  Size: 17841914 Hash: F8BAED545DE9D4E848187F9159794495 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 17BC0621EAC1134A15F621FAEA7218AC8F051D6C
FILE: 10 - Krajobraz po uczcie.flac
  Size: 19779201 Hash: 25514721ABCA772A579F03D36D514C3D Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 4404EC0B8F59AC03CFEF775803B200F81B1F2BA8
FILE: 09 - Kraj.flac
  Size: 9679471 Hash: 0ED159681E208EA8C4B1CBC54A26C6BB Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 2A586F17DDA346248B45181FC047364B0C3273BF
FILE: 08 - Pompeje.flac
  Size: 19560295 Hash: 2D50611EE89DBFEDDC3F3760278134AB Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 6944A9E6E6A3F6718113C8FFB9D27E1BD4755199
FILE: 07 - Casanova - Fellini. Scena niemiecka.flac
  Size: 30096478 Hash: 1837353510E3D73E181D3A7CFDC18445 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 99%
  Signature: A2B5FCD405E3ECDF389F775331523AE6F66DCD68
FILE: 06 - Smiech.flac
  Size: 23707508 Hash: FFA234142352E7E5DC662FDE3E5C048C Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 99%
  Signature: 5F8931BE4E035F0E9A4DC55007B313FD3D90A5D9
FILE: 05 - Pejzaz z szubienica.flac
  Size: 22791350 Hash: 61AF28690AE68CD8DA6412A7A56C08BE Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 99%
  Signature: D20C81CA27DB1F3AE0BAB787FAC73531FEE6278C
FILE: 04 - Przyjaciele, ktorych nie mialem.flac
  Size: 20856706 Hash: D2935D9397CB83EB146347B8C2963BF1 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: D2EFE70FC0ACCB856B92DDA13875D8562ACD2173
FILE: 03 - Pani Bovary.flac
  Size: 11009145 Hash: 6D3618661926F79DCCC1B4B04B9C1862 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: C32694790644A6DB25FB42D639CE5F74D04683B4
FILE: 02 - Encore, jeszcze raz.flac
  Size: 24982117 Hash: 25B0B131803B56870921D29F952DAC77 Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: FDEE7FB5C3F97607E53226B6BE9B7A1CCB97C63F
FILE: 01 - Ze sceny.flac
  Size: 17905666 Hash: FF0A14B9603EA833B16B3D38DF4EBEED Accuracy: -m0
  Conclusion: CDDA 100%
  Signature: 6F3F63D2FD6364A1E01722FA6EF8A48F488E64F9


Interested? Follow this link:
http://polskiecd.blogspot.com/2009/08/gintrowski-kaczmarski-apinski-mury.html

05 December 2011

Mr. Nooze - "Fanatic" [EP]

Solid techno / electronica (7/10)



Mr. Nooze - single producer, dj from Gdynia in Poland. Inspired by french music scene, and produce music in this french style (especially remixes). There's not much to say... more to listen: Mr. Nooze at Fairtilizer

A solid techno / electronica recording. Not a landmark work, but a short enjoyable straightforward electronic album.

The album has been released by the 49manekinow.net netlabel and is available for downloading at archive.org in mp3 format.

[Artist's Myspace]

[Creative Commons License]

Residus Plasmiques, les - "Album Medical, l'"

Nothing interesting (5/10)
Le thème central est le monde médical et le ton est toujours sarcastique et ironique.

Nothing special - lack of catchy melodies, lack of interesting sounds. Boredom. Disclaimer: I write only about music, because I can't speak French.

[Artist's website]

Creative Commons License

Manta Raya - "Remix My Ass! Vol. 1"

Mostly dull electroclash (5/10)

MANTA RAYA is born in 2000, in Argentina. Mecha, George and Quique knew each other studying Visual Arts in Mar del Plata city. At that time, 1998, they played in different bands. This is how they shared their art and gigs and parties sometimes. After a while, destiny and the same love for music brought them back together. And they had no other choice but to do what they like the most. to Rock!! They've played in every single place they could. From the smallest shitty underground bar to big venues, clubs and festivals. In march '07 Manta Raya was selected by Paste Magazine and Coca Cola Company to be one of the independent artists promoted at Coca Cola's website. Finally their new album Yeah! was released in October 2007. Produced by Manta Raya. Mixed by MantaGeorge and Luciano Siclari. Mastered by Luciano Siclari. Supported by UMI ( Independents Musicians Union ). And one week after the release, they started their first European Tour performing in Berlin, Hamburg, London, Paris and Guadalajara.

I never listened to Manta Raya, so I cannot compare these remixes to their original versions. I will, therefore, judge them on their own merits.

Most of the remixes fall into electroclash genre, with accompaniment based on 8-bit - to a rather tiring effect. Dull punkish vocals combined with primitive disco-like beats add up to a really ugly whole.

The only two interesting tracks are nos. 02 & 08, because of much more intelligent, breakbeat-based instrumentals.

The album has been released by the 49manekinow.net netlabel and is available for downloading at archive.org in mp3 format.

[Creative Commons License]

[Artist's Myspace]

04 December 2011

Eclectek - "Groove On"

They are getting better and better (10/10)

Enregistré et mixé au Studio Ka de Faches Thumesnil en 2011 // Production Tour de Chauffe 2011
masterisé par addhenteam
JOIN US ON FACEBOOK
www.facebook.com/pages/eclectek/27621380544

I watch Eclectek's development for several years now and I am more and more impressed. Their works were interesting from the very beginning (these old albums have been unfortunately removed from Jamendo), but they work hard and with each new album they cross new borders. And I really like where they are heading. They started with very eclectic :) mixture of rock, electronica, hip-hop and funk. But on this two-track minialbum they step deeper into the realm of rock music. And they really should feel at home here. Both tracks are outstanding - highly energetic, with strong aggressive female vocals and ultra catchy melodies. Their rock is spiced up with electronica, but in perfect proportions, without turning their music into some campy electroclash shit.

The bands that immediately come to mind are Guano Apes and Skunk Anansie. Do not get me wrong; I do not bring these names as a claim of unoriginality - everybody has some influences. I just want to tell you two things: one - what type of music you can expect, because "rock" is too general and "alternative rock" is not only an extremely stupid, but also a meaningless label; and the second - they already reached the level of these bands. This is not some amateurish effort rated "10/10", because it is "good for non-professionals" (the usual argument of bad artists complaining on low ratings). This recording gets "10/10", because you could mistake it for a new Skunk Anansie's single. This is how good it is.

My only complaint is a usual one in such cases - IT IS TOO SHORT! I WANT MORE!

To sum up - wanna hear some really fresh super catchy top quality heavy rock? Check out this album.

[Artist's website]

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02 December 2011

Turzbot - "Piso:plax"

11-minute album - 11-word review (7/10)
Turzbot was originally founded as Polymorphic back in 2000. The music hasn't changed a lot since then. It is not that innovative nowadays as it used to be, but is more mature and more sophisticated. The project name has been changed as the old one was no longer unique. If you like pure, abstract IDM old school electronica give it a go, and you're gonna like it.

Description by: 49manekinow.net netlabel

electronica, glitch, breakbeat, instrumental, too short, very good, experimental, creative, recommended

[Artist's Myspace]

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