ANECDOTAL

fifty first impressions


PSYCROPTIC
Symbols of Failure
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woooooooghahahhghghghghghhhh! death death die kill. "Alpha Breed" is ultra pinchcore death. The vocalist is indecipherable, which is at least amusing. The music is like Lamb Of God, but somehow more. It's just, jeesh. Violent but pretty. "Missionaries of a Future to Come" too. It's like a future mutant breed of death metal. The production is great, you can hear every single note. And every single vocal utterance, none of which is apparently in English? You could headbang to this, sure, but you'd never recover. HUGHAHAHHHH!!!!!!!! Death. Grind.

SUBTRACTIVELAD
Suture
Well, "Petals" is a gorgeous way to open an album. I feel refreshed now. The gorgeousness gives way to some laptop aphexiness with a fuggled bigbeat and superwoob synth pads & lines. Downright funkeh in spots. "Safety In Numbers" is back betwixt the pretties & the DSP freakage. "Twinge" = COOL. Full on u-ziq fakeout action. "Your Tattoo" is song title of the day so far. Ooh, "Embryonic Again" = even more gorgeous than the first one. So there.

GUNS N ROSES
Leaked Chinese Democracy demos
Might as well get this out of the way now. Look, I'm not a fan now & I never have been, though I was poised to ride their particular wave from the onset. I was there when they arose & a few of my stupider friends latched on. Like lice. Since then, what have they done that didn't suck? I can't think of anything. He hired Buckethead & Brain, that was cool. But will it make a difference? Buckethead was out as fast as he got hired too. Okay, here goes. "Better Demo Extended". Starts with lo-fi guitar & drum loop that...wow, could've come from a Buckethead record. The distorted guitars, drums & vox kick in at the same time. It's not the worst thing I've ever heard. The chords are actually kind of cool. It's a midtempo modern rocker. I'm surprised, frankly. But, again, what did I expect exactly. The sweep picking solo COULD be Buckethead. Like I fuckin' know. The track is only 2:06 but I didn't gouge my eyes out once. Next... "I.R.S. Demo". Acoustic & slide guitars, I did see that coming. But the lo-fi breakbeat, no. The beginning is like Cinderella with a beatbox. Haw. And that fuckface's signature voice singing over it. I guess this is more like what I guessed they'd sound like. Bleah. Slow midtempo hard rock. Bluesy. Whatever. "There Was a Time" starts with more mid-fi beats & piano. Oop, bit of backward guitar there. Uh-oh, is this the 'summer jam'? I applaud the use of beats, too bad it took so fucking long. No point in bleahing anymore, pretty soon you'll know more about this than me. The first one was okay but the others munch cack. Meaning that y'all will be going apeshit in a matter of weeks.

THE JAZZINVADERS
Up and Out
Well. Jazz, eh. At least with a song called "Bonga Bonga Jazz" you know what you're in for. This is almost like samba. "Go Ahead" is almost like samba. Do grownups dance to jazz? They could get their asses moving to this, properly placed. The whole album seems to groove, even the minor-key choons. Well done. "Licks and Brains" - uh-oh, second good song title of the day. Ew, female vocals on "Black". Vocal jazz = NO. Otherwise you could shake your jazz bootay to this whole thing for an hour.

THE DINING ROOMS
Versioni Particolari 2
Um. 75 minutes of groovy remixes. "Ocean" is coolly jazzy. Not sure about the female vocals but the music is awwwww-ite-plus. The whole thing has kind of latin, samba-ish undertones. & jazzy chord stabs. I know nothing about The Dining Rooms. Ah, but truth in song-titling reveals this to be a series of "Experiments in Ambient Soul". & it is. So, yeah. Nice. Loungey dance music.

VITAL REMAINS
Horrors of Hell
Where have I heard of Vital Remains before? "Of Pure Unholyness" opens with severely warped keyboards & treated spoken vocal sounds. Then: poooodge, slow/midtempo thrash death metal. Bluuuuuagh. More traditional in its deathly metallic stylings than I've heard today. The production isn't great but the playing & songwriting might be. "Nocturnal Blasphemy" sounds like, hell, an old Sodom track or something. Old Kreator. Oh, wait - "Vital Remains" the song. This must be a compilation of demos 'n' shit. Can I start again? No?

SINJON SMITH
One More Night
What the fuck is this, Fleetwood Mac? Ew, no. More generic than that. The production & playing are okay...no, wait, is that Stevie Nicks on "I'm Telling You"? Oh my god. Kill me now. Grody. Get this if you suck.

VANDEN PLAS
Christ.0
What is this, Christian industrial metal? Or is it, like, NOT Christian? I don't give a shit either way, I guess. The first track is flippy changey prog rock with all the trimmings. Then a ghey little breakdown. Oh, wait, that's the verse. I guess it's modern progressive rock after all. Okay. Now I get it. Sort of. Dream Theater lickers get over here now.

TORTURE KILLER
SWARM!
This is more like it. Midtempo death metal or something. The incessant guitar hammer-ons in the intro of the first song are really fucking annoying. I guess that's the idea. "Forever Dead" is the first proper song. Ah, too bad you can understand the lyrics. The riffs are okay. The production isn't bad. But I'm just not getting into this. "I Killed You" = sweet title.

FIVE DEEZ
Kommunikator
"Fugg That" opens with atmos synths & eh........ I don't know. It's hiphop all right. I think you have to be 18 to get into this shit. The vocals are super super monotonous. I realize they're supposed to be, but this isn't deeply funky, it's not funny and I don't enjoy listening to this. I think I just aged 20 years. "BMW" doesn't make me suicidal. It's uptempo. This is probably the sell-out track. "From Sorrow" is okay. It sounds like the guy from Dub Pistols. Do I win a prize if it is him?

RAY DAVIES
Other Peoples' Lives
Y'know I don't think I've ever heard an entire album by Ray Davies OR the Kinks. Oops, I typed the Kinko's there by habit/accident. So is it unfair of me to say the first song sounds like something from Paul McCartney's last album? No, not unfair, just stupid and/or incorrect. I guess I just nod & agree when people say Davies is a genius. I wouldn't know, maybe he is. I'm obviously a fan of guitar-driven pop rock friendly music. Which is what this is. I can already tell I'll need to hear this 50 more times before I understand any of what's happening. So, check ya later.

COPY
Mobius Beard
Wow, this is cool. Dancey syntho pop stuff. "A Slight But Delicious Warble" opens. It's foonkey & melodic. & no crappy vocals to spoil the atmos. "Just Expect" is more of the same but moodier & a bit slower. "Like a Turtle" - lo-fi drum samples, peely synths and stabs. It's like a more sociable Mr. Oizo. "Afro Oven" ha. Nice.

DICTE
Dicte and the Sugarbones
Umb. Modern rock/guitar pop. The first track sounds like Foo Fighters with a female singer. After that, yeah, it just sounds like an up to the minute pop record. Which it probably is. Which means there are guitars, hacked beats, synths, layers of vocals. Uh, Goldfrapp goes c0ck-rock?

REDNOISE
A Subtle Defiance
Wow, more hacked-up guitar samples & drum beats. Maybe this is the bigbeat genre ten years on. All those acid synths...I'd have to say so. "Say It To My Face" takes the portamento function to outer space. That's when all the notes blur together. "Conform" is a slow synth doomer like Massive Attack useta make.

JOSH ROUSE
Subtitulo
Ew, sycophantic David Gray clone. But even more obvious & cloying.

IN-FLIGHT SAFETY
The Coast Is Clear
Kicks off like U2. But the singer sounds like Coldplay. Or, yes, David Gray. Har.

FLOWJOB
Support Normality
Ohhhhhhh SHIT! Epic epic techno. Just like Orbital. Hell yes. "Flangers in the Night" = SONG TITLE OF THE CENTURY!! So, it's, what... the shortest track is 7:45, the longest is 10:13. Beats, undulation, buried vocals like Underworld. I love this shit.

HAMMELL ON TRIAL
Songs for Parents Who Enjoy Drugs
My friend saw this dude a long time ago & became an instant convert. and you know how annoying those guys can be. And how long-lasting the effects of a well-intended but still-annoying convert can be. It's not awful but I doubt I'll listen again. "Coulter's Snatch".


JENNY LEWIS & THE WATSON TWINS
Rabbit Fur Coat
Oh sister where art thou?

JAMES BLUNT
Chasing Time
Sounds like it's live. I've never heard this guy. Does he suck? It sounds like he sucks. Oh yeah, that voice. Good god, it's like Jamiroquoi strangling himself. Oh christ, nice StarSearch version of "Fall at your Feet". Okay, fuck this. Points off for yodeling

FINK
Biscuits for Breakfast
Acoustic guitar-heavy singer songwriter dude stuff. No.

EVERGREY
Monday Morning Apocalypse
More modern euro pop death metal. This is the euro version of Disturbed, isn't it.

DYSLEXIC LOVE
Dyslexic Love
Oh my god. This is a sonic paint-by-numbers. And the worst snare sound this side of Metallica.

KITARO
Spiritual Garden
Ha. I've never heard the guy. I guess the music is exactly what I expected. Piano/synth-driven, melodic, mellow, reverby instrumentals with strategically placed nature sounds. It actually isn't bad. I've definitely heard much worse.

MAN MAN
Six Demon Bag
Okay. Oom-pah-pah piano. Chorus of dude. "Engwish Bwudd" is like an orgy between Rasputina & Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. Heavy on the oom-pah cheese & light but still present on the weird-out shit. "Van Helsing Boombox". Ha: "Push the Eagle's Stomach".

LADIES
They Mean Us
What the hell is this? Built To Spill with blastbeats? "Black Metal in the Hour of Starbucks". nice. It's like a jazzier, quieter, but still very fucking whacked-out (obviously) Fantomas. Or something. And with indie whiteboy singing. Um. And the 12:08 album closer is called....."Mandatory Psycho Freakout".


NATACHA ATLAS
Mish Ma'oul
You know she fucking rules. Straddling genres & cultures. Bit of Bollywood here. bit of, I don't know. But I like it. "Ghanwa Bossanova" = Latin American/Middle Eastern hybrid. Hell yes.

TOSCA
Souvenirs
"John Lee Huber (Burnt Friedman)" is the first thing I've heard from David Sylvian's new collaborator-bwah outside of their Nine Horses album. And it sounds pretty much just like that. So much texture, so much groove. Shit is deep, shit is nice. "Fuck ya brain" they sayeth. Niceth. I don't know any of the other remixers or the remixees for that matter. It grooves, that's all I know.

QUEENSRYCHE
Operation Mindcrime 2
Okay, I liked Queensryche for about five minutes in 1986, after that "Gonna Get Close To You" video came out. I thought it was great. Maybe I was right. Dunno. Beyond that, see above remarks about Guns & Roses. I'm not down with the Ryche. What else can I tell you but that it sounds like fucking Queensryche? I'm sorry I just wasted your time and mine.

NIGHTMARES ON WAX
In A Space Outta Sound
"Passion" = slo jam. "The Sweetest" = synchro shuffle reassembled reggae parts. "Flip Ya Lid" too. "Pudpots" = teh JAMMMM!
Cool, mature-feeling dancey groove shiot, but not.

MISS CRAZY
Miss Crazy
Savatage lives! The singer sounds like Axl & the music is like 80s hard rock, with the bass line thudding quarter notes on an open string. Take yer pick. I don't know, it's really strange when the most derivative 80s hard rock metal thing I've heard in a long time is actually the breath of fresh air. Shit. Just don't tell anyone.

ISOBEL CAMPBELL & MARK LANEGAN
Ballad Of The Broken Seas
"honey child what can I do" is the fuckin' jam. Wouldn't know about the rest.