One Measured Exposure

Thomas Dolby
Windpower live video
Cleveland, OH
May 10, 2006

Damn it. I should've been at this show! Cleveland is as close as the tour came to me. Windpower has long been a favorite, so it's with mixed feelings that I watched this clip. He begins the song a capella & sounds horribly out of tune for some reason. He strains to get the notes out. Once the music kicks in, the song is in freefall, basically remixed on the fly. Verses, choruses, other bits, coming in rapid succession but not necessarily where they belong. I like the one man band idea but unfortunately it just boils down to karaoke. It's not all bad, though. Many aspects of the original are retained and despite everything, it's good to see Thomas Dolby in action. I love the fact that he makes things like this available

download - Thomas Dolby Windpower

Slow

SLOW MUSIC
05-11-2006
*thud*

30 second pause

*thud*

29 second pause

*thud*

28 second pause

etc.

Then! A slowly building drone that could be.... anything. Synth? Guitar? Guitar synth?

*atonal zing*

*slams head on keyboard*

*floor tom roll*

*frippertronic drone*

*cymbal roll*

Upright bass riffs. melodic percussion.

In other words, the sound of many musicians not playing together.

I CAN TASTE THE HATE

DREAMS OF DAMNATION
EPIC TALES OF VENGEANCE
Heavy as shit brutal death metal, thankfully with no concessions to vocal melodies. "Kill for Peace"! "Eaters of the Dead"!!!

FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY
ARTIFICIAL SOLDIER
I was just thinking about these guys yesterday. In making yet another typically lazy comparison, I think. I like the breakbeats on "Unleashed" & "Buried Alive".

HEAD CONTROL SYSTEM
EPIC TALES OF VENGEANCE
Strange combination of Nine Inch Nails, Nickelback and Disturbed? They just call this rock music now. You kids today and your Marilyn Manson. In my day, rock music was Billy Squier, Pat Benatar, Rick Springfield.

RICHARD H KIRK
ENTERING VALHALLA, VOL 2 (VIRTUAL LITE)
Very cool blippy & bassy um light dance music? I think the derisive term would be chillout music. But, y'know. Before that it was called ambient techno, maybe that's more apt.


UWE RECKZEH
POINT NORTH
Pleasantly spacey & ambient Hearts Of Space type shit. I can find no quarrel with this hour of quietly uplifting moods & melodies.

OUR RELATIONSHIP WAS BUILT ON LIES

Car music today:
V/A - Big Band Remixed And Reinvented
Thievery Corporation - The Doors - Strange Days

1. Dirty Pretty Things - B.U.R.M.A (3:18)
2. In Strict Confidence - Promised Land (5:40)
3. King Biscuit Time - C I Am 15 (3:21)
4. Pascal Feos - Out Of My Head (4:11)
5. Patrick Lee - For My Piano Teacher (4:56)
6. Strange Attractor - Simulacra (5:27)
7. Sufjan Stevens - No Man's Land (4:45)
8. Raman Beats - Monsoon (Lazy Mix) (5:07)
9. Triangle Sun - Beautiful (3:55)
10. The Outfield - Long Walk Back (from Nowhere) (4:28)
11. Headphone - sublime parade reworked (3:16)



ANGEL THEORY
RE-POSSESSION
Dark synth pop. The guy's voice reminds me of... Cyberaktif. Or old Front Line Assembly. And Skinny Puppy.

APARTMENT 213
CLEVELAND POWER VIOLENCE
16 songs in 30 minutes. Ultra grind! And it reminds me of Spazz, which is a high compliment indeed. All hail the return of the four second song. "After School 38 Special". Ha.

DANIELSON
SHIPS
That name. I already hate this band. Flaming Lips, Built To Spill. Not as bad as it could've been.

DIRTY PRETTY THINGS
WATERLOO TO ANYWHERE
Hello my new favorite new British band of the week. I love you more than anyone else this week. Sadly, the love affair will end before the CD. Although "You Fucking Love It" is a great song any day of the week.

EDENBRIDGE
THE GRAND DESIGN
Dream Theater crossed with Queen. No shit. Fucking hilarious.

FIRE IN THE ATTIC
I'LL BEAT YOU CITY
Big budget death metal emo. Just like I knew it would be. Look at the band name, look at the album title. Sucky fucking suck suck.

GLEDHILL
CONSTELLATIONS
Weird. Country guitar pop rock with all the comforts of home. No, um, I mean it sounds like Wilco crossed with Linkin Park. Epic synths & pianos at every turn. Hm. Not fun. Not cool. Close, but no.

HEADPHONE
TWO STORIES HIGH
Quietly jazzy layered clicktronica. & triphop, innit.

IN STRICT CONFIDENCE
EXILE PARADISE
Wow, kick-ass, dark synth pop. Depeche Mode meets Ace of Base, in a good way.

JEWEL
GOODBYE ALICE IN WONDERLAND
Y'know, I've never heard a Jewel album before. Owing largely to my own survival instincts. This just sounds like country to me. Now I know.

KILLING MACHINE
METALMORPHOSIS
Musically... Mercyful Fate. Vocally...Bruce Dickinson.

KING BISCUIT TIME
BLACK GOLD
I guess there's a reason it reminds me of Beta Band.

KMFDM
RUCK ZUCK EP
I forget the last time I heard these guys. This ain't bad, big buncha remixes. Whatever happened to good, angry electronica anyway? Oh yeah, Trent Reznor.

KUTLESS
HEARTS OF THE INNOCENT
Disturbed, or Godsmack. Or Mudvayne. Same thing.

PATRICK LEE
TWELVE TUSK PIANO
Holy shit, this rules. Funky, jazzy, sample-based, um, songs? The beats are large & AWESOME. And it's loungey like Thievery Corp. I like the fact that there are no vocals. NICE!

MAD MAX
NIGHT OF WHITE ROCK
Is that guy taking the piss with the singing? The music is detuned, in-your-face riff rock. Then the singer comes in. I can't even describe the guy's voice. It's really high & wimpy. Oh, I know - the guy from Prefab Sprout. Who I love. But he'd be useless fronting Iron Maiden.

MAINSTAY
WELL MEANING FICTION
Linkin Park crossed with Coldplay.

NORMA JEAN
O GOD THE AFTERMATH
Screamy, Pantera-style hardcore riff metal. Wow, they really sound like Pantera to me. Norma Jean is a dead ringer. And? There's no lame emo action anywhere.

OTHLIA
CONTINENTS
Yelling, movie soundtrack-type orchestral thingamajigs. Prettiness, quietness, loudness, sound effects.



THE OUTFIELD
ANY TIME NOW
Good god, is this The Outfield from the 80s? This sounds like new U2 or something. If it's them, then I give them credit for updating their sound. If it's not, then, maybe they should renew the copyright on their name. Whatever it is, it's very good 80s style guitar driven pop rock. "Long Walk Back (from Nowhere)" sounds like vintage The Outfield. I didn't realize I liked them the first time around. But, yeah. Surprisingly cool.

PAN AMERICAN
FOR WAITING, FOR CHASING
Clicky, fucked-up, antimusic. In a good way.

PASCAL FEOS
SYNAPTIC
Cool, fun, modern, instrumental, danceable electronica. Like who? Like no other. Melodic, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay minimalistic. "Ausklang" is the shit. But every track rules.

RAISON D'ETRE
METAMORPHYSES
An hour of gradually shifting live ambience. Metallic percussion, loud drones. Etc. Heavily reverbed. Occasionally building to a crescendo. Occasionally just laying there in a Steve Roach-like pile of hmsh.

SECTION A
PARALLEL LIVES
Melodic heavy metal. Iron Maiden meets Foreigner. Not bad at all.

SERAPIS
SERAPIS
Death metal, cool. Okay, now I'm just waiting for the emo part to kick in. "Shatner Mask" - there it is.

SOFIAN ROUGE
MEDITERRANEAN EXCURISION
Utter ripoff of the first Enigma album, right down to the sexy voiced female spoken word intro and the fucking beat on the first proper song. & instead of gregorian chant you get a sort of middle eastern inflected dude going at it. It's...... not bad, I guess. It's just derivative as fuck! So cheeky!

STARKWEATHER
CROATOAN
Oh my god, no. "Slither" started out so strong! Slow doom death metal dirge with black metal vocals. And then it turned a corner & a clean voiced guy starts singing about emotions. Fucking fuck. So close. I didn't see that one coming at all.

SUFJAN STEVENS
THE AVALANCHE
I keep seeing this guy's name everywhere. Heavily embellished singer songwriter deal. Is it good, is it bad. There's too much happening for a first listen. It doesn't suck outright, I'll say that.

HAWKSLEY WORKMAN
TREEFUL OF STARLING
Unlike Hawksley Workman, whose sonic blueprint is strangely repellent.

SPIRIT OF THE FOREST

Wow, a rubbish charity single/video from 1989. Andy Partridge shows up immediately. Wait for the chorus to see Colin Moulding.

The song is horrible, which is why this is probably the first time you're hearing it.

GONNA BE THERE

ABOMINATOR
THE ETERNAL CONFLAGRATION
Scary black thrash grind metal. My favorite kind.

AKMUSIQUE
LA VIE DU LOUNGE
Mellow trip hop to full on jazz to, I don't know, techno pop. Interesting gamut.

AVENUE BLUE
NIGHTLIFE
Smooth jazz.

BOARDS OF CANADA
TRANS CANADA HIGHWAY
Slowly unfolding, melodic, textural electronica. Cool beats & production. I like "Dayvan Cowboy" and "Skyliner".

THE CHANNELS
THE CHANNELS
Occasionally acceptable big-budget wimpy indie rock.

KEEP OF KALESSIN
ARMADA
Progressive, epic death metal with an equal preponderance of synths and blastbeats. "The Black Uncharted" sounds like Voivod. Now I'm confused.

THE KILAMANJARO DARKJAZZ ENSEMBLE
Sweet, dark, full band improv. Portishead plus Talk Talk. Or, Sianspheric. Same thing, no? Very cool.

PERSUADER
WHEN EDEN BURNS
Super melodic death metal. Clean, melodic vocals. Very confusing.

PHARAOH
THE LONGEST NIGHT
Dope prorgressive-ish metal. With lots of long instrumental parts. The singer's voice doesn't grate either, which is rare in this genre. This genre we call Iron Maiden.

RED WINE
THE END
A band I've never heard, covering a bunch of metal/hard rock classic tracks that I've never heard. Well, I've heard the Dio & Megadeth songs at some point.

ROGUE TRADERS
HERE COME THE DRUMS
Um, kinda guitar-driven top forty pop music? "Voodoo Child" samples Elvis Costello's "Pump it Up".

RON SEXSMITH
TIME BEING
Elliott Smith? Or, if I'm feeling generous, Neil Finn? Type of thing? Singer songwriter thing.

SKYE
MIND HOW YOU GO
Slow/mopey pop music. Sounds like one of the Spice Girls with PMS.

STRANGE ATTRACTOR
EVERYTHING IS CLOSER
Kick ass trip hop. In bulk.

TACOA
FENG SHUI
Groovin' electronica along the lines of ole Deep Forest. ie beats plus indigenous music.

VOIVOD
KATORZ
It was sad when Piggy died. I've loved Voivod since the 80s. I don't care for Jasonic's involvement, but the 2003 self-titled Voivod album was excellent. 30 seconds into "The Getaway", this is already different. Let me listen to this mofo 50x & I'll get back to you. "The X-stream" is fucking excellent, I can say that much. But the front cover art isn't very amazing, is it.

THE WAKE
DEATH-A-HOLIC
Obviously not The Wake (UK) on Factory Records nor Cleopatra Records's The Wake from Columbus Ohio. This one is an Opeth-y death metal band.

SCOTT WALKER
THE DRIFT
Fucking weird. How did this guy become famous again? The music is experimental, possibly improvised. The vocals, um, highly poetic recitations? With occasional melodic passages.

LET

AFX
CHOSEN LORDS
More squitchy twitchy anti dance smleaugh from the main man of squitchy twitchy anti dance smleaugh. Me likey "PWSteal.Ldpinch.D", remind me to shout that one out at his next gig.

ALIEN VAMPIRES
EVIL GENERATION
Dark electro. All synthetic. The riffs might've originated on guitar, maybe not. The vocals sound like Dani Filth. And with trax like "I Fuck Nuns", "Fake Blod is For Cunt", the influence seems apparent. "Satanic Propaganda (SNTF Rising)" even takes the fun out of devil worship.

HERB ALPERT'S TIJUANA BRASS
WHIPPED CREAM AND OTHER DELIGHTS REWHIPPED
Allstar remix project that would've been much cooler about ten years ago. Still, this could've turned out much worse.

Die Anarchistische Abendunterhaltung
DOMESTIC WILDLIFE
The first song is like experimental orchestral jazz classical progressive rock. "Rabbit Eye Movement" is a gorgeous piece of orchestra... pop? Track three sounds very much like the middle eight of "21st Century Schizoid Man" for woodwinds, bass and drumset. Pretty cool.

CAMP
ICONOGRAPHY
Weird. Dance music beats, new wave guitars & keyboards. Disco basslines. And fey, disaffected vocals. I didn't mean it was weird. I should've said SWEET. "If I Were a Cat".

THE COMMERCIAL HIPPIES
IF YOU CAN'T STAND THE HEAT
Nine tracks that merge into one long hour of dull trance.

DATACH'I
SHOCK DIAMONDS
Weird-ass noises treated rhythmically. Quite a few of them. But not a beat or melody in sight.

DESTYNATION
RISING UP
Wow. Judas Priest crossed with Foreigner.

DRAGON LORD
THROUGH THE TIME
Um. Pass. Man, I wish these guys were kidding.

ENDRONE
THE SINS WITHIN
Detuned boy band emo death metal.

ETERNAL TEARS OF SORROW
BEFORE THE BLEEDING SUN
Melodic, orchestral black metal with catchy choruses. That can't be.

FANNY
SHOEBOMB HURRICANE
There's a Venetian Snares remix on the end. Need I say more?

JACK JOHNSON
CURIOUS GEORGE
Dull, offensive, Santana-esque acoustic guitar driven Top 40. And it's cheesy.

TIM KOCH
FAENA
This guy operates solely in the realm of the snarky song title. All 17 trax are steeped in snark. Musically, it's instrumental electronica of various descriptions. My favorite, "Seven Ate Nine" has a nice drum groove over melodic synth stuffing. Tim Koch, a subtle & palatable version of Aphex Twinkie.

LOSCIL
PLUME
Now THAT's what I call subtleatmosphericambientronica. Now I'm getting misty-eyed for the old days of Future Sound Of London. Awww.


MEDIAEVAL BAEBES & MARTIN PHIPPS
THE VIRGIN QUEEN
If this is a soundtrack, the movie sounds awesome. You know the Baebes's deal already.

NARNIA
ENTER THE GATE
If you have to be a Euro power metal band with keyboards, and no one is suggesting you do, I guess you could do worse than this. Bruce Dickinson-worship vocals, Maidenish riffs. The only wildcard on the first cut is the wildly inappropriate Journey (ca. 1981) keyboards. Which I like. Recommended for Iron Maiden fans who always wished Jonathan Cain would've joined.

OAKENFOLD
A LIVELY MIND
Semi-terrible stadium dance hitz. Maybe I expected more from Oakie cokey. But I don't know why.

SAMBASSADEUR
COASTAL AFFAIRS EP
Oh my god, musically, "Kate" gets it so right it's right. Acoustic guitar, bloppy bass, wispy female singing. Kind of like Magnetic Fields meets the Cure and/or New Order. Highly melodic.
All four tracks are like that. Fucking excellent!

SEPULTURA
DANTE XXI
I've never been a fan. I wrote them off as latecomers to the death metal game in the early 1990s. So fuck knows what their records sound like. This one is pretty brutal in spots. "Dark Wood of Error" has nice meaty riffs. ""City of Dis" starts like Celtic Frost, then thrashes out for a bit. Then it's kind of groovy. "Repeating the Horror" has a decent melodic element. Is
"Still Flame" a bonus track? It sounds like a heavy metal Portishead cover.

SPEKTR
THE NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCE
I know Cronos likes to refer to Venom's music (often mid-song) as 'black fucking metal', but I think this is real black fucking metal. It's scary, there are no grooves, you can hear keyboards in the distance, the drums are recorded & mixed strangely, and the vocals are terrifying. Plus, "The Violent Stink of Twitching Terror." Hands down. Black fucking metal!!

THIEVERY CORPORATION
VERSIONS
This shit is fucking awesome. 18 songs, give or take, are given the full Thievererrey biz. And, put it this way, my two favorite songs are their Versions of trax by the Doors and Sarah McLachlan. I know, I know. Shit is DOPE! Soundtrack of the century. The Fear of Pop cut is cool, as are Herb Alpert and Gilbertos Astrud and Bebel. WICK'd!

retouch

ASMODEUS
IMPERIUM DAMNATUM
Yay scary black metal. Brutal, terrifying, gorgeous. Those blastbeats are dramatic! "On the Inflammatory March." And it's cool that they saved the ghouly sound effects intro piece for the end.

ATTACKER
THE UNKNOWN
Good god, that voice. It sounds like the dude from Overkill in the 80s. Like, high, melodic & untrained. That's how it sounds anyway. The music is kind of like Overkill too. Adequate, non-fluffy, heavy metal. It's not thrash & it's not glam.

KENNETH BAGER
FRAMENTS FROM A SPACE CADET
With all those guest vocalists, this sounds like a mellow/dub version of the Junkie XL albums of recent vintage.

FRANK BRETSCHNEIDER & PETER DUIMELINKS
FFLUX
Monotonous/minimalistic electronica that practically isn't even there. Shit is quiet, repetetive & of almost no use to me as a listener! So there!

D.A.D.
SCARE YOURSELF
The first song reminds me of Nirvana. The second one reminds me of Foo Fighters. None remind me of Probot though, so I can't call them Grohl-ites. So, I dunno, melodic hard rock with a hint of alternativeness?

DNA
KICK ME UP
Generic instrumental trance.


FILUR
INTO THE WASTELAND
Awwwwwwww yeah. The first song is downtempo electronica with awesome vocals from the hawt hawt hawtie Stina Nordenstam. The second is uptempo & just as rad. "Avoid Disgrace" adds dude-vox. "Kid Retouch". "What I Long", is that the one with the Gus Gus singer female? It's nice too. "Right Said Frog", "Boredom Threshold". This album is the undisputed springtime jam!

HIM
PEOPLES
Potentially neato downtempo jazzy loungey dance rock thing. Then again "In These Times" strays a bit too close to Santana ground for my liking.

HOWE GELB
'SNO ANGEL LIKE YOU
Guitar, singing, drums, weirdness. Lots of weirdness.

IDLE SONS
SIXTEEN SEASONS
Emo punk pop rock.

LAURA MICHELLE KELLY
THE STORM INSIDE
It's just confusing that this otherwise nondescript young female singer songwriter piano pop album opens with a gorgeous cover of Nick Drake's "Riverman".

MADS LANGER
ATTENTION PLEASE
Who's this guy singing these generic pop songs. Nevermind, don't answer. Turns out I don't care.

NORTHAUNT
HORIZONS
Ooooh, ghoulyambience.

OPPOSITE8
HARD ENOUGH
Pleasant enough dance music.

PALACE
BLACK SUN
Wow, who else writes songs called "Women In Leather" in this day and age, I ask you. I have to give this one points just for that. Melodic power metal. I'm reminded of Pretty Maids. Aw, but "Rock Soldiers" isn't a Frehley's Comet cover. Darn.

PET SHOP BOYS
FUNDAMENTAL
I liked "West End Girls" when it came out because I heard it all over London the first time I went there. I was 13. Since then the only other thing I liked was the first Electronic single. The technology may be updated but it's still just synth pop, innit.

PORTUGAL THE MAN
WAITER: "YOU VULTURES!"
All that punctuation on the album title. I already hate this band. Song titles so snarky I'm not even going to bother relating ("Horse Warming Party"). Offputting combination of indie pop, prog rock & big budget emo. Bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh. Puke all over myself.

SHINJUKU THIEF
DEVOLUTION
Strangely-mixed uh, sonic experimentation. Some quite gruesome.

SILENT CIVILIAN
REBIRTH OF THE TEMPLE
Melodic progressive death metal. With screechy AND clean vocals. Something for everyone but me.

SNAKE EYE
RITUAL INSTINCTS
"Queen of the Night". Hm. This is hard rockin', high pitched voice hard rock metal stuff. The singing is okay, it reminds me of the fake band on the movie Rock Star.

STEREO FUSE
ALL THAT REMAINS
Fucking boring modern emo grunge. And the vocals are almost like country.



TIGER BABY
NOISE AROUND ME
Awesome band name (only Spider Baby could be better), great dance synth pop, hot-voiced female vocalist, fun songs. Soundtrack of the summer. Almost. Top five anyway.

URSULA 1000
HERE COMES TOMORROW
NOW yer talkin'. FUN dance pop big beat. & it's funky.

CARL MICHAEL VON HAUSSWOLFF
LEECH
Sounds like he spent the first 2.5 minutes trying to plug in the synth. Track two, 20 minutes of almost nothing. Track three, loops of clicks & static. Track four, 12.5 minutes of... even less. Heavily reverbed drum hits every 30 seconds or so.

RECOGNIZE

BENGA
NEWSTEP
Melodic & electronic, like a nu version of 808 State. Sort of. Maybe not quite that melodic. "Zombie Jig". "Dubstep Dreams".

HOOBASTANK
EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF
I've always hated this band despite never hearing them. No band called Hoobastank could be worth a god damn, I don't care who they get to do what. My premonitions were correct, this is indeed worthless pop poop rock. And can I just register a general complaint while I'm here about military imagery in rock songs? The ole hup two three four kind of thing? Because it's bogus & it makes my skin crawl.

MESRINE
JACK IS DEAD
50 song grindcore, um, concept album? About serial killers and... the Simpsons? The longest track is still under three minutes. Sound quality ranges from clean to disgusting! As well it should. "Andrew Cunanan"...."Apu".... "Skinner pt 2".

MOTORJESUS
DEATHRIDER
Melodic Euro power metal pop rock. The choruses sound like Nickelback.

KERRANG PRESENTS
REMASTER OF PUPPETS
Full length tribute album by 'today's hottest metal artists'. Machine Head tunes down, so their "Battery" intro already sounds different. Otherwise, yeah. It is what it is. Hm, covering an entire album, what a concept. I've never heard of Mendeed or Fightstar, but the rest are what passes for household names in the world of metal these days. Dude, Bullet For My Valentine's whiny singer sounds like a fucking tool. Chimaira (original band name there, well done)'s dude takes the opposite approach - tuneless death metal screeching - & sounds just as toolish. Funeral For A Friend too, with "Damage, Inc". Meh.

PAUL SIMON
SURPRISE
Good god, it sounds like Sonic Youth at the beginning. That's weird. Did I cue up the wrong thing? The highest compliment I can pay this is to say that it doesn't sound like Paul Simon. I've never been down with the little man. Though I was confused when Chevy Chase was in that one video, because he was still funny & hadn't turned into a puppet of elective cosmetic surgery yet. I might even listen to "How Can You Live in the Northeast" again. "Everything About it is a Love Song" goes drum & bass, yes, ten years too late. Better late than never, I suppose. Not bad for a fossil. Or, I've just lost my fucking mind.

SONIC YOUTH
RATHER RIPPED
I lost track of these guys after 'Goo', so I don't know what else to say beyond it sounds like Sonic Youth. Opener "Reena" is a clean-tone exploration. Upbeat & sorta jangly. But still moody & unique. "Incinerate" has clean guitars too. Is that how they do it now? Nice. "Sleepin Around" - there's the scuzz. Is Kim Gordon singing more? Cool album. I don't know what I expected, but this shit is cool.