EPT
Rap
Avant-Garde Metal
28th Feb-14th Mar
I haven't had time to write a proper themed issue so here's another general music blog. Check out what I've been listening to at http://www.last.fm/user/ice_9
Music Mag #4 - 15th - 21st March
The post has let me down and I've not had many new CDs show up this week so this will be partly new stuff for me and partly older reviews. Feel free to comment and suggest! I'm always looking for new music. Now, let's get it on.
Sometimes you'll find a pop song that you like. It's nothing to be ashamed of and you should just embrace it. I found this instrumental version of the song from a Mass Effect based remix. I loved the music so I tried the original. I hated the singing so I found a standard instrumental and this is it. John Hill is apparantly one of the writers and he produced it so I've added his name as the main artist. But anyway, I love this track, the bass is sexy and the guitar riff fits in so perfectly. As the song goes on the distorted vocals and the strings just add to it. I love this instrumental track so much. I was going to write a blog about "sexy" music at some point but I can't find a lot. Anyone know of any sexy songs?
This CD showed up two weeks late and in the mean time, another music blog sniped it!? OUTRAGEOUS. But still, more publicity is fine. This whole album (TSOL) is great. The best rap album I've heard in a long time. The two tracks I linked are my favourites but there's still a lot more good stuff on it. A lot of Rappers talk without saying anything. Shad doesn't fall into this and I feel I've caught him on the middle of his rise in popularity. A friend of mine linked this to me out of the blue and I'm grateful for it. It does have one or two tracks I'm not too keen on but it's hard to find a rap album that's gold all the way through.
I haven't really listened to much new stuff this week but this song is so good I'm linking it here anyway so more people can hear it. It's a guitar cover of a Japanese song (that was sung by someone Chinese iirc) and it's so beautiful. It's my favourite instrumental guitar song ever and that's a genre I really love. Absolutely lovely song. Check out any songs by Marty Friedman while you're here. His ballads: Romance no Kamisama, Lovesorrow, Lust for Life, Devil Take Tomorrow, Coloureas Mi Vida are all godlike.
I thought it was time I had a power metal track or review on here, so I'm starting off with my favourite Power Metal album. Sonata Arctica are a typical Power Metal band in that their albums are so inconsistant that some stand head an shoulders above others. For me, Reckoning Night is that album. It's absolutely brilliant from start to end. It has everything power metal needs, cheesy narration, power chords, amazing vocals, catchy choruses and crazy keyboards. Epic throughout and with surprising variation (for Power Metal at least) this album has a number of my favourite tracks from the genre and is one effortless listen. With epic tracks like White Pearl, Black Oceans to the ballady Shamandalie this album has it all. If you're starting off with Power Metal, get this. If you love power metal and don't own this, get it. The track linked (Wildfire) is so godlike I can't help but listen to it on repeat. If you look at my Last.fm profile, four tracks from this album are in my top tracks of all time. Powerful from start to finish and all the while being unique to Sonata Arctica.
My New Albums
SHAD - TSOL
Check the mini section above. Real good.
Alcest - Écailles de Elune
This is a perfect example of incorrect tagging of a CD. I was told this was a "Shoegaze/Black Metal" CD. It's not. It's a shoegaze album with two black metal sections. Since when have small sections constituted to an entire genre name for an album? People seem to take the heaviest moment of a CD and change the genre to whatever that section comes under. Anyway, this CD is... I dunno it's pretty good. It's definitely not bad but I was expecting more Black Metal so my opinion on it is still a little skewed. Be certain that this is a Shoegaze album first. If you're into it, give it a try, It does have the most beautiful album artwork I've seen though. You can pick any song from the album. Try Percées De Lumière for Metal and Écailles De Lune - Part 2 for the general sound of the album. I feel I could really grow to like this album now that I know what to expect from it. I'll leave the shoegaze fans to pass a real judgement on it.
Albums Released This Week
I got three new ones I know of this week:
Protest The Hero - Scurrilous
New CD of a band I only recently discovered (see issue two). Looking forward to it although the only track I heard (C'est La Vie) seemed to be missing something.
Tesseract - One
Technical/Progressive Metal band from the UK who have been getting serious hype online recently. People are going crazy for this record. It's basically their previous EP "Concealing Fate", which I found a bit boring, which some extra tracks tacked on.. I'll probably give this a try but my advice is don't believe the hype and try before you buy.
The Haunted - Unseen
Swedish Thrash Metal band. A friend was excited about this one so I put it here for him. Swedish bands are normally really good so yeah. I'll probably check it out too.
Last Paragraph
Sometimes I try to find songs that fall under certain categories. The one I've been searching for recently is sexy music. Where the hell is all this stuff? I have like, three songs I'd call sexy, but surely there must be a market for sexy music. I'm not talking pop songs with slutty videos but geuinely sexy songs. Anyone got any suggestions?
