Präparat

Press play and dive into a sinkhole of bereavement, seep through the heavy sound of the skull-crushing drums, thanks to Atsuo, and the distorted sludgy guitars of Wata, get sucked into the ever-increasing glare of drone and doom.

Ahemm, well ok, I’m really pleased to see Boris musically overactive, they are masters of their own art, a level unreachable by the claw-like hand of cheesy music. Their back catalog is increasing pretty fast with a release per year or so, the sound is metastatic; from j-pop to free jazz but they are quite known for their drone hypnotic soundscapes a la Sunn o))) , Sleep and Melvins.

The Japanese trio is quite obscure and judging by the band photos, I don’t think that they’re willing to step into the limelight anytime soon.

My favorite tune off “Praparat” is a sweet wicked lullaby called “Elegy“. Enjoy

Welcome to Sky Valley

Long long time ago, somewhere in our galaxy, the Tetris super villain created planet earth and then Kyuss! A great band with super powers, just like Popeye but they used weed instead of spinach.

In fact, I always tell my imaginary best friend that the only flaw to Kyuss was Josh Homme‘s horrible haircut, aside from it, everything was pretty much stellar.

I’ve decided to review this album for no apparent reason other than it’s right before their final offering “…And the circus leaves town” and after their huge “Blues for The Red Sun” which makes for a solid argument, I guess!

The music is, well as you would expect from Kyuss; gritty, fuzzy and heavy guitars delivered  either by Josh Homme or his identical hologram. As for the vox; John Garcia is in a league of his own, killer unmatched vocals, he’s by far my favorite vocalist from the Desert Rock scene, he has a wild range and a set of pipes specially designed by the gods to suit Kyuss‘s style.

Welcome to Sky Valley reminds me of an era where men were men and recorded their music with no autotune bullshit. The music is vintage, raw and organic. It flows naturally be it an acoustic ballad like “Space Cadet” or down-tuned devastating stoner madness as in “Odyssey“.

The bass and drums are just astonishing, Brant Bjork and Scott Reeder are very skilled musicians and pair together very well! You’d get a natural shot in the arm just by listening to the bass lines in “Gardenia“.

This album is a cheap fare to outer space, a session-long cosmic jam and a guaranteed soar into a new hazy level where the sun is a bloody pulp and people are mushrooms, it’s pure perfection! But to put it in a more sober and delicate way; it’s just like that electric slap you get when you touch a girl’s itty bitty rear!

Lately, I’ve read that 3/4 of Kyuss is getting back together, minus Josh Homme, who’s obviously busy with QoTSA and Them Crooked Vultures, the project sprang after the demise of “Kyuss Lives!” due to a nasty legal battle with Josh Homme and Scott Reeder, and now it rolls under the cool label of “Vista Chino“, I’ll be looking forward to hearing what these guys have to offer.

Kyuss – Space Cadet 

Savages

 

There’s no better feeling than a jaw-dropping audio flavored surprise. Savages caught me off guard and it’s too damn good.

The mean bass lines and the fat beats moving along with the soul-slitting violins are blending together gracefully. The vox are voluptuous and sexy. I can hear many artists there from Gotan Project to Koop and Blue States.

I googled a bit and I found out about the mastermind behind Savages; he is a producer from Hungary named Nándor Kürtössy . Kudos to him for making the “Five Finger Discount” album a very pleasant down-tempo ride.

Enjoy!

††† Crosses

I’ve had this in mind for some time now and I happen to have a break to talk about it; Crosses is the brainchild of Deftones frontman Chino Moreno and Far‘s guitarist Shaun Lopez.

The project was born in 2011 and has 2 EPs under its belt as we speak, and I like what I’m hearing so far! Chino‘s clearly riding on the softer and laid back side with this one (as he did with the great yet underrated project Team Sleep ) and draws from Depeche Mode which is a good thing but it still has some heavy bass lines and eargasm-inducing synth.

Don’t get me wrong though, it’s not that as mellow as you’d think. Check out †hholyghs† and †elepa†hy :

King Animal

                                       

When Soundgarden called it a day back in the mid 90′s, everybody thought that it was a premature demise of a very successful Band amid a highly acclaimed career.  I still to this day, and out of the Seattle movement, don’t consider them Grunge.

In fact, albums like “Badmotorfinger” or “Superunknown” are clearly on the heavy and sludgy side with a very pronounced Metal affiliation. But let the past and its legacy rest in peace, for now, fast forward to 2012; the tides turned and rumors about a new album started swirling, I was skeptical due to Cameron’s latest album with Pearl Jam being a sub-par release and with, you know, Cornell’s solo drivel, hopes shriveled and  hecklers were yelling :”Stick a fork in it!”, I know for a fact cause I was in the front row of the naysayers.

The first single “Been Away Too Long” was a positive sign and a step in the right direction after the dull and flat “Live To Rise“.

But when the final product; the first collection of all new material in nearly 16 years titled “King Animal” came out, it took me by a storm, and I think that many others were electrocuted as well. It was exciting to hear Thayil‘s weird fills and leads, Cameron’s precise and clinical drumming along with Cornell’s soaring signature vocals again, you can’t help but think: Soundgarden is back with a vengeance and a heavy kick-ass album.

Songs like “Blood on the valley floor” and “By Crooked Steps” sound like unreleased material off “Superunknown“, I would have hoped that more songs were in that vein but it’s still a very solid record nonetheless. Other tunes like “Bones of Birds“, which by the way reminds oddly of “Black Hole Sun“, are on the softer side with a laid-back feel.

Oh I nearly forgot to mention one of my favorites on the album; Worse Dreams, this is straight alt hard-rock with a versatile verse à la Faith No More.

So let me sum it up here; You’ve got an edgy release by Soundgarden, a fantastic new album by the Deftones and Celebration Day by Led Zeppelin, this will certainly leave hordes of fans pleased and make naysayers eat theirs words.

“By Crooked Steps” official video

恋の予感 (Koi no Yokan)

I believe that when music reaches that intimate level where you can relate to it, it shifts from a form of art to become a living, breathing entity.

Much more than a stereo stream; Deftones has always been a myriad of textures, colors and energy.

And as peculiar as this might sound, they manage to sharpen their sound with every release. I’m stoked, cause that’s what happened recently with Koi No Yokan, which merely translates but not exactly to ; “love at first sight”, and I wouldn’t beg to differ here, because that’s what I felt for this album.

Deftones struck really hard with the first single “Leathers“; the angst of the music pierces right through the lyrics, it falls right within a quote by Khalil Gibran: “Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.”  and it was a fair premonition that a promising follow-up to 2010′s Diamond Eyes was being on the way.

It’s indeed a very good offering, a natural progression, I sure didn’t want another “Adrenaline” or “Around The Fur“. Koi No Yokan has songs that suit every mood, the range has been expanded and the tracks have a spaced feel, a very gentle yet strong character,  a trip right through a world of fantasy, it’s almost as if you were half-awake in a dream.

This  album is definitely a grower that stands up there in  my top 5 this year, gracious and well crafted, a shot in the arm that will make you feel exactly as stated in “What Happened To You?” “We’re Alive somewhere else/ far ahead of our time…”

Highly recommended for slackers and day-dreamers.

SouthPacific

I grew almost tired of the rehashed music that gets air time nowadays; stale, boring and lacks feel.  Steven Wilson said it best :”The music of the future Will not entertain .It’s only meant to repress And neutralise your brain“. I think that what prepared the nest for the proliferation of a gazillion post-rock bands who spend more time on their haircuts than actually practicing their instruments,  is mainly sheeple who force themselves into liking anything that has a pseudo-intellectual vibe to it, good news is, You can test it here and now, You’ll just have to choose a fancy name for your band like “Voltaire lies bleeding on the Beach”, and You’ll already have some fans somewhere, right away, out of the blue!

So in order for me to keep up with some stereo goodness, I often find myself digging out older records to harvest some diamonds in the rough, and I’d like to introduce a band that I’ve been listening to for a while now, the horribly underrated; “SoPac” short for SouthPacific .

The short-lived project (only two albums under their belt), was founded in 97′ and  has featured some of the finest shoegaze/dream-pop/post-rock tracks caught on tape, before its demise nearly a decade ago.

In all honesty, I didn’t like it at first, but the album kept getting back in my playlist and It grew on me, but you really have to be in the mood to enjoy it. The music is layered and dense, the guitars thick and reverb overshadows the instruments and fills the tracks creating a deep haunting hypnotic weird feel “Automata” and “Round (Forget What You feel)” come to my mind.  Speaking of the latter, the first time I heard it I was staring at the waves roll upon a dark teal sea, I got a natural high out of it! (kids don’t try this)

The songs might all have that saturated sound but they aren’t similar, in fact they are quite different spanning many fields from Post-Rock, Shoegaze and Electronica to Ambient.The only track “Built To Last” featuring vocals is an amazing psychedelic voyage, the laid back arpeggios are soothing and shift in a very elegant manner.

What I liked the most about the album “Constance” for instance, is that its textures are raw, multi-layered and natural. It’s not your typical bedroom record, rather it’s an album to listen to while having a walk by the sea and You’ll definitely need some time to get ahold of it.

Hisingen Blues

Stoner Split records are like Chinese fortune cookies; you could care less about the crust, id est: the artwork, cause all the faux wisdom and intriguing voodoo-like mystic charades are inside. A few acts come to mind when I think of bands who teamed up to make some killer music like Grails / Red Sparowes collaboration, These Arms Are Snakes / Prefuse 73 , The Melvins / ISIS, in that fashion and pertaining to the same pattern I’ve discovered the split made by Ancestors / Graveyard and I have to admit that It stands up there with the finest offerings by the retro stoner doom movement.

While you should check out “Ancestors” before you hit the casket, I’ll urge you to give Graveyard a listen too. Indeed, the Swedish quartet just finished crafting a follow up to their self-titled and highly acclaimed debut. No auto-tune madness or drum triggers, just classic stoner rock played the old fashioned way with an evil twist. The music is monolithic yet appealing in the vein of Witchcraft but with a bluesy feel. As for the guitars and vox, they’re sleazy, swampy and will get you high as a kite, I’m talking Stereo Meth here.

This sophomore chapter titled “Hisingen Blues” is a bitch-slap in the face of corporate radio friendly Rock ‘N’ Roll. Graveyard once again managed to pull a mind-whipping album with an outstanding musicianship and if you’re fed up with the sloth inducing releases like the new Opeth, you should give their fellow peers a try.

My favorite tracks are Buying Truth (Tack & Förlåt) , Ungrateful Are The Dead, Longing and Rss but Hisingen Blues is far more profound and overall it is an up range display of catchy psychedelic hooks led by a crafty plot that transcends the boundaries of mainstream music and pushes back its approach towards a more raw, straightforward and vintage sound. Keep an eye on these guys cause they’re an invigorating shot in the arm that will hopefully lay the ground for more acts to come.

Since I Left You

Hier soir, allongé au berceau de mes pensées, écoutant quelques morceaux en shuffle masqué, les arpèges d’une chanson plus que familière ont envahi mes écouteurs, accompagnés d’une phrase quelque peu cliché

“Watch the steps. Get a drink, have a good time now. Welcome to paradise, paradise, paradise…”

C’était pas difficile de deviner qui c’était, me rendant compte par la même occasion, que cette chanson n’a pas  quitté mon lecteur depuis près d’une année. Mais reprenons l’histoire depuis le début sans trop de balivernes.

Un beau jour j’ai déterré une compilation d’un de ces sites où l’on se vante à établir des “best-of”s pour le plus grand plaisir des mélomanes et des curieux.

Et ce fut ma première rencontre avec le collectif australien “The Avalanches” .

Au début, je n’ai guère aimé mais je me suis vite aperçu que j’écoutais de plus en plus le titre “Electricity” ; Une ballade haletante saupoudrée d’accords, de samples et d’une basse saturée.

En découvrant, l’album “Since I Left You” , sorti en 2001, on se sent un peu désorienté; les chansons comportent beaucoup de couches, enracinée dans le turntablism, plus de 3500 samples vinyle ont été utilisés pour sculpter et forger le son de l’album. Les chansons ont été recollées puis découpées, de telle sorte qu’on peut écouter l’album en intégralité sans vraiment noter les sauts inter-morceaux.

Des samples épars allant de Madonna (Holiday employé sur Stay another season), de Michael Jackson, de 1968 des Mamas and Papas (employés dans Little Journey) jusqu’à Debbie Reynolds (1957),  The Main Attraction (1968) , Cerrone (1976) ou encore les Paper Clip People (1996) sur A Different Feeling. Ce mélange peu anodin et exotique a donné naissance à un disque hybride, fraîs mais portant une signature unique valant à “Since I Left you” une carrure imposante, qui, une décennie plus tard continue à être brassée par les éloges des critiques. (classé No.10 parmi les 100 meilleurs albums australiens de tous les temps)

Mon titre préféré reste “Since I Left You“, en effet, même si certains le décrivent comme le revers de la médaille, je le considère comme le pilier même de l’album. Son côté mystérieux,  nonchalant et  déroutant est tellement fascinant que je me laisse arroser par sa vive émotion douce-amère remuée telle une marée par une voix radieuse et délicate chantant “Since I Left You, I found the world so new“.

Mélancolique, joyeuse et à la fois indifférente, cette palpitante nature lui ajoute des années à sa longévité.

La vidéo , qui a remporté plusieurs awards, reste tout de même assez ambiguë, ouverte à toute sorte d’interprétation, la mienne? je pense que c’est une invitation à vivre sa vie pleinement car de toute façon elle s’achèvera un jour (Le canari au début, utilisé pour détecter l’oxygène suggère que les mineurs étaient ensevelis, l’un d’eux qui s’est laissé aller naturellement, a pu danser pleinement et même s’il est mort il était heureux à en croire la fin:
“Three days later, They dug me out, I never saw Arthur again, But without bet wherever he’s gone, he’s having a damn good time…“
Links :

The Devil’s Orchard

Progressive Metal Juggernauts Opeth are back in business, giving away the first snippet, a brand new song called “The Devil’s Orchard“, from their upcoming album Heritage. Mikael has mentioned in earlier interviews that the band had decided to ditch the Death Metal growls, recording solely in clean vocals. The CD was produced by Åkerfeldt and the mixing duties were handled by Steven Wilson (Porcupine Tree)

When asked about the new direction of Opeth and the overall vibe of the new offering, especially after the departure of keyboardist Per Wiberg,  Mikael stated

“I never heard music like that, so I can’t compare it to other bands. If you want to compare it to another band, it has to be us. But still, it’s different. feels like I’ve been building up to write for and participate on an album like this since I was 19.” Fittingly, he says he listened to a bunch of Alice Cooper over the past year. There’s also something youthful about the exuberant blend of jazz upswings, “God is dead” lyrics, and stop-on-a-dime tempo shifts in lead single”

“The Devil’s Orchard” can be streamed below. The album is due on September 20 via Roadrunner Records.

“Heritage” track listing:

1. Heritage
2. The Devil’s Orchard
3.  I Feel The Dark
4.  Slither
5. Nepenthe
6. Haxprocess
7. Famine
8. The Lines In My Hand
9. Folklore
10. Marrow Of The Earth