Author: James B. Eldred (Page 14 of 21)

Empire of the Sun: Walking on a Dream

June 12, 2009 /

Ripping off ’80s artists can work, but you have to choose wisely. Go for Depeche Mode or New Order, leave Kajagoogoo alone. Empire of the Sun’s debut album Walking on a Dream has been out for a bit now, and It is frequently being compared to MGMT’s breakout debut Oracular Spectacular. The comparisons, however, aren’t justified. While MGMT is a psychedelic band with a synth-pop side, Empire of the Sun are firmly synth-pop and electro-pop to the hilt, with a sound ripped straight from 1984. Whether or not that’s a good thing can be debated. Sure, they work as a throwback retro act, and songs like the ultra-catchy title track and “Half Mast” are well-made simplistic pop-dance numbers, but once you dig past the obvious singles, there isn’t much to Walking on a Dream. The second-half of the album has some touches of experimentation, such as the “Delta Boy” with its Flaming Lips freak-out vibe, and “Country,” which has a strange easy listening feel, but its mostly just boring and kind of monotonous. By the time that the closer “Without You” comes up, the duo from Australia have more than worn out their welcome. Still, the highlights are great; hopefully they can craft something a bit more consistent next time. (EMI 2009)

Empire Of The Sun Myspace Page

Alternative, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Dance, Electronica

Radio Moscow: Brain Cycles

June 12, 2009 /

On Brain Cycles, Radio Moscow’s sophomore release, there’s an eight-minute jam called “No Good Woman,” in which there is a three-minute drum solo complete with headphone-porn stereo effects. The audacity of said drum solo is matched immediately by a one-minute unaccompanied guitar solo that closes out the track, with equally ludicrous stereo-shifting effects thrown in for no good reason. If that sounds awesome to you, then you should probably just buy Brian Cycles (as well as Radio Moscow’s 2007 debut) right now. If not, well, then you have no soul. Radio Moscow is a blues-rock band with some heavy psychedelic influences. They’re carved from the same stone as Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughan and the Allman Brothers. Subtle as a punch in the face, their musicianship is without question; guitar solos run amok as drums fly at you in all directions, while Parker Griggs bemoans about womanly woes and many other of life’s common ills. It’s not original in the least, but sure as hell sounds good. These boys from Iowa know what they are doing, and Brain Cycles is sure to cause all but the most jaded blues rock fan to drop his head in awe and cry out “goddamn” at least once. This isn’t Wolfmother-style emulation of a classic rock sound – this is the real deal. (Alive 2009)

Radio Moscow’s MySpace page

Alternative, Blues, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews

Sin Fang Bous: Clangour

June 12, 2009 /

Everything is weirder in Iceland, that’s a scientific fact. Their pop singers are weirder (Bjork) their rock groups are weirder (Sigur Ros), and if Sin Fang Bous is any indication, their singer-songwriters are weirder as well. Sin Fang Bous is actually Sindri Mar Sigfusson, the lead singer of Seabear. If you’ve heard Seabear, that won’t really prepare you for Sin Fang Bous, since the former is indie pop and this is decidedly…different. The music on Clangour runs between glitched-out electronica to quiet acoustic rock, all facing a common bond in Bous’ off-kilter and utterly charming songwriting. One-of-a-kind romantic verses like “I will be the lumberjack and you will be the trees” populate left-of-center odes like “Clangour and Flutes.” Decipher that one? How about “Sinkership,” which has Bous proclaiming, “I’m coming down, I see eyes in the mirror / An old rhino sweeps in rolled up flames”? Give me a ring when you figure that one out, but even if you can’t they still work, as the dreamy electronic vibe of Clangour accompanies the out-of-this-world lyrics. High speed loops of bleeps and bloops are layered behind simplistic acoustic guitar strumming, creating a Bob Dylan-meets-Beta Band vibe. It’s not wacky or sample-filled like Beck, but very deliberate and low-fi. This isn’t dance music, and calling it “electronic” might even be a misnomer; this is acoustic singer-songwriter stuff that happens to be plugged in to a few computers and a drum machine, and it’s pretty amazing. (Morr Music 2009)

Sin Fan Bous’ MySpace page

Alternative, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Electronica

IAMX: Kingdom of Welcome Addiction

May 15, 2009 /

Chris Corner is a member of the Sneaker Pimps, and seemingly not content be associated with the worst-named genre of all time (trip-hop) (Ed. Note: two words: riot grrrl), he’s branched out with his solo project IAMX into Electronic Body Music (EBM), the second-worst-named genre of all-time. Twitch-era Ministry and the work of Cabaret Voltaire and Front 242 are good examples of the genre, which is a dance-friendly hodgepodge of electro, industrial and synth-pop. It’s generally a pretty stupid but fun little subgenre, filled with over-the-top lyrics about sex and drugs and even more over-the-top synthesizers. IAMX embraced the sound with his first album, 2004’s Kiss + Swallow, but on Kingdom of Welcome Addiction he tones it down a bit, with most of the songs being slow, introspective ballads and mid-tempo pop songs that take the minimalist approach of trip-hop and transport them to a synth-pop environment with generally positive results. He seems to be going for an Imogen Heap vibe, a presumption made all the more accurate by Imogen Heap’s guest appearance on the haunting “My Secret Friend.” Even without the synth-pop diva to back him up, Corner usually keeps things going nicely, with “I Am Terrified” and “Think of England” especially standing out. Parts are uneven, and Corner’s vocals aren’t always up to task, such as on “An I for an I” where he weakly bellows in vain to match his throbbing industrial beats. Still, this is a surprisingly good and complex record that actually might make you yearn for a new Sneaker Pimps album. (Metropolis 2009)

IAMX MySpace Page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Electronica

Julien-K: Death to Analog

May 1, 2009 /

Julien-K is a side project by two of the guys from Orgy, but don’t ask which two because it doesn’t really matter. They’re better than Orgy, but lowered expectations should not be a pass, and hoping something is better than Orgy is about as low as expectations get. This is synth-pop-influenced electronic music, but it has more in common with Linkin Park or even ’90s industrial-dance like Stabbing Westward than the ’80s synth-pop that the group is obviously trying to emulate. That makes sense, since Chester Bennington of Linkin Park has worked with the duo before with his side-project Dead by Sunrise. Chester makes a guest appearance on Death to Analog, dropping some backing vocals on the single “Kick the Bass,” and his emo whine is the least annoying part of the instantly forgettable excursion into ’80s pastiche. The amount of ’80s music that Julien-K rip off is truly staggering, adding only some slightly more aggro synthesizers to the mix; imagine the Pet Shop boys by way of KMFDM. Their obsession with the synth-pop of the past turns into downright theft with “Disease,” which blatantly steals portions of “West End Girls” without apology. The Handsome Furs had to pay New Order because their song “All We Want Baby, Is Everything” sounded too much like “Temptation”; precedent has been sent, the members of Julien-K should be forced to hand over their synthesizers as payment to the Pet Shop Boys. It would not only serve as restitution for the theft, it would also mean Julien-K wouldn’t be able to record new music for at least a short period of time, making everyone a winner. Even worse than that uncredited rip-off is the credited one, as the duo cover Romeo Void’s “Never Say Never,” which for some reason is spelled out in txt-speak as “Nvr Say Nvr.” But haphazard vowel removal is the least of the song’s problems, which removes the original’s classic saxophone solo with an oppressive synth riff while the singer tries to go the creepy, throaty whisper route with the vocals, presumably to make the song sound more aggressive and threatening. But there’s no way to make “I might like you better if we slept together” sound scary. Death to Analog just isn’t bad, it’s insulting, and on second thought it might actually be worse than Orgy. (Metropolis 2009)

Julien-K MySpace Page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Dance, Electronica

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