Last year Jayme had a great idea of making a list of our favorite records of ten years ago…way back to 1998 to be exact. Eric at Can You See The Sunset and I of course followed right along. Well, we are back again and hopefully making this a yearly feature for all of us. This time we explore our favorites of 1999. So, here we go again! This list ended up being 30 albums cause I could not stop thinking of great albums to recognize…1999 was a great year. I did not list any descriptions so if you want more info on a band or an album just ask in the comments and I will be happy to wax nostalgic on some of the lesser knowns.
Posts Tagged ‘Mogwai’
11.12.2009
28.09.2009
24.03.2009
Who? Vessels
Where are they from? United Kingdom
What do they sound like? Vessels’ debut full-length, White Fields & Open Devices, is a tremendous listen with an immaculate, natural flow. The band’s choice of The Paper Chase’s John Congleton to produce has certainly paid dividends. The band is heavy and technical at times but can also indulge in quiet atmospheres just as well. Vessels also possess a math rock vibe at different intervals that keep the album moving at a swift and engrossing pace. Vessels probably remind me mostly of instrumental bands like Russian Circles or Mogwai even though the band does interject vocals on the majority of tracks. Vessels might run the gamut on their influences but never to the detriment of their songs.
Two Words And A Gesture
05.03.2009
As a reviewer (I certainly don’t claim to be a critic), instrumental music is definitely the most challenging genre to write about. And I think as a musician (and this is just me guessing cause I play no instruments), it might be the most difficult genre to truly find your own unique voice. Without words and vocals both the listener and the musician must dig deeper to find a true meaning and purpose in the music. AristeiA’s How To Kill A King is an exercise in addition by subtraction.
How To Kill A King is stark and desolate as it slowly searches to find its own space and time. As I grapple with the words to describe the band, I am left feeling almost helpless. In a refreshing turn of events, AristeiA lack all the cliches of the normal build up. The loud/soft dynamic that so many instrumental post-rock bands have put forth before is minimal at best here. The band seems to take pride in creating textures and moods instead. It is no coincidence that How To Kill A King ends with the droning of sparse noise. AristeiA stand out in a crowded genre by simply doing more with less.
Genre: Instrumental/Post-Rock
RIYL: Mogwai, Romance Of Young Tigers, Growing
Label: Self-Released
I’ll Take Mine Black
03.03.2009
I’ll never forget the first time I heard Mogwai: it was late spring of 1999 and I was living in Toronto. I walked into Rotate This! downtown on Queen St. W to purchase Aloha’s …The Nonbelievers EP and sift through the racks for anything else of interest. CODY had just been released a while earlier and the shopkeep had what I later learned was the song Kappa pumping through the store. I remember being completely captivated by this sound that I’d never heard before. I went up to the counter with my Aloha record and asked for a copy of whatever it was that was being played. And my love for post-rock was born. As for Aloha, I don’t think I cracked the cellophane for a good week. It was all Mogwai all the time. CODY, still to this day, gets its fair share of rotation and remains one of my favorite albums of all time.
Ten years and hundreds of records later, cue up Austin’s latest post-rock wonder-group The Calm Blue Sea.
The reason for my little Mogwai story is this: I couldn’t tell you when, where, or how I first came across The Calm Blue Sea. I remember being completely taken by the album’s interplay between massive and minuscule, but can recall little else. Seems anti-climactic in comparison, which is exactly my point. I fell for this album hard at first — like a horned up college kid stricken with puppy love for a bar nymph. I was even ready to offer toast the next morning. But once the sun rose and the blood alcohol returned to normal levels, so to speak, I couldn’t help but feel that I wasn’t the first to have been so easily seduced.
Don’t get me wrong — this is a stunning debut from a band that I absolutely look forward to hearing more from in the future. They’ve built upon the template laid before them by their Austin contemporaries Explosions in the Sky so perfectly, that I dare say they actually sound better at times. But that’s precisely the problem for me. Everything I hear on the album is familiar in one way or another — like I’ve owned it for years and am just blowing off the dust after a lengthy recess. It’s unfair, really. Songs of this caliber deserve better.
The Calm Blue Sea have shown me with this release that they are more than capable of producing near textbook examples of everything a post-rock record should aspire to be. What’s missing is that certain signature, that identifiable nuance to elevate The Calm Blue Sea from exemplary to essential. Whatever that may be, I sincerely hope that we all find it on subsequent installments from the band because one thing is for certain — rarely is anyone ever remembered for writing textbooks.
Genre: Post-Rock
RIYL: Mogwai, Explosions in the Sky, Mono, etc.
Label: Self-Released
After The Legions
Aughra is the solo noise/drone project of Magic Bullet Records owner and Forensics member Brent Eyestone. Proof of Dark Matter | Light the Lights is Aughra’s first proper full length and it is in expansive exploration of sound in all its many forms. What stands out about this album is the sheer diversity of Eyestone’s reach. Aughra are equal parts creepy and inviting. The album boldly transforms itself back and forth from icy, cold movements into rich, warm textures. Yet always at the center of its being is an unmistakable melodic core that molds every note, idea and found sound loosely in place. For fans of ambient music, Aughra’s Proof of Dark Matter | Light the Lights is a worthy and heady listen.
Genre: Drone/Noise/Instrumental
RIYL: Mogwai, Wolf Eyes, Fennesz
Label: Magic Bullet Records
Et In Arcadia Ego
Romance Of Young Tigers are a young band from Dayton, Ohio who have masterfully crafted some of the most captivating instrumental music I have heard in a long time. Combining the haunting atmospheres of Godspeed You! Black Emperor with an almost ambient feel at times, I Have Supped Full On Horrors is four songs and nearly 35 minutes of instrumental bliss. With no percussion (yes, no percussion), ROYT create waves of instrumental “noise” to create an aural masterpiece. Each player seems to bleed into each other but every note and every movement is impeccably placed and perfectly nuanced together to create breathtaking atmospheres. I was startled to find out that I Have Supped Full On Horrors was written and recorded over three years ago and was the band’s first release. To create such engrossing compositions at such a young age for a band is truly remarkable. Now it’s time to see what their next steps take them.
Genre: Instrumental/Post Rock
RIYL: Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Mogwai, Growing
Label: Magic Bullet
Long Withdrawing Roar
25.11.2008
Upon initial observation, Eksi Ekso’s I Am Your Bastard Wings might seem like a peculiar release for Magic Bullet, a label more known for it’s instrumental behemoths and punk/hardcore bands. Upon closer inspection though, Eksi Ekso is actually made up of some former members of previous Magic Bullet alumni, The Burning Paris and On Fire. Eksi Ekso are an extremely mature rock band and some might even categorize the band into modern rock categories. But, that would be a gross understatement. Eksi Ekso are far too intelligent and ambitious to be confined that easily. From an instrumental standpoint, Eksi Ekso are certainly grandiose enough to match just about any post rock band. With a full string section for much of the record Eksi Ekso excels in creating illuminating soundscapes. Quite similar to a band like September Malevolence, Eksi Ekso have the might of a post-rock band with the subtle addition of vocals. The band’s musicianship and arrangements are stunning to say the least. I Am Your Bastard Wings is 50+ minutes of rising and falling, of pain and pleasure, of simplicity and elegance. While the album certainly illicits certain moods, Eksi Ekso’s I Am Your Bastard Wings is most certainly not just a mood piece that is meant to be left to the background. Turn the volume up on those headphones and realize the depths of what Eksi Ekso are creating here.
Genre: Indie/Post-Rock
RIYL: Sigur Ros, September Malevolence, Mogwai
Label: Magic Bullet
Killing Texas
14.11.2008
I just discovered Alcest’s 2007 album, Souvenirs d’Un Autre Monde, a few months ago and the album kills me every time. There has always been a somewhat informal link between metal and shoegaze. You have seen it with Justin Broaderick’s metamorphisis from Napalm Death and Godflesh into the warmer melodic depths of Jesu. French metal multi-instrumentalist Neige follows the same path with Alcest. You can call it post-metal if you want. Either way, it’s huge sounding and fans of Mogwai, Sigur Ros and My Bloody Valentine should take note as well. Souvenirs d’Un Autre Monde is a six song, forty minute journey into epic guitar bliss. Absolutely gorgeous.
Souvenirs d’Un Autre Monde
23.07.2008
In the interest of self-disclosure, I preface this by saying that instrumental/post-rock is my genre of choice, and I welcome a good, meaty listen. As such, I was excited by the opportunity to review the latest effort, Ohm, by Milwaukee’s This Specific Dream. But what started out as excitement and intrigue didn’t quite make it through the roughly fifty-four minutes of music crammed into the disc’s four tracks.
Talent and confidence certainly aren’t in short supply when referring to This Specific Dream or Ohm. There are more than a few moments throughout the album that have a significant wow factor, with “Cicada” being the most heavily laden of the four tracks (and consequently the longest). And it definitely takes some minerals to bust off an album with an average track length of over thirteen minutes, which is territory even instrumental heavyweights Mogwai and Explosions In The Sky rarely wander into (the former’s My Father My King being the exception). My attention span seemed to be the only thing lacking, as I found myself reaching for the fast forward button on more than one occasion. “A Slight Intermission” was the only track I managed to listen to in its entirety more than once, which qualifies it as the album highlight in my opinion.
Each of the four songs on the album contain a core sound, like a cleaner, spacier, version of Pelican that I thoroughly enjoyed. It’s just that this delicious core was wrapped around too many minutes of unnecessary skin — like I had to work to get to the sweet, sweet innards. Maybe a good edit would have been in order to pare away some of the excess. Or maybe I’m an asshole for suggesting the artist change the art to appeal to my tastes. After all, nobody told Homer or Milton to shorten things up a bit.
As it stands, Ohm has served me as a great listen for those times when I’m not really listening, which is unfortunate given the caliber of material.
Genre: Instrumental/Post-rock/Metal
RIYL: Pelican, Isis, Red Sparowes
Label: Self-Released
Scott Reynolds & The Steaming Beast “Adventure Boy” (Suburban Home)
Now if Suburban Home would release something by Dave Smalley next, they would have the ALL trifecta. What the hell am I talking about? Well, that would give the label three projects by all three of ALL’s different lead singers. Of course you have the label already releasing (and re-releasing) just about every Drag The River record which boasts ALL’s third and current singer, Chad Price. And now you have the label releasing Scott Reynolds’ new project, The Steaming Beast. Reynolds was the second ALL singer. Much like Price’s Drag The River, Reynolds’ newest endeavor bares little resemblance to the pop-punk of ALL. Frankly, you can decipher that without even listening to the album. The credits boast producer Dave Fridmann (Mercury Rev, Sparklehorse, Mogwai) and Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips. However, I don’t write for Maxim so I guess I should listen to Adventure Boy. The album is certainly not a chore though. The Steaming Beast combine humor and intelligence so well that it’s hard not to compare them to those early Flaming Lips records. On the other hand, The Steaming Beast never head off into those odd territories that the Lips were so well known for either. Reynolds and company might be peculiar at times, but never weird for the sake of being weird. That is an asset for Adventure Boy as the album moves at a healthy pace without ever feeling sidetracked. In fact, all this recalls the sadly defunct Troubled Hubble the most. That’s high praise indeed. For fans of quirky, offbeat pop, Scott Reynolds & The Steaming Beast might just be what you have been looking for.
Genre: Indie/Pop/Rock
RIYL: Troubled Hubble, The Flaming Lips, Ben Folds
Angel
[audio http://www.suburbanhomerecords.com/mediafiles/ScottReynolds/ScottReynolds_Angel.mp3]
www.myspace.com/scottreynoldsmusic
01.04.2008
This Will Destroy You “This Will Destroy You” (Magic Bullet)
Two things to start this review off. First, have you ever noticed how post-rock instrumental bands have the most melodramatic names? This Will Destroy You, Explosions In The Sky, and Godspeed You Black Emperor! just to name a few. Secondly, as assinine as the term post-rock is, when listening to This Will Destroy You the term actually makes sense. This Will Destroy You are huge, expansive, wide open and completely beyond normal rock music. This is what it is supposed to sound like, right? The band’s debut, Young Mountain, was a solid yet somewhat unspectacular entry into the instrumental rock journal. The band’s second album is a different story though. It certainly shows a depth and willingness to expand. No more is the band content with the normal ebb and flow of the soft/loud dynamic. With more attention given towards creating atmospheres, This Will Destroy You put forth a gripping album full of glorious highs and desperate lows. Creating an instrumental canvas of vivid colors and cinematic scenes, This Will Destroy You are approaching the majestic imagery of Sigur Ros. While I have found myself involuntarily retreating from instrumental rock in the last couple of years, This Will Destroy You might just have what it takes to bring me back. With their second effort, the band has put down a massive gauntlet for all their peers to step up to.
Genre: Instrumental/Rock
RIYL: Mogwai, Explosions In The Sky, Sigur Ros
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