[Review] Just Like Vinyl - Black Mass

Just Like Vinyl emerged from the ashes of The Fall Of Troy after the release of their last album In The Unlikely Event in 2009. Thomas Erak joined forces with Jake Carden (also on guitar and vocal duties) and Henry Batts (bass) joined shortly after. With TFOT still playing their final shows the trio began rehearsals and recorded a few demos for their debut LP. The result was a self-titled album far away from TFOT virtuosic nature but still retaining the protagonism of the guitar above all. Two years later we have Black Mass, building upon the sound of their debut but turning the distortion up a few notches: the riffs are heavier, the drums sound thicker and the percentage of screaming and howling probably excedes 50% of all the vocals.

The band experiments with twisted accentuations, tempo changes and a few odd time signatures, keeping the album fresh song after song. The lyrics are probably the aspect that changed less since TFOT's separation, still tackling with themes such as cheating, love turned into hate and all that Erak has got us accustomed to.
Since the songs are much heavier that in their self titled a little of The Unlikely Event shows up in some of them (Hours And Whiskey Sours, Atm) with Lucky Star sounding like it could have been a bside from The Fall Of Troy's last effort. The mix is good and all the instruments can be heard clearly even in the noisiest moments. Overall a very good sophomore album that expands the range of JLV's sound.

8.5/10

http://justlikevinyl.com/

(8/10) Omar Rodriguez Lopez - Saber, Querer, Osar y Callar

If there is any rule to Omar Rodriguez Lopez' recent solo career, that rule is each time an album comes out it means at least two will be out soon. Saber, Querer, Osar y Callar [SQOyC] is no exception, after the release of Un Corazón de Nadie it only took a little more than a month for another of Omar's experiments to see the light. Following the trend of the aforementioned album, Saber is another compact delivery of noise-electronic-drone rock, with the particularity of featuring fellow The Mars Volta drummer Deantoni Parks on live drums. From the get go the album is all about synths, distorted, echoing vocals and almost free-style shifting "electronic" beats. It almost feels as if Rodriguez Lopez had written and recorded all the songs and then tasked Parks with pasting drums on top, which is not necessarily a bad thing and in fact works great; since the songs have a much less defined structure than regular TMV songs Deantoni has more space to improvise and lay down ideas over Omar's fertile soundscapes. 

SQOyC opens with the noisy, eerie collection of synths of Home Lost, with Deantoni laying beat after beat over Omar's babbling-like vocals, diving directly into the second track (Habits) and then taking a short break in the relaxed Gentle Umbrellas (with a very interesting implementation of backward guitars), that only gets a little more energic towards the end. The following four tracks can either be perceived as hit-or-miss efforts depending on how much time you are willing to invest into them and how much you can tolerate Omar's love for experimentation (curiously Tentáculos is an alternate version of Agua Dulce De Pulpo from Un Escorpion Perfumado, though at this point it's harder to tell which one came first). Decided? takes a step aside of the electronic nature of the album to deliver a more guitar-driven experiment that will probably remind you of Omar's early solo work, with Angel Hair going ever farther from the rest of the songs, probably Omar's own take on a love song and one of the most interesting songs on the album once you listen to it a few times. Overall a very solid effort, specially for something that could be labelled as an experiment.

(7.5/10) Omar Rodriguez Lopez - Un Corazón De Nadie

After 2011's unusual blank space in Omar's release calendar comes the first album since 2010's Un Escorpion Perfumado, following the overall aesthetic of said release but this time featuring Omar behind all the music, from vocals, through bass to live drums and showing a bit more of his electronic side which he has been exploring briefly in the last year, aside from the completely electronic 2010 album Tychozorente, the first to feature no guitars, that is, of course, ignoring his past ventures into noisy territory with Despair and ORL&JMW.
Un Corazón De Nadie was released (as usually) as a surprise upload in Omar's Bandcamp page with cd preorders following a few days later. The release was probably planned as a tribute to his mother who passed away a few months before (she's holding Omar in the cover and is credited with creating the collage picture).

Like in Un Escorpion Perfumado the album consists in about half a dozen songs often separated by electronic/noise interludes and experiments featuring pulsating bass lines and sinister sounding synth arrangements, the fifth track (Colmillo) is the first to stray from that definition, offering a nostalgic and light hearted synth melody, briefly followed by the sound of hammering percussion and odd beats in Querer, featuring Omar on piano. Most of the vocals are often unmelodic and delivered in the form of low register whispers, something that Omar seems to feel comfortable about and that has been present in other recent releases. After Querer the albums dives into noisy and mostly instrumental territory until the closer Adiós arrives, while still delivering some interesting landscapes like Hez. 

Overall Un Corazón De Nadie is a good statement in Omar's branching career and a good stepping stone for his recent obsession for synths and electronic music, I just wouldn't recommend to those looking for an accesible entry to his catalogue or for those more accustomed to his "guitar" albums.

(7.5/10) Marriages - Kitsune (2012)

A new release from Sargent House, the debut album from Marriages is a short  psychedelic post-rock album very similar to Dot Hacker's debut album and ep, only slightly heavier. The band is composed of members of Red Sparrowes (the three members are from RS though they all have other projects). The album was recorded between the last months of 2011 (when the band formed) and the first months of 2012, and was released today via Bandcamp. Kitsune flows very well from beginning to end, both as an album or analized as individual compositions, the only drawback is that the album has the lenght of an EP and clocks at 26 minutes, which doesn't let much space to experiment, but ultimatelt it serves the flow well.

01. Ride In My Place

02. Body of Shade

03. Ten Tiny Fingers

04. Pelt

05. White Shape

06. Part The Dark Again

Emma Ruth Rundle - Vocals, Guitar, Piano, Flute 

Greg Burns - Bass Guitar, Synthesizer 

Dave Clifford - Drums, additional Guitar on "Pelt" 

http://marriagesmusic.bandcamp.com/album/kitsune

Just Like Vinyl: review and philosophy

Tomorrow at 8'o clock (Argentinian Time), El Espectro De Color is realizing it's first programme on a local radio. We will be talking about some Erak's new composing aspects and the rock industry nowadays. Hope you enjoy it.

You can hear us here: http://puckradio.listen2myradio.com/

The Mars Volta - The Malkin Jewel (Single)

The Mars Volta's new single from their upcoming album Noctourniquet. You can buy the tracks from iTunes or Amazon or get a free instand download in 320kbps MP3 if you pre-order the album here (btw I'm getting that T-Shirt!). You can meanwhile listen to the song and play a fun mini game at the same time here or just watch it on Youtube.

(8.5) Thinking Plague - Decline And Fall (2012)

If I were to judge this album based on it's cover and both the name of the band and the album it would be fair to say that it looks and sounds like "another generic hardcore/metal band", but it's not!. There's one simple way to describe what this album is like: syncopated, atonal jazz-fusion... is that enough? If not then let me get a little more specific, it's like a mix of King Crimson's most "recent" syncopated instrumentals and their jazz fusion era, plus a stripped down, less chaotic Kayo Dot... with female vocals. If you don't have a general idea of what this bands sounds like yet then you're probably reading the wrong blog...
That's pretty much how the album sounds like, but what makes it even more unique is it's vocals, to begin with, it's not everyday that you find a jazz fusion band with a female vocalist, and second, the vocals are as atonal as the sax or the guitar playing in the background, as if they improvised/wrote another instrumental track and used it as a vocal melody.

Now go give the album a listen!.

http://www.generalrubric.com/thinkingplague/main.html

(9/10) Mastodon - The Hunter (2011)

After the epic journey that was Crack The Skye it seems Mastodon decided to go in the opposite direction, leaving the long progressive-rock/metal compositions of their previous effort and writing a more straightforward yet extremely technical and agressive record (which doesn't mean there isn't space for some relaxed moments) that shows a side Mastodon has never explored before, more focused in the "stoner" side of the band which is probably the best thing about this album (for some moments I even thought I was listening to Queens Of The Stone Age), songs like Stargasm (which by the way, reminds me of Sleeping Giant a little) and The Sparrow bring lots of melancholic, distorted images to my mind. 2011 was a special year, with RHCP releasing their first album since John Frusciante left the band, Incubus going into a completely new direction, Pez moving away from their straight-forward punk songs into full blast hard rock, Primus coming back from sleep and The Dear Hunter releasing one of the most ambitious projects I've seen in the last 5 years, as if all my favourite bands conspired to give me some nice surprises last year... it seems that Mastodon didn't want to be less than them.

01. Black Tongue (3:27) 
02. Curl Of The Burl (3:40) 
03. Blasteroid (2:36) 
04. Stargasm (4:40) 
05. Octopus Has No Friends (3:49) 
06. All The Heavy Lifting (4:31) 
07. The Hunter (5:18) 
08. Dry Bone Valley (4:00) 
09. Thickening (4:31) 
10. Creature Lives (4:41) 
11. Spectrelight (3:10) 
12. Bedazzled Fingernails (3:08) 
13. The Sparrow (5:31)

http://www.mastodonrocks.com/news

(8/10) Soundgarden - Live on I-5 (2011)

Reviewing live albums can be a bit difficult sometimes, generally I try not to focus on the songs itself but on the performance quality, lenght, tracklist and improvisation/extras. In this case Live on I-5 is a pretty decent live album that in my opinion is long enough but lacks variety. Of course some people may have different preferences about the tracklist, I feel most of Soundgarden's casual audience sticks to Superunknown, this may be the reason I'm not completely satisfied with it since I've heard most of their discography and I like their punk roots as much as I liked Down On The Upside which in my opinion is very underrated when compared to Superunknown. The sound quality is good enough for me, there's little to no improvisation involved (specially not jams, maybe one or two, a short jam in Spoonman for example) and the tracklist is 60% Superunknown/Down On The Upside, with the former being the protagonist (they obviously couldn't let out hits like Black Hole Sun or Fell on Black Days).

A song that is sadly missing from the album (unless you preordered it):

Regular version tracklist:

1. "Spoonman"
2. "Searching with My Good Eye Closed"
3. "Let Me Drown"
4. "Head Down"
5. "Outshined"
6. "Rusty Cage"
7. "Burden in My Hand"
8. "Helter Skelter"
9. "Boot Camp"
10. "Nothing to Say"
11. "Slaves and Bulldozers"
12. "Dusty"
13. "Fell on Black Days"
14. "Search and Destroy"
15. "Ty Cobb"
16. "Black Hole Sun"  
17. "Jesus Christ Pose" 

Matt Cameron – drums, percussion
Chris Cornell – vocals, rhythm guitar
Ben Shepherd – bass guitar
Kim Thayil – lead guitar

http://www.soundgardenworld.com/

(8.5/10) Leprous - Bilateral (2011)

I found about Leprous via Google Alerts because I kept getting news articles mentioning Jeff Jordan as the artist behind the album's cover, I decided to download some of their albums but I didn't enjoy them very much so I ended up deleting them, nevertheless when this album dropped I felt the need to check it out and I felt very pleased with the result. Bilateral is like mixing modern prog metal like Dream Theater (which I don't like very much honestly) and Opeth with experimental bands like Porcupine Tree and The Mars Volta, I dare to say that in some spots I even thought I was listening to Muse in their less poppy era. The growling is kept to a minimum during the album which is something that in excess ends up boring me, so for those who were getting worried as soon as I said "prog metal", go ahead and give the album a try. WARNING: weird video below.

1. "Bilateral" (4:00)
2. "Forced Entry" (10:20)
3. "Restless" (3:30)
4. "Thorn" (5:47)
5. "Mb. Indifferentia" (6:33)
6. "Waste of Air" (5:32)
7. "Mediocrity Wins" (6:07)
8. "Cryptogenic Desires" (2:45)
9. "Acquired Taste" (5:13)
10. "Painful Detour" (8:18)

Einar Solberg - Synth, Vocals

Tor Oddmund Suhrke - Guitar, Vocals

Øystein Landsverk - Guitar, Backing Vocals

Rein Blomquist - Bass

Tobias Ørnes Andersen - Drums

http://www.leprous.net/

(9/10) Incubus - If Not Now, When? (2011)

This may be the most polarizing Incubus album to date, during their almost 20 years of career they've gone from funk metal to alternative rock, and while they've always had some catchy tunes and a certain commercial format to their songwriting this is the first Incubus album I wouldn't consider a rock album... to be completely honest I didn't like this at all when I first listened to it, but once you've gone through it a few times you begin to notice that the basics of every Incubus song are there, specially on Mike Einziger's guitar parts. The rest is a laid back version of what they've done before, after listening to some 80's classics accidentally at one of my relative's 50th birthday I realized how much this album sounded like that, specially the title track. About the lyrics I think Brandon Boyd's words are enough: "it's about love and finding art and success in love. I never know what I'm going to be writing about until I'm actually writing about it. It's what's relevant in my heart and mind. There's definitely a romantic undertone and overtone.". There's still room for experimentation (the dark In The Company Of Wolves) and classical Incubus freaky songs like Switchblade, that is to If Not Now, When? what Priceless was to A Crow Left Of The Murder.

 1. If Not Now, When
2. Promises, Promises
3. Friends and Lovers
4. Thieves
5. Isadore
6. The Original
7. Defiance
8. In the Company of Wolves
9. Switchblade
10. Adolescents
11. Tomorrow's Food 

http://www.enjoyincubus.com/

Joanna Newsom - Have One on Me (lyrics video)

http://www.dragcity.com/artists/joanna-newsom

(9/10) Scale The Summit - The Collective

No soy muy fan de este tipo de música pero este disco me conquistó totalmente, porque no se pasa de virtuoso ni suena repetitivo. Algunos diran que son una banda de metal instrumental, pero para mi van mucho mas allá que solo metal. Lo poco pero interesante que se sobre esta banda es que sus dos guitarristas se recibieron en Berklee y que ambos son luthiers. Otro dato interesante es que si alguien quiere animársele a alguna de sus canciones ellos venden libros de partituras y tablaturas en su sitio. En estos momentos estan salieron de gira como headliners por primera vez, y aparéntemente están trabajando en su próximo disco (prometen tocar un tema nuevo en los shows). Es un disco para escuchar con paciencia y esperar a que se asiente...

Guitar – Chris Letchford
Guitar – Travis Levrier
Bass – Jordan Eberhardt
Drums – Pat Skeffington

 

 1. "Colossal"
2. "Whales"
3. "Emersion"
4. "The Levitated"
5. "Secret Earth"
6. "Gallows"
7. "Origin of Species"
8. "Alpenglow"
9. "Black Hills"
10. "Balkan"
11. "Drifting Figures"

http://www.scalethesummit.com/band/

At The Drive In reunites for a few shows

Don't get me wrong I like ATDI a lot but this is so disheartening despite the fact that it could be a clever move from Omar and Cedric to promote LP6 and have some fun in the process... that beign said, I hope they can kill it this hard, but I have my doubts... Cedric's voice is my main concern. For those wishing to see them Coachella tickets will be available soon.

(8.5/10) Opeth - Heritage (2011)

No soy un gran seguidor de Opeth, de hecho este es el primer disco que escucho, pero estoy al tanto de que cada vez hacen discos menos pesados y eso es quizas lo que hace a este disco especial, porque de metal tiene poco y nada, suena mas a rock progresivo moderno, bastante técnico y variado. Por momentos me recuerda a Frances The Mute, con una mezcla menos cargada.

01. Heritage
02. The Devil's Orchard
03. I Feel The Dark
04. Slither
05. Nepenthe
06. Haxprocess
07. Famine
08. The Lines In My Hand
09. Folklore
10. Marrow Of The Earth

Mikael Åkerfeldt – guitar, Mellotron, grand piano, vocals, sound effects
Fredrik Åkesson – rhythm guitar
Per Wiberg – grand piano, Mellotron, Rhodes piano, Hammond B3
Martín Mendez – bass guitar, upright bass
Martin Axenrot – drums, percussion

http://www.opeth.com

Coming soon :P

Un adelanto de lo que se viene ni bien termine de subir los álbumes de 2011 



Composed by Toby Driver, Lyrics by Tim Byrnes
All else consumed by a holy cloud of forgetting
Build this man by the way attained
Go forth into the warm waters, brother,
Happy is he, healthy is he among the pulled out and pulled apart.
He sat with them, but not in vain.
He sat among the ones long-dead,
A feast, a store, a partner, love;
Encourage him in all his ways
To help him to forget the time of disengagement;
Calling power down upon the hour,
Scouring the sea for word and need,
The broken healer, wounded lasts;
Prays the skies to shut the rain and
Makes them shower down again.
A sign that he's there.
A friend.
Skilled to these degrees.

(9/10) Beardfish - Mammoth (2011)

Beardfish es una de las pocas bandas privilegiadas de rock progresivo clásico que no sufre de los problemas típicos del género, no abusan de clichés, no mezclan los discos tratando de que suenen como si fuera 1974 y no se pasan de pretensiosos. Sumado a esto, vienen entregando (en mi opinión) un álbum sólido tras otro desde su debut de 2003 (a un ritmo bastante rápido) y Mammoth no es la excepción. Aunque la mayoría los suele comparar con con bandas como Genesis o Yes el estilo de Beardfish es mas pesado sin dejar de ser melódico. ¡Puntos extra por traer un dvd con performance en vivo + making of!.

(El video de abajo no es parte del dvd).

1. The Platform
2. And the Stone Said "If I Could Speak"
3. Tightrope
4. Green Waves
5. Outside/Inside

6. Akakabotu
7. Without Saying Anything

Rikard Sjöblom - vocals, keyboards
David Zackrisson - guitars
Magnus Östgren - drums
Robert Hansen - bass
 

http://www.beardfish.argh.se/

(9/10) Primus - Green Naugahyde (2011)

No se si es "el mejor álbum" como dijo Les, pero creo que es el que mas me gusta, por lo parejo. Uno de los que más escuché el año pasado. Green Naugahyde marca el retorno de Jay Lane en la batería después de abandonar la banda antes del lanzamiento del primer disco, y también es el primer disco en 12 años (el anterior fue Antipop en 1999).

Vevo bloqueó el videoclip en nuestro país pero alguien se encargo de subirlo en su canal.

1. "Prelude to a Crawl"  

2. "Hennepin Crawler" 

3. "Last Salmon Man"

4. "Eternal Consumption Engine"

5. "Tragedy's a' Comin'"

6. "Eyes of the Squirrel"

7. "Jilly's on Smack"

8. "Lee Van Cleef" 

9. "Moron TV" 

 10. "Green Ranger"

 11. "HOINFODAMAN"

12. "Extinction Burst"

13. "Salmon Men" 

Les Claypool – bass, vocals
Larry LaLonde – guitar
Jay Lane – drums

http://www.primusville.com/

(8.5/10) Yes - Fly From Here (2011)

Yes no había lanzado un album desde Magnification (2001), 10 años atrás. Es un disco lleno de datos curiosos, para empezar gran parte de la música la venían trabajando desde principios de los 80, pero nunca le encontraron un lugar dentro de su discografía (quizas por eso suene mas al Yes clásico y no al de sus últimos años), a pesar de que si tocaron algunos de esos temas en vivo, pero mas peculiarmente, las vocales estan a cargo de Benoît David, quien había cantado en una banda tributo de Yes por mas de 10 años (llamada Close To The Edge) antes de unirse a la formación actual en 2008.

 

1. "Fly from Here - Overture"
2. "Fly from Here - Part I - We Can Fly"
3. "Fly from Here - Part II - Sad Night at the Airfield"
4. "Fly from Here - Part III - Madman at the Screens
5. "Fly from Here - Part IV - Bumpy Ride"
6. "Fly from Here - Part V - We Can Fly" (Reprise)"
7. "The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be"
8. "Life on a Film Set"
9. "Hour of Need"
10. "Solitaire"
11. "Into the Storm" 

   Chris Squire – bass guitar, backing vocals, lead vocals on "The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be"
    Steve Howe – guitars, backing vocals, joint lead vocals on "Hour of Need"
    Alan White – drums
    Geoff Downes – keyboards
    Benoît David – lead vocals

    Oliver Wakeman – additional keyboards on "We Can Fly", "We Can Fly (Reprise)" and "Hour of Need"

Trevor Horn – backing vocals, additional keyboards

Luís Jardim – percussion

Gerard Johnson – piano on "The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be"

http://www.yesworld.com/

(7/10) Myrath - Tales Of The Sands (2011)

Personalmente una decepción respecto al disco anterior... Tales Of The Sands se vuelve repetitivo después de un rato mientras la banda sigue exprimiendo los mismos recursos tema tras tema, zafable de todos modos y a más de uno le va a resultar interesante por el sonido oriental de la banda, pero para aquellos que ya estamos acostumbrados esto parece una paso atras respecto al disco anterior...

 

1. "Under Siege"
2. "Braving The Seas"
3. "Merciless Times"
4. "Tales of the Sands"
5. "Sour Sigh"
6. "Dawn Within"
7. "Wide Shut"

8. "Requiem for a Goodbye"
9. "Beyond the Stars"
10. "Time to Grow"
11. "Apostrophe for a Legend" (bonus track)

Malek Ben Arbia - guitars
Zaher Zorgati - vocals
Anis Jouini - bass
Elyes Bouchoucha - keyboards, backing vocals
Piwee Desfray - drums

http://www.myrath.com/