Jonathan Hill

A Soapbox for Uninformed Opinions

Jun
29

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Ulver Shadows of the Sun Review

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Ulver Shadows of the Sun Review

Artist: Ulver
Album: Shadows of the Sun
Genre(s): Ambient
Subgenres(s): Ambient
Released: 2007
Length: 40 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): The End Records, Jester Records

Track List:

01. Eos
02. All the Love
03. Like Music
04. Vigil
05. Shadows of the Sun
06. Let the Children Go
07. Solitude (Black Sabbath Cover)
08. Funebre
09. What Happened?

Ulver Shadows of the Sun Cover

Shadows of the Sun is an ambient album by Ulver. By this point in their career, anyone familiar with Ulver should know that you can’t predict what direction they’ll take on their next album and to live up to their reputation, they followed up their noisiest album in about a decade (Blood Inside, 2005) with one of their softest albums to date.

Unlike the swirling keyboard sounds that are common to ambient music, Ulver utilises live instruments to make up the bulk of the album and go as far as including a theremin on Eos and Funebre while hiring a string quartet that appears on many of the songs. If sombreness could be personified by any musical work it would be Shadows of the Sun.

If you listen to Shadows of the Sun casually a lot of the music can blend into a long soundscape but if you pay attention you will hear thoughtful piano melodies and dramatic strings that make Shadows of the Sun an exceptionally cohesive, low key album perfect for the small hours. Kristoffer Rygg’s voice remains within the baritone range for most of Shadows of the Sun, which suits the theme of the album perfectly and happens to be one of his strongest performances with Ulver.

Ulver shakes off the hazy atmosphere by weaving glitchy noises and thudding percussion together on songs such as Like Music, a calm piano ballad that turns into an eerie dark ambient soundscape and Let the Children Go, which builds up to a dramatic martial industrial anthem with another appearance of the trumpet to avoid any accusations of monotony.

Another standout moment is the cover of Black Sabbath’s Solitude, which holds true to the original but Ulver manages to make it their own song by making the bass more prominent and replacing the flute with the trumpet. It holds the same feeling as the original and surprisingly, it fits in with the rest of Shadows of the Sun despite it being the only rhythm based song on the entire album.

The cover art for Shadows of the Sun is actually a good reflection of the album once you’ve heard it and although music doesn’t fit neatly into a single genre, ambient is the closest you will get given the texture heavy nature of the songs.

Shadows of the Sun is a creative set of soundscapes that continue to explore the prevalent melancholic themes Ulver revel in to create (and reinvent) their unique musical vision with.

May
26

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Miles Davis Kind of Blue Review

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Miles Davis Kind of Blue Review

Artist: Miles Davis
Album: Kind of Blue
Genre(s): Jazz
Subgenres(s): Modal Jazz
Released: 1959
Length: 46 minutes (55 minutes with bonus material)
Language(s): N/A
Label(s): Columbia Records

Track List:

01. So What
02. Freddy Freeloader
03. Blue in Green
04. All Blue
05. Flamenco Sketches
06. Flamenco Sketches (Alternative Take)

Miles Davis Kind of Blue Cover

Kind of Blue is a seminal jazz album by Miles Davis. The original release consisted of 5 songs that where improvised in the recording studio but with restrictions on what scales each musician could use to shape how they played. This influential yet unorthodox technique laid the foundations for the modal jazz subgenre and became synonymous with it.

Miles Davis collaborated with other high profile musicians from the era, some of whom he had worked with before or where longstanding bandmates. This included Julian “Cannonball” Adderley (alto saxophone), Paul Chambers (double bass), Jimmy Cobb (drums), John Coltrane (tenor saxophone) and Bill Evens on piano for all tracks except Freddie Freeloader, on which the role was taken up by Wynton Kelly.

In contrast to the frantic bebop sound that Miles Davis is also known for, Kind of Blue is a laidback recording despite the nature of modal jazz. The structure of the songs becomes a hindrance as the entire album sounds like one long piece due to the structure making everything flow as subtly as it does. Most of the instruments only play small pieces before another one jumps in to do something else. Eventually it feels like trying to answer the question “at what point does the mouth of a river end and the ocean begin?”

There are some noticeable recording problems on Kind of Blue. The trumpet bursts with hissing feedback during the build-up on So What and instruments only come through one speaker (saxophone and piano on the left and drums and bass on the right). This feedback issue only seems to be at the start of So What whereas stereo sound is abused throughout Kind of Blue.

The spontaneous approach Miles Davis selected (apparently only hours before going into the studio) along with the emphasis on music theory pushes Kind of Blue into a corner in terms of who the album will appeal to. It is most likely going to be jazz enthusiasts or those with a working knowledge of music theory. The latter of which is required to “get” the music as the theory behind it (which was first written about by pianist George Russell in 1953) is in fact the focal point and the reason for it being regarded as a cornerstone of jazz music. For the rest of us it is the equivalent of throwing buckets of paint at a wall and expecting to pick out well defined shapes and patterns.

May
3

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Green Carnation The Acoustic Verses Review

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Green Carnation The Acoustic Verses

Artist: Green Carnation
Album: The Acoustic Verses
Genre(s): Rock
Subgenres(s): Art Rock, Progressive Rock
Released: 2006
Length: 43 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): Sublife Records, The End Records

Track List:

01. Sweet Leaf
02. The Burden is Mine… Alone
03. Maybe
04. Alone
05. 9-29-045
06. Child’s Play (Part 3)
07. High Tide Waves

Green Carnation The Acoustic Verses Cover

The Acoustic Verses is the 5th and final album by Green Carnation. It shows a drastic shift in sound by taking the soft art rock/progressive rock sound that could be heard on parts of their previous album, The Quiet Offspring, and letting its influence seep out to create an entire album based on that sound. The Acoustic Verses is full of low key melancholic vibrations and unstrained, almost delicate singing from Kjetil Nordhus to match the theme. The Burden is Mine… Alone only consists of an acoustic guitar, keyboard ambiance and straightforward lyrics but it manages to neatly summarises this theme over its short duration.

While the title of album allures to acoustic instrumentation, there are still some electric instruments used including the bass, keyboard and theremin. The acoustic guitars often take centre stage with the biggest exception being Child’s Play (Part 3). It is the only instrumental piece on The Acoustic Verses and only involves the piano and keyboard. Songs such as Alone and High Tide Waves see Green Carnation go as far as bringing in a string trio (consisting of a violin, viola and cello) to add another dimension to the rich sound of The Acoustic Verses.

In a throwback to Green Carnation’s knack for writing long songs back in the early stages of their career, they wrote a 15 minute, 3 part suite called 9-29-045 (Part 1 My Greater Cause, Part 2 Homecoming and Part 3 House of Cards). This is at odds with the other songs being that they are between 3 and 5 minutes. Placing it in the middle of the album was certainly a bold move as it could throw off some listeners but Green Carnation pulls it off and melds all the elements of The Acoustic Verses together to make a fluid sonic journey out of it.

Drummer Tommy Jacksonville deserves a special mention for being able to play a diverse and often subtle role that could have easily gone against the soft nature of the music. The drums haven’t been mixed too loudly which prevents it from overshadowing anything which leaves Green Carnation and your own ears with the best results.

Long-time fans could be disappointed by the change in sound, or even the lack of distorted heavy metal guitar riffs, but Green Carnation proves to be adept enough to dive headfirst into their new sound that lets the band end their career on a well-deserved high note.

Apr
23

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Reverend Bizarre Return to the Rectory Review

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Reverend Bizarre Return to the Rectory Review

Artist: Reverend Bizarre
Album: Return to the Rectory
Genre(s): Heavy Metal
Subgenres(s): Doom Metal
Released: 2004
Length: 66 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): Spikefarm Records

Track List:

01. The March of the War Elephants
02. The Festival
03. The Goddess of Doom
04. Aleister
05. For You Who Walk in the Land of the Shadows
06. Dark Sorceress (Autumn Siege) (Barathrum Cover)
07. The Wrath of the War Elephants

Reverend Bizarre Return to the Rectory Cover

Return to the Rectory is the second EP by Reverend Bizarre. The title is an obvious throw back to their first album, In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend. At 66 minutes long it is hard to consider In the Rectory an EP by any stretch of the imagination. In either case the music follows the same format as In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend; atypical song structure, sparse guitar plods, dramatic baritone singing and a guitar tone so thick that you can almost see it.

This time around the longest song is 12 minutes and Reverend Bizarre have managed to throw in a couple of new tricks to try and keep their sound fresh. This includes a lengthy acoustic guitar intro to The Festival and more mid-paced parts which sometimes become genuinely fast. This is definitely a welcome addition to their sound.

The subdued keyboard sounds heard on In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend have been given a second chance on Return to the Rectory. While used sparingly, they do get stand out moments on For You Who Walk in the Land of the Shadows and The Wrath of the War Elephants. They work well to build up their foreboding atmosphere to make the songs stand apart that bit more.

Opening song The March of the War Elephants features the usual lengthy guitar drones and some excellent drum work that makes the song promising enough in its own right. The song suddenly bursts into a full on gallop and then rapidly fades out to leave you miffed. Reverend Bizarre might have spent time throwing in more variety but it doesn’t mean much when you forget to finish your opening song.

On the other hand there is strong continuity to be found elsewhere. The spares lyrics on The March of the War Elephants seem to follow into The Wrath of the War Elephants which then reprises elements of the music found in The Goddess of Doom.

The dramatic baritone voice still presides over most of the song but with more enunciation while their cover of Dark Sorceress (Autumn Siege) by Barathrum makes a U-turn by extensively using the vomiting voices found in black metal. The Goddess of Doom name drops several influential and current doom metal bands with Reverend Bizarre appointing actress Christina Ricci the title of The Goddess of Doom. This at least shows that there is a sense of humour mixed in with Reverend Bizarre’s prolonged agony.

When a band has all the ingredients for making great music it is hard to hear them miss the target if for nothing other than forgetting when to stop playing a song. Return to the Rectory shows a small expansion on their sound but it will most likely appeal to existing Reverend Bizarre fans before anyone else.

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