Jonathan Hill

A Soapbox for Uninformed Opinions

May
26

By

Spiritual Beggars Demons Review

Category: Music Tags: , , , , , Leave a Comment

Spiritual Beggars Demons Review

Artist: Spiritual Beggars
Album: Demons
Genre(s): Rock
Subgenres(s): Hard Rock, Stoner Rock
Released: 2005
Length: 49 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): Icarus Music, Inside Out

Track List:

01. Inner Strength (Intro)
02. Throwing Your Life Away
03. Salt in Your Wounds
04. One Man Army
05. Through the Halls
06. Treading Water
07. Dying Every Day
08. Born to Die
09. Born to Die (Reprise)
10. In My Blood
11. Elusive
12. Sleeping With One Eye Open
13. No One Heard

Spiritual Beggars Demons Cover

Demons is the 6th effort by Swedish quintet Spiritual Beggars. The band draws on influences that span across the rock spectrum to include elements of psychedelic rock, blues rock, hard rock and even heavy metal for the colossal song In My Blood. When meshed together these diverse influences form the basis of the semi-obscure stoner rock scene, of which the Spiritual Beggars are usually associated with.

The lyrics are quite straightforward and focus on the struggles of life, regrets and depression but are presented in a way that is more akin to perseverance than misery. It is the last album by Spiritual Beggars to feature singer Janne “JB” Christoffersson (Grand Magus) whose powerful grit laden voice brings the songs on Demons to life in a way that few others ever could.

His voice is backed by a plethora of catchy, driven guitar leads and passionate solos courtesy of founding member Michael Amott (Arch Enemy, Carcass). This contrasts with bassist Sharlee D’Angelo as his playing seems to exist somewhere in the middle of everything else and while never being washed out, he rarely comes to the forefront. He gives the album a denser sound quality but lacks many of the outstanding moments you’ll hear coming from the guitar.

Spiritual Beggars frequently delve into fluid instrumental passages that give each band member the chance to really come to life and show that they have perfected their craft. Drummer Ludwig Witt injects creative fills between verses and keyboardist Per Wiberg provides colourful, sometimes textural keyboard lines (and an extended solo at the end of Dying Every Day). He often sounds like he is taking on a support role but if he featured more prominently it could have introduced an exciting and different dynamic to their sound.

Spiritual Beggars embody the heart and soul of rock music on Demons and in doing so they create a genre defining album that should have a place in the collection of all rock fanatics.

May
5

By

Team Sleep Team Sleep Review

Category: Music Tags: , , , , , Leave a Comment

Team Sleep Team Sleep Review

Artist: Team Sleep
Album: Team Sleep
Genre(s): Electronic, Rock
Subgenres(s): Trip Hop, Trip Rock
Released: 2005
Length: 54 minutes
Language(s): English, French
Label(s): Maverick Records

Track List:

01. Ataraxia
02. Ever (Foreign Flag)
03. Your Skull is Red
04. Princeton Review
05. Blvd. Nights
06. Delorian
07. Our Ride to the Rectory
08. Tomb of Liegia
09. Elizabeth
10. Staring at the Queen
11. Ever Since WWI
12. King Diamond
13. Live from the Stage
14. Paris Arm
15. 11/11

Team Sleep Team Sleep Cover

Team Sleep is the self-titled debut album and end result of an extensive collaborative project that manages to pull together a myriad of influences ranging from shoegaze, post rock, dream pop, instrumental hip hop and glitch music. When combined, these influences are used to create a low key trip hop/trip rock album that focuses on ambience and textures with an experimental edge rather than big choruses or flashy instrumental leads.

The trip hop/trip rock songs that make up about 2/3 of the album are abruptly broken up by the more experimental and challenging songs littered through the track listing. The post rock/shoegaze styling of Your Skull is Red and Blvd. Nights will make you feel like you’re being swept under by a tidal wave of noise.

In contrast, the hip hop and glitch inspired song Staring at the Queen features programmed percussion that clangs around like a lumbering machine and is rounded off with skipping and looping effects in an effort to make it sound as dysfunctional as possible. King Diamond on the other hand uses samples of Chino Moreno and Mary Timony to create an odd spoken word collage with a similar musical style. While arguably not the highlights of Team Sleep, they are certainly memorable.

Paris Arm is a straightforward love song that is unexpectedly sung entirely in French by Sandy Lakdar, who is not credited in the album booklet but does get mentioned on the Team Sleep homepage. It is also one of the shortest songs on the album, only outstretching the interlude Delorian by 9 seconds.

While the brooding ambiance makes Team Sleep a suitable soundtrack for the small hours, the noisy post-rock/shoegaze and glitchy hip hop inspired songs will provide enough variation to stop the songs from running together.

Apr
23

By

Device Device Review

Category: Music Tags: , , , Leave a Comment

Device Device Review

Artist: Device
Album: Device
Genre(s): Rock
Subgenres(s): Hard Rock
Released: 2013
Length: 40 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): Warner Bros. Records

Track List:

01. You Think You Know
02. Penance
03. Vilify
04. Close My Eyes Forever (feat. Lzzy Hale) (Lita Ford Cover)
05. Out of Line (feat. Serj Tankian & Geezer Butler)
06. Hunted
07. Opinion (feat. Tom Morello)
08. War of Lies
09. Haze (feat. M. Shadows)
10. Through it All (feat. Glenn Hughes)

Device Device Cover

Device is the new collaborative project started by Disturbed frontman David Draiman and former Filter guitarist Geno Lenardo. The sound can best be described as a continuation of where Disturbed left off with Asylum, only with a return of the electronic effects reminiscent of The Sickness while performing under a new moniker.

Song-writing ultimately remains the same as what you would expect from Disturbed but with a few small deviations. Hunted is the most obvious song to point at for the new bands experimentation. It has Device jumping into the deep end of the pool as they infused slow, ominous electronic segments with louder guitar passages that makes it a credit to the album. If this fusion was a common element in Devices debut, it would definitely bring the album into its own.

Device features a multitude of guest performers with perhaps the most memorable being Lzzy Hale (Halestorm), who performs a duet with Draiman on their cover of Lita Fords Close My Eye Forever. While faithful to the original song that featured Ozzy Osbourne, Device injects their personality into the song to give a fresh take on it that prevents them from cloning the original.

Devices debut will probably be a hit amongst hardcore Disturbed fans after they went on hiatus in 2011. Unfortunately not enough has been done with Device to step out of the shadow of Disturbed sans the occasional flirtation with the electronic elements.

Apr
9

By

Porcupine Tree Deadwing Review

Category: Music Tags: , , , , Leave a Comment

Porcupine Tree Deadwing Review

Artist: Porcupine Tree
Album: Deadwing
Genre(s): Rock
Subgenres(s): Progressive Rock
Released: 2005
Length: 60 minutes
Language(s): English
Label(s): Lava

Track List:

01. Deadwing
02. Shallow
03. Lazarus
04. Halo
05. Arriving Somewhere But Not Here
06. Mellotron Scratch
07. Open Car
08. The Start of Something Beautiful
09. Glass Arm Shattering

Porcupine Tree Deadwing Cover

Deadwing makes for another impressive foray into progressive rock by Porcupine Tree, who used their previous effort, In Absentia, as a blueprint to build off for this album. The brooding soundscapes have been replaced with a dreamlike ambiance created through the heavy presence of keyboards, synthesisers and pianos. The metal-esque guitar tones now resemble a driven, rock-orientated sound, while Steven Wilson’s singing remains firmly in their established passive and unstrained style.

The rock-centric portion of the album is often mid-paced, while the ambient portion is restrained with steady percussion and subtle bass playing that stops it from drifting into formless soundscape territory. The soft sounding moments are easily recognised on Mellotron Scratch and Glass Arm Shattering as the ambient textures lead them. Many of the songs switch between these styles and because of this, the album rarely stays static. Instead, they opted to create sprawling and imaginative passages with plenty of dynamic changes.

The different styles are brought together seamlessly over the course of Deadwing and never feel out of place with one another, which is exemplified with Arriving Somewhere But Not Here. This is Deadwings centrepiece and epitomises the albums sound over its 12 minute duration. The length of the song could seem daunting to some, but it builds up and flows into new passages effortlessly to keep the listener interested and comes to an end before you know it.

Deadwing is an excellent introductory album to the current progressive rock scene. It is also a worthy addition to the already lengthy Porcupine Tree catalogue and easily ranks amongst their strongest and most rounded efforts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ug8CWIasWi8

« Older Posts
Newer Posts »