Music Discovery #1

Music: Some good, some bang-your-head-against-the-wall worthy
Since its a little difficult to find, listen to, and review more than about two or three albums a week, I thought I would start something new, but still music related, similar to my "Guilty Pleasures" posts.  This time, however, I thought I would write a bit about music I have recently stumbled upon. 


First off, I'd like to start out with the bad music I've found.  While I was writing my Miley Cyrus post and watching her music video on YouTube, I read a comment that said something along the lines of "Young girls can't look up to Cyrus anymore, blah blah blah, she better watch out for Cymphonique."  Now, after reading the name "Cymphonique," I thought to myself, "Maybe this is some sort of up and coming, young, R&B singer."  Well, I was pretty wrong.  After searching YouTube for "Cymphonique," this is what I found: "Lil Miss Swaggar."  At first, I thought it had to be a joke or at least some sort of Kidz Bop thing.  Unfortunately, this is serious.  I thought I had found the epitome of child extortion, but thankfully, she's related to a rapper or two.  For anyone who hasn't heard of Lil' Romeo, you're better off, he's terrible.  He was like a worse version of Lil' Bow Wow, ehem, excuse me, Bow Wow (fun fact: Bow Wow started getting upset at people for calling him "Lil'").  Lil' Romeo and Cymphonique are the children of Master P who has done little to nothing significant outside of the song "Oohhhwee," a song that's only redeeming quality is.... well, its sort of funny.  Oh, he was on Cribs too.  Anyway, if you couldn't tell, Cynmphonique's "Lil Miss Swaggar" is pretty catchy, but nevertheless, she scares me and needs to go away.  She's almost as bad as Bieber... almost...  I have one more bad thing I stumbled upon, but I'll save that for a later post (Hint: Asian pop song).

Next, I'd like to talk about something I found that was surprisingly good: J. Cole's "Who Dat."  I came across this song because I was listening to something on YouTube in the morning and he came on immediately after by mistake.  J. Cole's video, as far as I can tell, was taken in one shot and includes a mob of people follow him, a marching band, and lots of stuff exploding as he shouts "Who dat?  Who dat?  Bitch I got that flame! So don't worry 'bout my mother fuckin' name!"  J. Cole has some pretty impressive flow and has great personality and inflection on top of that.  His voice sounds good, a little similar to Kanye West, but has a certain rhaspy quality to it that really makes him stand out.  He also has lines that really make you go "Woah!" or, my favorite, "OOOOOOOOOOH SNAP!"  Among these lines are: "Clown told me, 'Ain't you rock, where the fuck your chain at?'/ Guess its something like your girl, nigger, it ain't came yet" and "Boy I'm picture perfect baby, you can check the Kodak/ Hey! So anything you can do, I can do better/ And any chick you can screw, I can get wetter."  All I can say is that I would absolutely love to see this guy throw down in a rap battle.  I may be mistaken, but at some point I can distinctively hear a clip of Andre 3000, and all I can say is that if Andre 3000 is backing this guy, I can too (it would make sense seeing as how Big Boi recently backed Janelle Monae with great success).  I am now eagerly anticipating the release of his new album, which should drop some time later this year.

As a finishing point I'd just like to mention a few things happening as far as releases go in the music world.  Big Boi, half of the Outkast duo, is coming out with his solo album "Sir Lucious Leftfoot: The Son of Chico Dusty."  Kylie Minogue is also expected to have a release coming out this week, although I'm less excited about that one.  3Oh!3 came out with their newest album "Streets of Gold" which, unfortunately, has received underwhelming reviews averaging a 47.  Lil Jon also came out with his newest album, "Crunk Rock," averaging a 59, just shy of overall positive reviews.  I may just have to give that a listen, for a laugh if not for anything else.  As for me, right now, I'm listening to the new Roots album "How I Got Over" and The Decemberists' "Hazards of Love."  Hope you enjoyed this new segment, and hopefully I'll be able to keep it going in the future.  What music have you stumbled upon?

Total Life Forever

"Religious regret and infinite debt,/ Heaven's pressure"

I wanted to write about something that was completely foreign to me, so I decided to take a listen to Foals new album "Total Life Forever."  I had never heard of this band, so I was interested to hear what they sound like.  Foals is a British indie/rock band that released their debut album, "Antidotes," in 2008.  "Total Life Forever" overall got a Metacritic score of 79 with high scores from Sputnikmusic (90) and BBC Music (80).

Out of all of the albums I've reviewed so far, I definitely had to listen to this one the most.  I listened to it about three or four times and thought I had a good feel for it.  However, when I looked at the track list, I couldn't imagine what each song sounded like.  I then proceeded to listen to the album about three more times really intently until I could think of what almost every song sounded like and I could pick out at least two songs that I felt explained the bands sound on "Total Life Forever" the most

The first song that really caught my attention was "Total Life Forever" (this link will take you to a pretty good live studio version of the song; you can listen to the album version here)  The reason it attracted my attention was because its significantly more upbeat than the albums first two songs.  It has a very bouncy beat with some funky guitar licks and keyboard lines.  Another reason why it caught my attention was because "Total Life Forever" sounds incredibly similar to Friendly Fires' "Skeleton Boy" (another album I may review at some point).  They sound so similar vocally that I did some research to see if the vocalists were the same.  Unfortunately, I didn't have the musical epiphany that I had thought, although they have played together before.

As you progress through the album, you'll notice that Foals has two different sorts of sounds they like to play with: one that is a bit more upbeat and funky, and another that is much slower and much more ambient.  "Alabaster" is the second song that attracted my attention starting with some simple synthesizing and guitar strumming which leads into some mild, but brief tension, bringing in the bass and vocals, all of which are incredibly light.  Not only do the lyrics present the idea of flying with lines such as "She's up in the sky/ She's up in the domes/ She's up in the sky, up in the dome," but the instrumentals also create a soft melody to compliment it.  About half way through the song, the vocals turn to chanting which lead into a brief industrial sound that becomes ever present throughout the background of the rest of the song as Yannis Philippakis, the band's vocalist, begins to convey a darker message: "She's up in the sky and the sky is one fire/...And with victory the whole world will be ours/ We will build nothing in it/ Nothing in it."

Lyrically, Foals is pretty strong and has fairly good content.  However, some of them seem lazy and redundant audibly with lyrics such as "Come and help me accept it, affect it, protect it/ Come and help me accept it, it's always my home" in the song "Blue Blood;" and "I'm the fury in your head/ I'm the fury in your bed/ I'm the ghost in the back of your head" from "Spanish Sahara."  Lyrics like these really take away from some of their more creative lyrics that are seen in songs such as "Alabaster."  "Blue Blood" in all fairness is one of the better tracks on the album, but because of the aforementioned lyrics, it drops significantly, not only because of the lyrics themselves, but because of the way they're sung, or rather, chanted.  Furthermore, unfortunately, the chant of "accept it, affect it, protect it" happens more than once.

While Foals seems to be successful in having two predominant sounds in their album (upbeat and ambient) they still seem to struggle with how to use both of these sounds effectively.  While "Spanish Sahara" turns out to be a pretty great song, it begins so quietly that not until almost forty-five seconds in did I realize I was listening to a new song as opposed to my iPod freezing; to me that's a little too ambient.  Their more uptempo songs, however, overall, are much stronger, "Black Gold" and "Miami" among them.  Overall, Foals manages to create something that is unique and possesses and interesting quality.  They are, however, a band that can easily become background noise; you really have to listen to the album intently in order to gain an appreciation for their music.

"Total Life Forever": 82/100

Take a listen to the full album here.

Although I wanted to go to bed... I had to say something

 "I've never heard a Jay-Z song."

 Miley Cyrus... she used to be Hannah Montana or whatever, right?  Well, she's certainly not looking like it.  I don't know if anyone has heard or noticed anything about her as of recent, but she's grown boobs, I mean, wings, and has evidently become a slut and is quite proud of it (I can thank this discovery to Target).  Her new single, "Can't Be Tamed," off the album by the same name has her prancing around in a bird costume with a bunch of other people in bird costumes talking about how she, get this, can't be tamed.  This is seemingly ironic seeing as how in her music video she both starts and ends it inside of a cage.

Anyway, on to the issue: why does she exist?  She started out like Hilary Duff with her own teeny bopper show on Disney, followed up with a movie that hit theaters based off of said show, only to land a musical career afterward.  Now, Hilary Duff was a big flop and didn't really go anywhere.  Thank god the biggest mistake she ever made was dating Joel Madden from Good Charlotte;  she never seemed to hit her Britney phase.  Miley Cyrus, on the other hand, seems to heading straight down the path towards Britney, however, this could be much more interesting than Birtney's crazy phase ever was.

The part about this "new" Miley Cyrus that baffles me is that she's using this song as a platform to say, "Hey, everyone!  I'm an adult and am going to sing about adult things, so, like, take me serious, okay?"  which roughly translates to, "Hey, dudes!  I'm a slut still, but am going public!  Do adults things to me, like, serious, okay?"  I can understand where certain pop stars had these phases: Britney was always seen as the innocent virgin until she released her "Britney" album in 2000 with the "sultry" song "I'm a Slave 4 U" (Yay for text talk);  Christina Aguilera did the exact same thing, with a slightly grungier look, in 2002 with "Stripped."  There's no denying that all three of these female vocalists started in Disney, but there is one big difference.  Britney came out and said, "Hey, I'm a slut!" when she was twenty, Christina did it when she was twenty-two... guess how old Miley Cyrus is.  She's a whopping seventeen years old.  You know what that means?  She's still jailbait (jailbait: n. Slang A person below the age of consent with whom sexual intercourse can constitute statutory rape).  Uh... that's a no go.

The thing that's even worse about it is that while now she's publicly trying to have a womanly image and have people take her seriously sexually as opposed to thinking she's still some sort of Disney child star, everyone already thought she was a slut in the first place.  Her announcing it via album isn't anything new.  Remember in 2008 when you were FIFTEEN YEARS OLD and there was a scandal about you posing in PROVOCATIVE photos as well as doing a supposed NUDE PHOTO SHOOT for Vanity Fair?  Everyone thought you were a slut then and no one has changed their minds about that, I promise you.  If anything, you're just admitting that you're a slut (I have never used the word slut so many times in such a short amount of time in my life).

Just to add another thing, she's stupid as hell.  In an interview she was asked what Jay-Z song inspired her to write "Party in the U.S.A.," her hit from last year, seeing as how in the song she mentions a Jay-Z song coming on the radio.  She responded with "I don't know, I didn't write the song, so I have no idea," closely followed by "I've never heard a Jay-Z song. I don't listen to pop music." ... shit like this makes me mad that people like her have a fan base.  Anyway, she's heading straight down the path to marry K-Fed, have two children, and look like Britney in her crazy days.

Have fun shaving your head.

Recovery

After over a week of sitting in a wedding, reading the seventh Harry Potter, getting sun burnt, and eating cheese curds I'm finally back from Wisconsin.  Its nice to be home.  On to the review, and its gonna be a long one, its Eminem:

"Cinderella Man"

I was really anticipating the release of Eminem's new album "Recovery," and had been for a long time.  Anyone who reads my blog might have read a post I wrote about Eminem talking about why I hold him in such high esteem as a rapper.  After listening to his 2009 release "Relapse" and being severely disappointed, I was expecting a lot from this album.  When I first listened to it I was pleasantly surprised.  Where on "Relapse" Eminem took a dramatic turn towards his more comedic rapping style, in "Recovery" he definitely tries to return to the edgy, angsty, angry sound that made him so popular on his "Slim Shady LP" and "The Eminem Show."  At first, I thought the album was great.  After talking to a friend of mine, however, I realized that even though he is trying to dig back down to his roots, it isn't possible; there is absolutely no way Eminem can be the Eminem that Dr. Dre originally discovered.  He's changed drastically and he just isn't the same.  After listening to the album a few more times, I realized that this is even more true in terms of his rapping and lyrics.  The best way I can describe it is through this analogy:  Say you have a friend who you go out drinking with a lot; you have fun, get drunk, get schwasted, whatever.  Say later they become an alcoholic and are crazy out of control.  They check into rehab and afterward, you're glad they're sober, but they're just not as much fun as they used to be.  Well, that's Eminem.

Eminem has always been the epitome of edgy rap.  Certain rappers like Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, 2-Pac, and the Notorious B.I.G. pushed what was typically acceptable to rap about by (as Steve Berman puts it in "The Marshall Mathers LP") "rappin' about big-screen TVs, blunts, 40's and bitches."  Eminem, however, took it to an entirely different level, as Steve Berman again puts it, "rappin' about homosexuals and Vicadin."  Its without question that Eminem is the edgiest most controversial rapper out there.  In fact that's what attracted me to him; he is entirely different from any other rapper that has ever picked up a mic.  In his 2009 release "Relapse" Eminem was almost entirely devoid of his typical edge.  "Relapse" focused more on his comedic side and although it did have some disturbing content, such as his song "3 AM," even those songs were rapped in his more joking style of rap seen in hits such as "My Name Is" and the "The Real Slim Shady" (save for the stand alone harder song "Underground/Ken Kaniff" at the end of the album).  In "Recovery" Eminem really does try to turn back to his harder edgier style, but, unfortunately, with little success. 

His single from the album "Not Afraid" conveys feelings of regret for his last album, confessing that he knew it was a disaster, saying "Let’s be honest, that last Relapse CD was 'ehhhh.'" He also addresses his absence from his fans right before by rapping "And to the fans, I’ll never let you down again, I’m back/ I promise to never go back on that promise."  Eminem really does stand out on this track and does sound a bit like his old self.  Its nice to hear him own up to his mistakes and actually apologize to his fans.  While this is all well and good on "Not Afraid," Eminem wears his apology a little too thin, the same subject matter appears in several other songs such as "Cinderella Man."  He exhausts several other themes such as how he hates "the fame" but loves "the game;"  how hip-hop can't be the same without him and he's not going away; and how he has been constantly doubted as a rapper.

To get the rest of the negativity out really quick, the only other serious downfall on this album is that Eminem doesn't make the most of his guest appearances.  In "Won't Back Down" and "Love the Way You Lie" he has P!nk and Rihanna as guest appearances respectively.  However, all they do is sing the chorus and nothing more than that.  Having two hot, popular female artists on a hip-hop album is huge and to not use their vocals to your advantage is a huge mistake.  The only guest appearance Eminem makes use of is Lil Wayne in "No Love;" however, even then, this song doesn't seem to compliment Lil Wayne very well and one would expect a duo of Eminem and Lil Wayne to make a hilarious rap song if used correctly.  Unfortunately, the end product is an almost cheesy, heart-broken ballad with Haddaway's "What is Love" as a back track.

Onto what makes this album good, namely three tracks: "Cold Wind Blows," "Almost Famous," and "Cinderella Man." While at first I didn't really enjoy "Cold Wind Blows," after listening to it a few times I liked it more.  Eminem has comedic rapping in it (my favorite line is "Yeah I laugh when I call you a slut, its funny!") while still having a sort of tough back beat.  I was unsure about the chorus at first because its Eminem singing which is never pretty.  However, after listening to Mariah Carey's "Obsessed" it is clear that this song is a little stab at her.  Although Eminem already DESTROYED Mariah and her husband, regrettably, Nick Cannon in his single "The Warning," everyone knows that Eminem tends to hold onto grudges for quite some time.  His flow overall is really solid and his content is decent making an overall standout song.  "Almost Famous" has an eerie, almost creepy sound that borders on a hybrid of "Amityville" from "The Marshall Mathers LP" and "3 AM" from "Relapse."  A female vocalist sings the chorus which really provides for the eerie atmosphere.  The lyrics in the song back track through how Eminem started out and made it famous.  Although this is a subject Eminem has touched upon several times in the past, the lyrics are strong, dynamic, and manage to paint an impressive pictures with lines such as "Now there he goes in Dre's studio cuppin' his balls/ Screaming the wood off the panel/ And cussing the paint off the walls."

"Cinderella Man"  in my opinion, is the best track on the entire album.  It starts with Eminem talking over a stomping and clapping beat, closely followed by a male choir singing.  The male vocalists also later sings the hook "Cinderella man, Cinderella man, Cinderella man" mingled in between Eminem's verses which really compliments the harshness of his flow.  The chorus on top of that, while being somewhat cheesy, is incredibly well constructed and really works as possibly one of the best he's ever created: "Now guess who who (hey)/ Here's a clue (hey)/ He came to a ball in a wife beater/ Lost his Nike shoe/ It's in ya ass (hey)/ He's in ya ass, he's all up in ya psyche too/ Now what's his name?" followed by the choir repeating "Cinderella Man."  The overall feel of the song really juxtaposes a calm, relaxing feeling with one of anger and triumph creating an epic song that really shows that Eminem still has his spark. 

While its not his best album ever, Eminem does have some shining moments in "Recovery," which ended up with an overall Metacritic score of 61, which is a huge success, considering that he started his release out with as low of a score as 30.  Thankfully he had high reviews from Entertainment Weekly (83) and Rolling Stone (80).  Where "The Marshall Mathers LP" (arguably his best album) has all good songs with stand out great songs, "Recovery" has some decent songs, some good songs, and one great song, "Cinderella Man."  Eminem will never be the edgy rapper he used to be.  He's not struggling as much as he once was and although I'm glad his life is almost entirely turned around, that in turn turns around his rap as well; his torment and anger is what originally fueled his fire.  Fortunately, "Cinderella Man" shows listeners that Eminem doesn't need to be at the bottom of the barrel in order to create something great.  Take a listen to it here.

"Recovery": 79/100

Check out Mariah Carey's "Obsessed" and Eminem's rebuke, "The Warning" and you be the judge as to who won the battle.

Milkman

"I wish the milk man would deliver my milk, in the morning"

Rather than reviewing an album, I'm going to review an up and coming artist.  Gregg Luskin, aka Milkman, is a glitch-pop remix artist (in laymen's terms, a mash-up artist) from San Diego, CA rocking a tight Jew fro.  His first album "Lactose and THC" was released on January 22, 2008 and he released his second album, "Circle of Fifths," on March 29, 2009.  

Milkman was originally introduced to me by a friend of mine and I really like his creativity and the variety of samples he uses.  He uses samples of artists ranging from Journey, Tiesto, Beck, Jay-Z, No Doubt, Eminem, Outkast, Lupe Fiasco, Britney Spears, Daft Punk, and Missy Elliot among several others.  What I want to do is compare his two albums and talk a bit about what he does and where he's going.  So, here goes:

"Lactose and THC"

Although this was his first album, I listened to this one after I listened to "Circle of Fifths" which was bit of a mistake.  While "Lactose and THC" has received some high praise, being called the second best mash-up album of all time by DJ Forum, it is extremely rough.  The first song "All About It" didn't exactly set a good tone for me to want to listen to the rest of the album.  I actually could not listen to the song all the way through and had to skip it because it was just too much.  It is quite possibly the worst, most obnoxious mash-up I have ever heard in my life.  It wasn't bad up until about three minutes in where Milkman decides its a good idea to include a siren... a sire that will not stop.  The siren is mixed in with some sort of bass beat, with "Call on me" being repeated in the background incessantly.  On top of that, he adds Pitbull's "Go Girl" and later Justin Timberlake's "Sexyback" followed by 50 Cent's "Candy Shop."  That's upwards of four different things going on at one time.  Not to mention that the only part of "Sexyback" that is played is "I'm bring sexy back (Yeah!)" and the only part of "Candy Shop" that is sampled is "I let you lick the lollipop/ Keep going til you hit the spot (Woah!)," each of which is repeated over and over and over and over.  I'm listening to it as I write and am trying to write faster so I can skip the damn song. 

Another problem is that Milkman not only reuses samples from his first album in his second album (such as "Ms. New Booty" by Bubba Sparxxx and "Bring 'Em Out" by T.I.), but he reuses samples within the album.  There's more than enough material out there for him to do sample something else, not to mention that his mass amount of creativity shouldn't lead him to reuse old materials, no matter how much he likes them.  Milkman also tends to ruin certain moods he sets up.  In "Dreams" he sets up a very laid back sort of gangsta lean song using samples from The Ying Yang Twins, Hot Chocolate (totally gangsta), and Lil Wayne.  This attitude is only to later be ruined by the back beat to Daft Punk's "Digital Love."  Don't get me wrong, that's a great song, but its more of a light hearted, lovey-dovey beat which does not work with what Milkman set up in the first half of the song.  Also, last thing, in "Light It Up" he alters Jay-Z's voice to be higher in his sample of "Dirt Off Your Shoulders," which is a little irksome.  

"Circle of Fifths"

This album is significantly more successful than his first.  There are very few awkward mash-ups and Milkman has really learned how to set up a mood and keep it.  Even if he does decide to change the sound of a song later on, its a subtle transition, nothing awkward.  It seems as though he's really figured out what goes together and what doesn't.  This isn't as much genre matching as you would think, seeing as how he mixes Snoop Dogg and Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's cover of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and it works incredibly well, but also matching rhythm and musical count.  Certain songs have the same rhythmic count and others don't (musicians will know what I'm talking about); trying to put a song that is in 6/8 and one that is in 4/4 together doesn't work out as well as putting two 4/4's together. 

His two most successful tracks have to be "Good Sex" and "Rap Is Beneath Me."  Each has its own sort of attitude that it keeps throughout the song.  Its incredible how in "Good Sex" he combines the Ying Yang Twins rap from "Get Low" over Maroon 5's piano line from "This Love."  You would never think they would work, but they create an amazing sound.  Now, not every track on here is incredible, there are definitely songs I tuned out for, but the two aforementioned songs definitely have that WOW factor.  Its a lot of fun to be able to pick something like Maroon 5 out of a song or No Doubt; stuff like that really shows how various his samples are across "Circle of Fifths."  Milkman does, however, lose points in reusing "Ms. New Booty" and "Bring 'Em Out" in this new album.  Unfortunately, those are only the two I can recall off the top of my head, as far as I know, he reuses somewhere in between five and eight samples from his first album.

Overall, Milkman has a lot of potential, but he really needs to smooth out his rough edges.  He needs to bring new material to the table especially when he is working within an album.  As far as I'm concerned, and maybe I'm being a little harsh, using a sample two or three times within the same album is a big cop-out.  It makes me think that Milkman is lazy and really didn't want to look for a sound that could fill that certain gap.  He still has some mash-ups that really do not work, but he has gotten better about his layering, keeping his songs to about three samples at a time and rarely more than that.  I would definitely give him a listen though and definitely download "Lactose and THC" if you're interested seeing as how its FREE off of his website.  If you want to take a listen to either album, you can check them out at his website as well.

"Lactose and THC": 56/100

"Circle Of Fifths": 78/100

This Is Happening

"Just laugh it off, its better than it seems"

So, I decided to review something a little more foreign to me, LCD Soundsystem, a band I had never heard of.  However, their album "This Is Happening" (2010) released May 18th got great reviews, so I thought I would give it a shot.  At the head of LCD Soundsystem is James Murphy, a musician, producer, and co-founder of dance-punk label DFA Records.  Supposedly, "This Is Happening" is Murphy's last album as LCD Soundsystem, so I guess it was a good time for me to find him.  LCD Soundsystem has received overwhelming support in the UK and is beginning to become more popular in the US, especially with "This Is Happening" breaking into the Billboard Top 10 (after looking on the Billboard site to see where he was at as of now, I noticed he dropped down to #58; something more terrifying was that Justin Bieber is at #2... someone please end this).

LCD Soundsystem does a good job with their album in successfully synthesizing an electronic-dance feel with more punk vocals.  At first I was really unsure as to how I was supposed to listen to them.  When I listen to Daft Punk or Ratatat, I go into it with a certain mindset; when I listen to Sum 41 or Blink 182, I go into it with a certain mindset.  For LCD Soundsystem, I had to merge those two different mindsets.  The minute I started getting into a funky dance beat, punk vocals would jump in a catch me off guard and vice versa.  I had to get used to this because originally it upset me because I would really dig the instrumentals/vocals and then the added punk vocals/dance beat would totally throw me off.

With that out of the way, I can easily say that, once wrapping my mind around it, LCD Soundsystem has a very successful hybrid of electronica-dance and punk.  One of the most successful of these hybrids is "One Touch," which features a very technological, trance-like beat accompanied by very monotone, droned out vocals.  However, the punk hops in once the chorus hits with Murphy chanting "One touch is never enough/ You gave the opening, opening/ One touch is never enough/ People who need people, to the back of the bus" with female vocals shouting "One touch!" at the same time he chants it.  The vocals really compliment the back track and although Murphy's vocals almost sound like Mike Score, lead singer of A Flock of Seagulls, he manages to incorporate it well with the more contemporary dance track.  He keeps his chorus interesting as well, with variations on the phrase "People who need people, to the back of the bus."  

Unfortunately, where LCD Soundsytem is a melting pot of sound in certain songs, he seems to ruin the mood for other songs.  My favorite song on the album is his opener, "Dance Yrself Clean."  The track opens up with a very mellow beginning: light drumming and a very simple bass line.  Soft vocals eventually creep into the mix creating a very calm, relaxing, and serene sound; almost a hybrid of sounds found in Iron & Wine and Zero 7.  Murphy repeats the phrase "present company" throughout the song in lines such as, "Present company/ The best that you can find" and "Present company/ Makes me want to stay" translating to a very warm message.  However, around three minutes into the song, Murphy drops a very heavy synthesized beat with a drum machine.  The soft vocals transform into... well, the best way I can describe it is soft shouting; his voice is more strained, but he's not screaming.  Now, after listening to this song a few times, I expected it to come and it really does work with the song as a whole.  However, the first time I heard it, I was disappointed that he killed the amazing atmospheric sound he had setup in the first three minutes of his song.  While the song is almost nine minutes long, those first three are still what I wish I could hear more of.

LCD Soundsytem does this again in their second to last song "Throw."  The beat is awesome, one of the best dance beats I've heard in a long time.  Its really repetitive, but has enough variation to keep a listener interested and builds a lot of tension that dance listeners are always looking for.  Unfortunately, around six minutes into the song, Murphy starts screeching long held notes over the funky beat.  When I first heard this, I almost thought it was a joke because I imagine these vocals as how Towelie from South Park hears himself when he's high.  This is no exaggeration either, you need to hear this.  The vocals in this song are really annoying and don't fit the back beat at all; the bass line is so funky and the drums are quick and fun, but the vocals just sound like some guy who's drunk at karaoke.  On top of that, the notes are held way too long, some going for over 20 seconds; I highly doubt he holds those notes live, much to the appreciation of the audience, I'm sure.

Because I feel like I should give LCD SOundsystem a little bump before finishing off this review, I'll talk about another one of his more successful songs briefly.  "Pow Pow," again, has a good synthesis of dance beats and vocals.  Murphy essentially talks throughout the whole track with little actual singing.  However, all of this works together to create a very unique song that stands out from the rest of his album.  The talking vocals really make you want to listen and the catchy phrases and comparisons he makes within the lyrics (such as "You on the outside/ Me on the inside/ There's advantage to both" and "I have been untied/ And you are all cross-eyed/ There's advantages to each") really suck the listener in.  With all of his creative lyrics though, my favorite has to be "Three, we have a black president and you do not, so shut up, because you don't know shit about where I'm from that you didn't get from your TV," which is incredibly ballsy considering that a large portion of his audience is from the UK.

Overall, LCD Soundsystem has a great album.  The sounds Murphy creates by intertwining electronica-dance and punk are really interesting and its definitely worth a listen.  I would recommend either giving yourself about two hours to listen to this or try to listen to it in chunks.  The album as a whole is only eleven songs long, but takes up nearly eighty minutes (there are only two songs under four minutes long, most being around seven or eight).  I can safely say that after listening to "This Is Happening" I will be downloading more LCD Soundsystem at a later point in time.  The album is good and well deserved of the marks it has received, averaging a Metacritic score of 84.  I definitely enjoyed this album, but I think LCD Soundsystem is stretched a little too far vocally and needs to really try to settle within a few different vocals ranges instead of a different one for nearly every song.  I give it an 82/100.  Take a listen here.

Also, seriously... someone please stop Bieber.

EDIT:  I just realized that "Throw" is an exclusive track on iTunes and maybe the UK version of his album, as is another track, "Oh You (Christmas Blues)."  If anyone wants to listen to those tracks, let me know and I'll get them for you.

Thoughts

 

This video is just a song I've been listening to.  Hopefully I'll be reviewing this album next, but the start of this song really stood out to me, so I thought I'd share it.

I've wanted to start branching out this blog a little bit.  I know I started it mainly to talk about music and to review albums and whatnot, but I thought I could use it just to talk about stuff in general.  I used to write a lot back when i was a senior in high school.  I had this really eccentric writing style, which, as far as I know, was a little hard to read and follow.  Even though it was a bit unorganized and awkward syntax wise it was really cathartic for me just to write.  I probably won't be as expressive as I was in my own private journal here on my blog, but I figure writing in general can only help.

Its been nice to read Becca's blog and see her just talk about things in general.  She's not writing for anyone except herself.  There's no direct message to anyone in most of her posts, she just wants to share.  If people want to read, they will, if not, that's okay.  I've been one of those people that's been lucky enough to read.  

I realized I've started seeing the world a lot differently than I used to.  A few years ago, I had a very spiritual mind set.  I tried to take in as much as I could: trees, clouds, rain, cars, buildings, sounds, smells.  Now, however, how I see the world has closed off from that a bit.  I tend to be caught up in my head a bit more, just thinking about things.  Another thing that has happened is that I start seeing the world in patterns.  I was driving home tonight in the rain and noticed how, every time I went under a street light, the pattern of rain drops on my windshield changed.  Some times it was really organized and linear but other times it had blotches and was more chaotic.

This sort of epiphany helped me to realize that artists really do see the world differently than everyone else.  Not just visual artists like me, but all artists: musicians, writers, photographers, sculptors, architects, chefs, all of them.  Its kind of fun to think about it that way in all honesty.  I can't imagine what it would be like seeing the world from a different perspective.  But, then again, I guess everyone sees the world differently.  I'd like to start taking everything in like I used to.  For some reason, when I was able to do that, it really put me at ease about everything.  Everything just seemed in order, everything was in its place.

How do you see the world?