Sunday, June 22, 2014

Vol. 5 Episode 24



The new full length Flowers album is up for preorder at Kanine records.

You can also preorder the new Spoon album in multiple different packages on their page.

The new full lenth from The Proper Ornaments called Wooden Head is up for preorder at Slumberland Records in the US. It is already available via Fortuna Pop! In the EU.

sorry for the late post... here we go...



This is the sixth album from Linkin Park (LP). It was released in June 2014. This is the first of their albums to be produced with Rick Rubin since Meteora. The name of the album is kind of a metaphor. It is said to be that Linkin Park is the party that is hunting to bring back the energy and soul of rock. They have pushed back the electronic flavor that they had been using in favor of their hard rock roots this time. There has been a lot of advertisement for this album. It has ranged from the different packages that the band has put together for the album and the special Best Buy version of the album to the new tour that they will be embarking on. All of the packages that I have seen have only been on download or CD. I have not seen the album advertised on vinyl. I am happy to say that I will be attending that concert with my son. It is his first concert ever!

There have already been five singles released from the album and it was just released in the US this week. That is nearly half of the album. The first single from the album is called Guilty All The Same. The song features the rapper Rakim from Erick B. & Rakim. The songs first appearance came on Shazam and a day later as a standard single. The song is very hard edged with stabbing guitar chords, Simple but rough guitar solo parts, and pushed to the edge vocals by Chester Bennington. Synth parts made to help progress the song and hard drumming. This is a great first single from the bands new album and shows directly where the group went for the album.

The second single from the album is called Until It’s Gone. This one goes back to the electronic style of the previous albums. It reminds me of a track that could have been a part of a sound track. It has a super polished sound that movie soundtrack makers gravitate toward. It fits with the album only because it breaks up the album. I like the song but if the group is going for a heavy rock album all the way this one doesn’t really fit the bill.

The third single, actually the third, fourth and fifth singles were released at the same time, is called Final Masquerade. This is another track that seems super polished with electronic and synth parts floating in the background with not much in the way of heavy guitars and hard hitting drums. They are there but not as heavy as some of the other tracks on the album. Like the previous single, it is good but not has heavy as the rest of the album.

The next single is called Wastelands. This is a hard hitting drum song with guitar fills and synth fills. The song hits like a light version of a song from living things but still has heavily distorted guitars to make the fans of the earlier work happy. The break down in the song is the exciting part with cool psych sounds that make your brain feel all twisted. When it comes out of that part it sets you straight and prepares you for the next track on the album.

The last single from the album is called Rebellion. The song features Daron Malakian from System of A Down who plays additional guitar on the track. The addition of a heavy guitar gives the band a new dimension. This heavy guitar sound makes this track one of my favorites on the album, although, I could due with out the synth part all together on the track. This is another great song from the album that really smacks of the System of A Down sound from the Toxicity era. Either way it is still a great LP song.

It is a great album leaning on the heavy metal sound from the first three albums with some of the good stuff sprinkled in from the last few albums. I am very excited to get to know this album.



This is the first release from the group ever. It was released in 2010. This was well before I had ever heard of the group. This is a different recording from the version of Recalling put out a few years later (2013). The two songs put on this single were recorded at a friends house and as such have a duller sound. It gives the sound a boost on the lower end. It is also a little crispy on the highs too. This isn’t necessarily a good thing but it does give it a homey feel that you usually only find on demo versions of songs.

The A side song is called Recalling. I had this to say about the re-recorded version of the song and this still applies to this version of the song, “The song starts off with a simple chord progression played in muted eighth notes. There is also a slight tinkle of piano and a good drum beat. As the song progresses the guitar parts get more complex and the piano plays more frequently. There is also an organ part that floats in the background that reminds me of the Vox organ that was used heavily in the 60s and 70s. The vocals send me back to that time as well with their lower tone and drawn out sound. The song is really great…” I think that the difference between the two versions of this song is mainly that this version was recorded at someone’s house and the newer version sounds like it was recorded in a studio. Both versions are good and I can’t say that I prefer one over the other.

The B side to this single is called Are You Going Blind? It is a slower song that matches the sound to the A side. It is a slower song that uses slow strummed chords with eighth note pick playing on the bass guitar. It is a sad song about a friend going blind and listing off things that they won’t be able to do any more. It is kind of depressing though. If you can get over the lyrics the music is very good.


This is a limited edition release of demo tracks from the group. It was released last year in the EU for their spin-off of Record Store Day called Cassette Store Day. This is the only thing that I have gotten from that event with the exception of the Bleed In Gold album that was also made available as a download through Art Is Hard. The cassette came with a download sticker in the sleeve. The downloaded tracks didn’t come in the proper track order and one of them came as an aif file. I am not sure if this was just sloppy production on the part of the record company that put this out or what. I did find it quite annoying as I had to not only correct the order of the songs and make sure that the names and other bits were labeled properly I also had to convert the aif file to MP3. An aif file is a pretty large file. It was not such a big deal for me to do but I know that not as many people have that ability or understanding to do so.

There are eight tracks on this tape. They are all demo versions but in varying state of clarity. Some of these demo tracks were re-recorded in the studio for their first album and a couple of them are used on the second album. Largely, they are only heard on this cassette. I hope that they all in some way or another get a studio treatment as they are all a lot of fun to listen to.

Shining Bright and Drop Off were given a studio treatment for the first album. Tire Me Out and Stereolab got the studio treatment for the second album. These demo tracks are very fun and I can’t wait to get the two full length albums from this group. I am just as excited to hear the studio versions of these tracks.

That's all for now...
 

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