Favourite albums and tracks of 2015

Top 5 (alphabetical order)

A Forest of Stars – Beware the Sword You Cannot See
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Leviathan – Scar Sighted
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Mgła – Exercises in futility
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Paperi T – Malarian Pelko
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Tähtiportti – Tähtiportti
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Top 6-7

Abyssion – Luonnon Harmonia ja Vihreä Liekki

Swallow The Sun – Songs From The North I

Top 8-15 (random order)

Sigh – Graveward (possible grower)

Venetian Snares – Thank You For Your Consideration

Enshine – Singularity (possible grower)

Shape of Despair – Monotony Fields – I really wanted this to be awesome but its just good, allthough the first ~4 minutes of The Blank Journey are among my favourite metal moments this year.

Tribulation – The Children Of The Night

Pryapisme – Futurologie

Misþyrming – Söngvar elds og óreiðu (possible grower)

Ghost Bath – Moonlover

Possible growers that I haven’t listened enough

Swallow The Sun – Songs From The North II & III

Venetian Snares – Your Face

Arcturus – Arcturian

Paradise Lost – The Plague Within – I actually got a semi-kick out of it but then started listening to Tragic Idol and so far I haven’t seen any reason why to go back as Tragic Idol is so much better.

Carpenter Brut – Trilogy – Recently used it as background music for

Binding of Isaac Afterbirth and it worked really well in it, but haven’t tested longevity yet.

The Morningside – Letters from the Empty Towns

Opeth – Pale Communion

Mogwai – Music Industry 3. Fitness Industry 1.

Disappointments

Melechesh – Enki – Almost the whole album makes me want to fall asleep. I would use it as sleeping music if I wasn’t so annoyed that it is so fucking boring.

Last Step – Lost Sleep – Sideproject of Venetian Snares, I suppose Acid (genre) is not my thing.

Messer Chups – The Incredible Crocotiger – What happened to Messer Chups, they used to be so fun, merging b-movie clips and incredibly imaginative melodies with surf. Now they are just plain surf without any other flavours.
Lasten hautausmaa – Lasten hautausmaa – overhyped, yeah they aren’t bad but no they aren’t the new Mana Mana or even close.

Grave Pleasures – Dreamcrash – What a suitable name, after the surprise debut, still with the name Beastmilk, this album is so shy. All the great melodies and freshness are gone. Beastmilk was dangling on the edge of hipsterness and ridiculousness but miraculously avoiding it and being stunning. Grave Pleasures crashes headfirst, being both annoying and pretty good in every track. There may be a jewel there but I haven’t got to powerlistening this mess yet.
Trepaneringsritualen – Perfection & Permanence – Such a ridiculously bad album it created a time paradox and appeared in this list even though it’s been released in 2014.

Favourite tracks (random order)

Top 11

Venetian Snares – Ötvenöt 3

Tribulation – Melancholia

A Forest of Stars – Drawing Down The Rain

Mgła – Exercises in Futility IV

Ghost Bath – Happyhouse

Swallow The Sun – Lost & Catatonic

Leviathan – Scar Sighted

Mgła – Exercises in Futility VI

Tähtiportti – Viimeinen Tähtiportti

A Forest of Stars – Lowly Worm

Paperi T – Mainstream Solo

Next 6

Pryapisme – Futurologie 3–5

Opeth – Eternal Rains Will Come

Tähtiportti – Tähtiportti IV: Luciferin Pylväs

Tähtiportti – Tähtiportti I

Ufomammut – Daemons

Misþyrming – Söngur heiftar

Favourite cover art

Ufomammut – Ecate

BONUS – Top 2 2015 games to play while listening music

Rocket League (anything with a bit of a pace)

Binding Of Isaac Afterbirth (anything grim and gloomy)

MonuMental Progressive Collection I – from Progressive Rock to Black Metal to Breakcore

The first MonuMental Progressive Collection playlist starts with suitably uncommercial Finnish Progressive rock, advances to black metal and finally ends with modern breakcore classics. It’s idea is to progress naturally from genre to genre and also ramp up the quality track-after-track. It is a challenging ride, but when you are in contact with masterpieces, that’s what you bound to get.

1. For someone whose mother tongue is not Finnish the first track Kuha. – Tohtori Krabolan Telekineettinen testilaboratorio (From Telekineettinen Testilaboratorio, 2005) might seem like an odd bit. To be honest it was a slow starter for me as well. But from that Kuha. emerged as the best pure progressive rock band in Finland since Kingston Wall.

2. Dillinger Escape Plan‘s best instrumental, always surprising When Acting as a Wave (From Ire Works, 2007) serves as a small bridge to Chapter I: Introverting Dimensions by The Fall of Troy (From Phantom On The Horizon, 2008).

3. I know what you are thinking here, what is that half-emo band doing on a metal playlist. But that’s the thing, they are only half-emo, the other half is firmly rooted in Progressive rock, and most so on their EP Phantom On The Horizon. Give it a listen and you will see. Thomas Erak’s guitar playing is truly mesmerizing. At some point you may get mixed up and think you are listening to bastard cousin of The Mars Volta instead of an emo band.

4. A Prophet For a Pound of Flesh by Forest of Stars (From A Shadowplay for Yesterdays, 2012) is the first step to metal. On of the many bands who builds their flavour from black metal but has grown a vast amount of tentacles since their first efforts.

5. The Fecal Rebellion is by Mirrorthrone (From Gangrene, 2008) which is one of many Vladimir Cochet’s project. This one man powerhouse has such an amount of talent it is ridiculous. All his projects have only a few albums which I must take as the main reason of the fact that he has only advanced to cult classic status so far. If you mix modern classic music with complex black metal this is something you may get. Plus there’s harpsichord!

Waters of Ain by Watain (From Lawless Darkness, 2010) is a track that leaves me speechless every time. For me, this is the ultimate black metal track, mixing elements of black metal, progressive rock, Celtic frost and heavy metal perfectly. It is everything.

6. The only way to top Waters of Ain is to abandon metal completely with Venetian Snares – Integraation (From My Downfall (Original Soundtrack), 2007). Integraation is from Aaron Funk’s neoclassical releases where he mixes complex electronic beats with classical music elements. Also at best Integraation is actually as heavy as any metal track.

7. Venetian Snares – Miss Balaton (Bonus track) (From Detrimentalist, 2008). I know you aren’t supposed to put two songs of the same artist into a compilation. Whateva I do what I want. In truth I could not exclude Miss Balaton as it is even better than Integraation and fits perfectly after it. I won’t even start describing the goosebumps.

P.S. The playlist originally had Kuha.’s 25 minute Kalifi Myy Mustaa Valoa as a starter but it is not in Spotify.

266576-1449435327You can also find all playlists from playlists.net
http://playlists.net/epic-progressive-collection

Narrow-minded Metalhead reviews experimental music, why?

Being an avid underground rock/metal listener and huge fan in finding new music and genres I stumbled to TRASHFUCK Records, RedSK and their noise in 2009. A lot of their releases at best make me bored, scared and entertained at the same time. This impressed me to try out more of the weblabel scene and introduced me to Sirona Records’ Arnaud. I decided to start reviewing electronic music records after I realized I’m really not sure what is going on in half of Sironas’ releases.

I’m trying to give my humble opinions on some new music, whose genres, I may or may not have any familiarity, but sure thing is they are far from my normal music grounds. I have a feeling, if by chance I happen to stumble to albums with genre titles like “rave” “deathcore” or “techno”, I might have a hard time saying a single positive thing, but nevermind that. You can always bypass it by the fact that I’m just narrow-minded metalhead reviewing experimental music.

When I stared this review serie in 2011 I did not have many electronic artists which I was a fan of. Since that, the number has increased considerably.

Yerzmyey – FREAKuencies & Interphase // NMMREM XXXI

Yerzmyey has been composing his chiptune / micromusic / lo-fi electronica since 1989. Both releases in question have been composed with a ZX Spectrum clone. Not with an emulator, but with an actual retro computer.

The original ZX Spectrum is an 8-bit home computer released in 1982. ZX Spectrum was especially popular in Eastern Europe, mostly because of unofficial clones that were produced en masse in the former eastern block.

I first came across Yerzmyey from Grooveshark recommendations and randomly took two EP’s, FREAKuencies and Interphase for listen. It proved to be a great decision.

Especially FREAKuencies is nothing short of damn awesome. It is composed with a Timex Computer 2048 – the American/Portuguese ZX48K clone that came out in 1984.

The sounds may be nostalgic for the 80s generation, but the songs are as fresh as ever. With bit-pop being on raise Yerzmyey is bound to keep finding new fans. His tracks and melodies are simply excellently composed. A lot of hooks and a lot of variation and playful but complicated melodies. Yerzmyey masters the use of distortion which adds so much variety and poise to his catalogue.

FREAKuencies (8bitpeoples, 2008) contains 3/5 killer tracks. Yerzmix 4: melodic ear candy. Fuck off: I really hope the name comes from the chord progression that seems to vocalize “Fuck off fuck off fuck off fuck off”. Escape From the Spaceship: the “magnum opus”, a long track with a hint of retro sci-fi action and melodies strong enough to only get better during the 6.43 track length. Weird is also a good one, albeit a bit too long, Picturesque however is under the high par the other tracks set. Not bad though.

The top 3 tracks are top notch even compared to any uncompressed Higher-Fi 16 speaker Dolby Surround / 320 000 000 Gbit/s FLAC standard. The retro sound chip sounds as amazing as ever. I can see myself listening them for years to come

Interphase (DarkWingDuck Records, 2009) is plainly more uneven but there are great tracks and ideas. Oxygene (a short Jean-Michel Jarre cover) being the shining example. Parts of almost every track, especially 16Kb, Juh and 5th channel, shine through. But in total the long tracks don’t seem to have strong enough founding idea for this amount of variation. Interphase also contains two tracks which I’m not fond of, It’s only a joke (not funny) and 16 Kb tune 2 (too long, too slow). Compared to FREAKuencies Interphase may be disappointing, but it is still a good release, better than many metal albums I decide to give a listen to.

Yerzmyey’s tunes don’t even need a game in the background to function! A sign of a great composer. There are a lot of free download EPs and albums on weblabels (I can also recommend his 2013 release, Brutal and Aggressive). Finding great music has never been easier.

FreaKuencies 9/10

Interphase 7/10

http://www.8bitpeoples.com/products/520268-yerzmyey-freakuencies

http://archive.org/details/dwd-006

Spacebirds – Machine Day // NMMREM XXX

Machine Day is a 3 track ep by Spacebirds, self described as “A Sci-Fi Synth / Spacesound / SynthPop / Techno project from Russia. Producer by EugeneKha.” I must admit, at least half of the reason why I picked this EP for listen was the retro soviet cover art.

Machine Day starts with a promising piano intro, which is soon topped with a clumsy fade in. However, the good soundscapes that follow impress. The beatwork is simple, but there are a lot of solid, complex melody-work and spacey hums and wooshes. The sound that comes through is some sort of psychedelic electro (trance?). Compared to Iranon (another similar Sirona artist that I reviewed a week [AHEM! COUGH!] ago), Spacebirds are more dancefloor and extroverted. However my opinion is based merely on this EP.

The second track Mars Attacks is the best cut, a wicked psychedelic flow. It is not that often that I notice nodding my head automatically on a beat of electronic music. Machine Day does it at times and Mars Attacks almost constantly. There must be something special going on here. The sound definitely manages to avoid the worst Fruity Loopery.

There had to be a letdown. The third and final track Moonman has a vibe of being a mash-up track that lacks a functioning suit, silly melodies on top of a jarring thump-thump. Not my piece of pizza. The song brings images of a Moonman doing random stuff while floating around in zero gravity; it could work as a music of an animation or as childrens music but as a near 9 minute song, it doesn’t hold its ground.

The trance-like beats of first two tracks do make yours truly, truly an avid hater of trance beats, at best, fall in a state of trance. Same cannot be said on most dancefloor music.

7-/10

Free download: http://archive.org/details/siro476Spacebirds-MachineDay

The blog of the artist: http://spacebirds-sounds.blogspot.com (more music and spacey stuff :))

Iranon – Painting The Sound // NMMREM XXIX

Iranon, a one man project of Luc Messina is a promising psychedelic electronic outlet with spacerock influences. The main man not only does the music but also the stunning artworks. Just look it, it’s beautiful.

So far Iranon has released 1 album, Painting The Sound in 2011 (+ individual tracks on compilations). The album starts with its title track, ambience and a very Ozric Tentacles like bass riff. Cannot start a record with much more promise than this.

It is followed by some amazing Vangelis-vibe ambience and pretty piano melody and soon classy guitar leads. The guitar sound has a bit of a demo-feel but the structure and melodies are near top-class. In the end-track the guitar turns into some classy bass groove. Very nicely constructed.

After the first cut, it is painstakingly clear why the album got its title from Painting The Sound. While rest of the tracks fail to utterly disappoint, they just cannot reach to the standard set by Painting The Sound. Hell, I really thought i’d have a masterwork on my hands. For example, while I’m still mood peaking from the awesomeness of first track, Arctic Oasis is classy and Civilized Insects sympathetic but they’re more based on repetition than growth. It may have its fans but I feel the main themes fail to stay interesting enough.

It is also about the dynamics and setting a standard. When an album fills your ears with an enlightening 9/10 track, the next 6/10-7/10 tracks fail to satiate.

By the end of the record the spacerock vibes are fewer and the main element is painted electronic soundscapes and atmospheres. Tracks take a notable time to start and require patience and right mindset. Sound balancing also has more problems in the end album, sometimes tracks have quiet ambience that suddenly elevates into loudness. Thus the last three tracks require more volume or headphones to really open up. Especially the last track, Polar Tribes. The quiet ambients become that much more entertaining.

Painting the Sound is a pretty good effort but the album fails to live to the expectations set by the great first track. But boy, is the first track promising. If psychedelic electronic or spacerock are your things, I’ll definitely suggest you to give it a spin. Iranon should have more than just 1 great track per album to offer in the future.

7-/10


Free download: https://archive.org/details/Iranon-PaintingTheSound (5051 downloads)

You can also check the artwork by the artist from here (he makes killer album covers): http://oniroscope.deviantart.com/gallery/

Plus Iranon also has another great track “The End of Eternity” on this compilation: Sincerity Is The Key

Next week a very comparable album Machine Day by Spacebirds!