SPOOKRIJDER

Anja Kowalski - Wolke ALBUM STREAMING (2015)

2015-06-08T18:06:00.001+02:00

Brussels-based singer, songwriter and guitarist Anja Kowalski has been around the Belgian musical scene for a pretty long time now. She was first encountered by my ears, and eyes, during the Middelheim Jazz Festival in 1999, if I recall correctly. Anja Kowalski was the guest vocalist for soprano sax Pierre Vaiana's African project Foofango. I honestly didn't care much for that combo, I was there for Misha Mengelberg Trio and ICP Orchestra, which had a standing ovation for their unique and brilliant take on Duke Ellington's repertoire. Nevertheless, if Foofango's gig was unmemorable, Anja Kowalski stood out as a particularly interesting and extraordinary singer. I told myself two things, first "I've never heard such a voice before" and "how is it possible she's looking even more beautiful when she's singing ?" And I told myself a third thing : "This is an artist to follow and I can't wait for this lady to come out with her own musical project".

Well, Anja Kowalski wasn't easy to follow, and if she has taken part in several musical projects of her own (the chamber-folk trio Swiebel, the piano and voice duo Purzelbaum Unlimited and the last intimate duet Seven Stumbling Poets), only the second mentioned issued an album, "DÖ"... ten years ago. As a vocalist on the other hand, Anja Kowalski on records can be found alongside Antwerp's experimental jazz-rock ensemble Think Of One and more prominently Belgian best big band ever, and possibly one of the best, period : the iconoclastic, explosive and oddball avant garde cabaret jazz orchestra Flat Earth Society (I beg you to listen to their handful of records, you have no idea).

Good news appeared in 2009 with the creation of Anja Kowalski's own four-piece band Wolke (German for 'cloud'), the release of a beautiful self-released EP and several gigs around Belgium. But up until April 2015, and despite several concerts around, I honestly thought a full Wolke album will never see the light of day.

"Beauty Is a Rare Thing" is an Ornette Coleman's composition, which appeared on his seminal "This Is Our Music" in 1960 ; both titles could very much be applied to Anja Kowalski's first album under her own name, "Wolke" being relegated to the album title : this album is a thing of beauty, and this is their, mostly her, music. The Brussels record label, NAFF rekordz, bandcamp liner notes include Marlene Dietrich, Hanne Hukkelberg, Robert Wyatt, Eintürzende Neubauten and Bill Frisell as references, but if it gives an idea of what to expect here : melancholy, playfulness, fragility, punctual sonic destruction and succinct avant jazz improvisation, it doesn't say much about the sum of all its parts. The album works like a journey thru the band's, and mostly Anja Kowalski's, mind, and if the lady seems calm on the outside, there's much going on under her mane of hair. "Wolke" is at the same time and alternatively introvert and eccentric, delicate and powerful, pretty dense and airy, dark and colorful while it's certainly excellently performed, the instrumentation suits Anja Kowalski's idiosyncratic vocals perfectly. Two third of the songs are delivered in German, which adds to the uncompromising nature of the album, and that language never sounded that soft and intimate, heimweh being the German close equivalent of the Portuguese saudade.

Listen, share and surely spooking buy this thing there or anywhere!

Anja Kowalski - Wolke by Anja Kowalski - Wolke

PRAIRIE - Like a Pack of Hounds (2015) ALBUM STREAMING

2015-05-20T17:51:00.002+02:00

Brussels-based one man project PRAIRIE debuted in 2013 with a compelling and dark self-released EP called “I’m So In Love I Almost Forgot I Survived A Disaster”. A very promising record, if a little raw on the edges, oddly labelled here and there as post-post rock, whatever that means. Or is it because the influences are clearly rooted into the most experimental and abstract side of post-rock, while expending its sound pallet to incorporate ambient, noise, drones, electronic, spoken words, film music and even post-punk aesthetics? Oh, but that's quite what post-rock is, isn't it? And does it matter? Nope.

What matters is that the man behind PRAIRIE, Marc (Notthefckngdesigner) Jacobs, has signed a deal with Berlin-based Shitkatapult label, which has released a couple of months ago PRAIRIE's second effort to date, "Like a Pack of Hounds", and that's good news. It is good news because the man's music deserves to reach a wider audience. All the elements which made the first EP a fine listen are there, but like developed and extended towards larger than life yet terrifying proportion. I knew the man has an extremely vast musical knowledge as a music lover and professional, but it's fascinating to hear how those numerous influences ended up into this impressive musical sum that's greater than its parts, and best of all deeply personal, while almost worryingly relentless. Some parts could almost be too obvious to pinpoint, experimental composers Tim Hecker and Ben Frost come to mind, and when exceptionally - the album being mostly instrumental - one track got closer to a song, with vocals indeed, like on "Closed For Thirty Midnights", it's hard not to think of Phil Elverum's Mount Eerie/ The Microphones. The thing is, PRAIRIE does it better, surely concerning them surprisingly hip and overrated above mentioned couple of composers, because contrary to Tim Hecker's sterile harsh metallic multi-layers-that-go-nowhere and surely Ben Frost's special fx boom blasts-that-well-blast-for-nothing-and-is-that-all-there-is, PRAIRIE's "Like a Pack of Hounds" contains full formed fertile compositions, with an effective sense of direction, while somewhat keeping it close to Earth. There is sweat and dirt and sorrow and despair and even menace around here. An ambitious, uncompromising and ultimately rewarding listen.
Stream it down here, share it and buy it on the Shitkatapult website.

Like a Pack of Hounds by prairie

YODOK III - THE SKY FLASHES, THE GREAT SEA YEARNS (2015) ALBUM STREAMING

2015-02-01T16:49:00.001+01:00

YODOK, the Scandinavian duo of Tomas Järmyr, on drums, and Kristoffer Lo, on amplified tuba and flugabone (sic) was founded in 2008 in Trondheim, Norway (same place the mighty Supersilent appeared) and proposes improvised music within the drone/doom/noise genre. One of their many influences comprises Belgian guitarist and sound sculptor Dirk Serries' project Fear Falls Burning and it's nearly no surprise, if a good one, to see Vidna Obmana's founder join those productive Scandinavians in order to expand their already expansive sound. On this occasion the project was renamed YODOK III.

Both Järmyr and Lo are versatile musicians, active in the local Norwegian experimental and improvised scene. Järmyr and Lo collaborated in the drone trio Sunswitch, with bassist Trond Frønes, and the jazz-pop band Doffs Poi. Lo plays in the art-rock bands PELbO and Highasakite, is a member of the Trondheim Jazz Orchestra and the experimental tuba trio Microtub. Besides, he issued a solo tuba record. Järmyr is at least as versatile (check out his website) and he has already recorded a duo album with Dirk Serries, under the moniker The Void of Expansion, called "Ashes and Blues".

"THE SKY FLASHES, THE GREAT SEA YEARNS" is already the second studio recording issued by YODOK III (they also issued two live ones) and it is once again released on the small Dutch label Tonefloat Records, under their ironically called "a new wave of jazz" imprint. Their first studio effort, simply called "YODOK III", contained two long improvisations, both running around the 23-minute mark, this second opus doubled it with four tracks for a total of around 90 minutes of music. Despite the jazz appellation, YODOK III's music is closer to the long post-rock instrumentals proposed by bands like Godspeed You! Black Emperor or Stars of The Lid, with slow-building and thick-layered/thick-timbered aesthetics, except the music is here entirely improvised, which make them sonically somewhat closer to their near compatriots Supersilent.

This long album can be played in the background but I would recommend to push the volume button up as much you possibly can.

Stream, buy and share this thing below, spooking hell!

<a href="http://newwaveofjazz.bandcamp.com/album/the-sky-flashes-the-great-sea-yearns">THE SKY FLASHES, THE GREAT SEA YEARNS by YODOK III</a>

Chocolat - Tss Tss (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-12-24T20:05:00.000+01:00

The second album for French Canadian band Chocolat, cryptically or jokingly called "Tss Tss", was released end of October this year via Montreal-based record label Grosse Boîte, and it's an utterly enjoyable affair throughout. Chocolat has slowly disengaged itself from their unique garage punk sound (they toured with Ty Segall after all) to get closer to psych rock, and even flirting with prog here and there, while keeping their knack for direct melodies and powerful musicianship, this without pretentiousness or sterile virtuosity. Don't stop at their funny name and rather cheesy album cover, that record is a rock'n roll gem, and I might say this album counts as one of my most ecstatic discovery since "Elephants At The Door" by Italian duo Dumbo Gets Mad.

Don't hesitate to dig up their earlier album "Piano élégant" (2008), dirtier, more like some disjointed blues rock, with it's share of excellent hooks and melodies, as well as their first seven tracks ep, simply called "EP" (2007), even dirtier, in the face, closer to garage punk it is.

And you can even go further by looking for Chocolat's frontman solo albums. The guy's name is Jimmy Hunt, and despite his name, and just like in Chocolat's case, near all his songs are sung in French. I barely remember hearing French sounding as rock'n roll as this, somewhere between Jacques Dutronc at its wildest and a less mannered The Walkmen's Hamilton Leithauser. Jimmy Hunt's albums are released by Grosse Boîte as well. Check out his bandcamp page.

Oh, and you can already stream Chocolat's album down here, you won't be disappointed.

Tss Tss by CHOCOLAT

Jenny Hval & Susanna - I Have Walked This Body AUDIO

2014-07-17T13:29:00.001+02:00

Two of Norway's, and anywhere else's, most unique voices, Jenny Hval and Susanna Wallumrød (aka Susanna, with or without The Magical Orchestra), composed the music and wrote the lyrics for a collaborative album, "Meshes of Voices", which will be issued mid-August 2014 on SusannaSonata.

The first extract from the upcoming album proposed here, "I Have Walked This Body", is surprisingly ethereal and even noisy at times. It starts with layers of harmonium drones, which take some tremendously roaring foreground as Jenny's and Susanna's voices literally mesh for a deep near spiritual and spooky experience. A fine introduction to a very promising album.

You can stream "I Have Walked This Body" below.

Liars <> FOCUS

2014-06-28T17:24:00.002+02:00

Liars could pretty much be considered one of the most interesting, adventurous and consistent bands from the early 2000s until now, they also own one of the most recognizable sound around. Liars could somehow be described as Animal Collective's nemesis because just like those guys Liars changes musical direction for each new release, to the point that this band has always been very difficult to categorize and box into whatever musical genre. This could also be one of the main reasons why Liars don't get much beyond a cult status, only the most open-minded fans are able to follow up to the band ever-changing artistic choices and orientation. Besides, and just like Avey Tare and co, their untamed and playful studio performance during the recording of each of their album is palatable. But contrary to the joyous jamborees that characterize most of Animal Collective's outputs, Liars' unique aesthetic approach veers towards way darker corners and more violent territories.

Liars was founded in 2000. Its genesis can be traced in Los Angeles where Australian Cal Arts student Angus Andrew met microbiology student Aaron Hemphill in a record store. Both were collaborating on four-track recordings until Angus completed school and they relocated to New York. After responding to an ad, bassist Pat Noecker and drummer Ron Albertson joined and this was the first band's line-up, which later recorded the impressive debut "They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top" in 2001. Some different ideas on creative methods led to the departure of the rhythm section, Angus' old friend Julian Gross arrived, and Liars' new line-up never changed since then. They further signed to London record label Mute, and released their radically different second album "They Were Wrong, So We Drowned" in 2004.
The rest is history.

Let's explore Liars' discography.

They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top (2001)
Their debut album, "They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top", presented Liars as a particularly energetic dance-punk quartet. They took their inspiration from earlier UK post punk bands, with some affection for more danceable stuff, like Gang of Four and A Certain Ratio. Nevertheless, Liars ain't no Arctic Monkeys, and this debut album shows much personality indeed, surely in Australian frontman Angus Andrew's hostile vocals but also in their overall sonic attitude full of pummeling bass, angular guitars and jerky electronics, all with consistent songwriting. From the get go, Liars have demonstrated they will never be where we would expect them. Indeed, if the first eight songs on "They Threw Us All" is pure rock & roll energy and attitude, they cover only 2/5th of the entire album length and they lead up to the last 3/5th of it in the shape of one single half an hour closing track, the puzzlingly and dazzlingly repetitive, sample-ridden hip-hop pulsed and rather heavy "The Dust That Makes the Mud", which lies somewhere between heavy post-rock and Dälek, except Angus delivers a haunting insomnia-driven vocals to start with. A hypnotic and trance inducing experience.

7 out of 10

They Were Wrong, So We Drowned (2004)
Some line-up changes later, Liars' founder Angus Andrew and Aaron Hemphill dropped the rhythm section and hired Angus' schoolmate Julian Gross on drums, the band reappeared three years later with their sophomore and highly experimental sort of a concept album "They Were Wrong, So We Drowned". Inspired by witch trials/hunting and traditional witch folklore, with the addition of unusual instrumentation and non-traditional song structures, Liars further experiment with This Heat's reminiscing tape-loop experiments (besides, the record was produced by the not-yet-hyped David Sitek of TV on the Radio, who is renown for his sound looping tricks) and relentless industrial sounds thru guitars, electronics and tribal drum patterns, to create one hell of a scary and oppressive at times earsplitting atmospheric musical soundtrack. Angus Andrew's voice begins to show the extend of its capacities, from deadpan incantations to savage punk ululations or shamanic incarnations. No songs really stand out, except the 6-minute opener "Broken Witch" with its mantra-like lines "I, I am the boy, she, she is the girl. He, he is the bear, we, we are the army", it's an album to endure from head to tail. A challenging and mind-boggling yet a little sloppy affair.

7.5 out of 10

Drum's Not Dead (2006)
Liars went even further off to remove any musical cliche towards even more abstraction, and paradoxically more tribal polyrhythms, with their third full length "Drum's Not Dead". The album title shouldn't be read 'drums not dead' but 'Drum's not dead', a little wordplay as multi-layered and overlapping drums and percussion are indeed extremely all over the place on this record. Drum being one fictional character and nemesis of another one called Mt. Heart Attack, both giving their names to several tracks here. Drum is assertive and productive, the idea of creative confidence, while Mt. Heart Attack, like the name suggests, represents stress and self-doubt, both could be the yin and yang of creative process. A conflictual process that Liars' members could have felt while they relocated from New York to Berlin in order to find new inspiration; the ghosts of German's krautrockers Faust and Cluster are somewhat palatable.

The move was worthy, "Drum's Not Dead" is without the shadow of a doubt Liars' masterpiece. The band's larger-than-life personality reaches its peak with this album full of expressionist-versus-surrealist pieces which seem sometimes less interested in becoming music than post-industrial tribal bacchanals. The miracle is that them pieces and the album as a whole become music of the highest order in the process, even with a track as anti-musical as the static instrumental "It's All Blooming Now Mt Heart Attack". On the other side, Angus Andrew relies way more on falsetto, which gives the album a more ethereal and less aggressive sound than their previous ones, another musical choice that is bordering on genius, if not plain genius. With this album, Liars is tiptoeing between sanity and insanity. There is a sense of alienation that radiates from that music, and it emerges the would-be listener into some inner animalistic world, which is in turn fighting fiercely against the regular authoritarianism of the contrived and counterintuitive rational mind. A crucial album that helps you to blow any sterile preconceived ideas and concepts to pieces.

9 out of 10

Liars (2007)
Liars relocated to Los Angeles to record their self-titled album, which represents a musical and conceptual regression. It is as if the band decided to start anew with another debut album. The previous "Drum's Not Dead" could symbolize the apex of their musical experiments, and Liars could have felt they had nothing more to express on that matter. Besides, their unlimited curiosity could have pushed them towards other unexplored and more inspiration refreshing territories. Nevertheless, their fourth opus stands as a mixbag of hard to reconcile ideas that is the natural tendency of most of any versatile band's debut albums.

From the opening rock flexing muscles of "Plastic Casts of Everything" to the primitive beatbox, synth and mournful vocals on the skeletal yet tender closer "Protection", the musical scope is particularly wide. It ranges from the psych/industrial, with the use of the Moodswinger, of "Leather Prowler" to the noisy mid-80s Sonic Youth thing with a pop flavor of "Freak Out", from the hip hop electronic and efficient dance ditty "Houseclouds" to the atmospheric Eno-esque "Sailing to Byzantium". This self-titled record goes further with the Gothic no wave deadpan funeral "What Would They Know", the messed up post-punk mellowcake "Cycle Time" or the punkish Syd Barrett-ian "Pure Unevil", which lies somewhere between Crystal Stilts and Chad VanGaalen, or something like a Rollerskate Skinny leftover. Finally, "Clear Island" is a more colorful sister to "Cycle Time" and Sonic Youth-ian guitars reappear on the monotone "Dumb in the Rain" with more deadpan chants.

Despite its mixbag nature, the album however remains a diversified yet miraculously consistent whole. If it delivers a less deeply challenging, confronting and rewarding listen than its predecessor, Liars' quirky version of a pop/rock record remains head-bobbing, foot-tapping hence entertaining most of the time.

7 out of 10

Sisterworld (2010)
A bit like "Drum's Not Dead" was a more focused and deeper exploration of the musical aesthetics proposed with Liars' previous effort "They Were Wrong, So We Drowned", their fifth album "Sisterworld" expands on the diversification of musical genres (industrial, punk, prog, noise, etc.) and instrumentation of their previous self-titled work, while getting even deeper and more focused. "Sisterworld" could almost be considered Liars' "best of", but completely made of new songs, a "best of" that covers the band's past and future production. It is also a return to themed songs as the album targets the city of Los Angeles and the alternate worlds its citizens create in order to survive. The instrumentation on some songs is enriched by bassoon and strings, most notably on the intriguing but unimpressive opener "Scissor" as well as on "Here Comes All the People", with a beautiful almost neoclassical piano line, the latter recalls the band's Berlin era. The almost anthemic "Goodnight Everything" even contains brass besides the aforementioned new instruments.

"Sisterworld" leaves a contradictory feeling, on one hand it relies a little too much on old sonic tricks and musical ideas, for the first time Liars seem to repeat themselves a little bit, on the other hand most of the tracks here evolve in very unpredictable ways. Besides the band hasn't sounded as paranoid and angry since their first two records. Indeed, some of the best tracks here, the pretty distorted ranting hurricane of "Scarecrows on a Killer Slant", the oddly exuberant post-punk "The Overachievers", the claustrophobic "Drip" and the slow burner yet threatening "I Still Can See an Outside World" reassert Liars as the masters of uneasy listening. On the other side, Liars look forward into their own future with the insidious hip pop of "No Barrier Fun" and the incredibly groovy "Proud Evolution", the latter being sonically not far off Eno's work on U2's "Zooropa" in 1993.

"Sisterworld" remains at the same time one of Liars' best albums and one of their least adventurous.

7.5 out of 10

WIXIW (2012)
The electronic undercurrents that permeates exponentially each Liars' outputs since their very first album have been brought to the fore on "WIXIW" (pronounced "wish you"). Nearly gone are guitars and drums, analog synths, electronica and digital drums took over, and in doing so Liars delivered their own take on that however debatable revival of 80s synth-pop. Still, the overall sound is intrinsically Liars', even on the extremely cold wavy single "No. 1 Against the Rush", which surprisingly and strongly recalls 80s Dutch Clan of Xymox, for those who remember them. But the most striking aspect of "WIXIW" lies in its delicacy and even prettiness for the best part, even using acoustic guitar and nature found sounds on "Ill Valley Prodigies" and flutes on "Who Is the Hunter", besides most tracks here are rather slow. The album could therefore be Liars' own ambient album too, if it wasn't for the pretty disturbing and disorienting 6-minute title track, with its circular synth pattern and below the surface tribal tom-tom rhythm until all of a sudden the drums turn frontal and it's all scary voodoo dance for the digital age. The other song which breaks the quite ambient mood is the techno thumping industrial dance-floor gem "Brats". Another highlight is "His And Mine Sensations", an ambient techno thing with a clear sounding guitar line, a song reminiscing Radiohead's "In Rainbow", without the pathos. Liars don't rely much on emotions, despite the album's very human themes of longing and doubt.

Another reintroduction to the band, another artistic direction, gone are the anger, the paranoia, the abrasiveness, the confrontation. Nevertheless, Liars succeed to remain Liars while delivering another great album.

8 out of 10

Mess (2014)
Once again, Liars defy near all expectations with their seventh album to date. The band traded drums, percussion and guitars for computers and sequencers in order to deliver what could almost be considered their own version of electronic dance music. However Liars' move towards more electronic and beat oriented instrumentation was more and more noticeable throughout their discography, and it looks like each of their previous albums contained one or more songs which showed the way the band would evolve further. The very danceable "Brats" played that role on Liars' former and excellent "WIXIW". Indeed, most of the songs on "Mess" sound like an exploration of the musical foundation offered by "Brats", and as brilliant that one is, and how intelligently Liars managed to keep their unique sound while expending impressively on the limited possibilities offered by so-called EDM on their last effort, the first impression here was that of disappointment. There was the reoccurring thought that one doesn't need guys as inventive as them to add one layer more to the already extremely redundant if not mundane art of electronic dance music, that with some strong 80s influences on top (with a wink at one of Electronic Body Music's main frontguys : Belgian Front 242 on the opener "Mask Maker", imho). Bands as efficient yet as forgettable as Metronomy or Floor Factory, to name only two, are already too many. Besides, the title of the album is quite misleading as it could have made many to expect this album to be all over the place, noisy, chaotic, paranoid, even pretty improvised while, on the contrary, this is maybe Liars more focused and homogeneous record since, well, "Drum's Not Dead". Hence Liars are liars, because not only Drum is dead in the meantime, but furthermore there is no mess at all on "Mess". The title actually referred to the band just messing around in the studio without much other rules than having fun.

Still, Liars would not be Liars if there wasn't more than this to chew on and some further listening delivered the nonetheless expected goods. Liars' inventiveness and experimental libido are less about the structure of the song than their texture, and here they did another fantastic achievement. Each track of "Mess" contains its share of carefully crafted electronic sounds and beats, which are built layers upon layers in a similar way for each of them, but the feeling of variety, and surprise, comes from the very wide range of sonic colors, and the album cover is an apt illustration of this; despite its coldish and plastic aspect, the image is ultimately colorful and fun to look at. The music proposed on "Mess" is no different. Besides, several listens barely decreased the feeling of wonder each time a new element appears, even when the band is playing with cliches like on the very cheeky techno intro archetype of "Pro Anti Anti" to get further into crushing industrial beats and abrasive bricks of distorted synths. A far from refined example for an album that contains an incredible amount of refinement all along. "Mess" is no masterpiece, nor is it groundbreaking in any ways, but it is Liars' most entertaining and fun album (since their debut in 2001) - their own fun doing is pretty fun listening indeed - while remaining a real treat for a more attentive listen. And this is some rare feat.

7 out of 10

30,000 Pageviews

2014-06-05T15:27:00.001+02:00

Thank you to all visitors, even the lost ones who were wondering "what the fuck is this shit all about?"
Now some more feedbacks and comments would be fine,
don't be shy.

Click on the pic and you can go like Spookrijder's facebook page.

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St. Vincent <> FOCUS

2014-06-03T22:55:00.000+02:00

St. Vincent aka Annie Clark is pretty hip these days.
As a multi-instrumentalist, she began her career as a member of the psych/prog choral rock band The Polyphonic Spree and was also part of cult singer/songwriter Sufjan Stevens' touring band before spreading out her wings as a solo artist with the one-woman band St. Vincent in 2006. Annie Clark took her mysteriously odd moniker from a Nick Cave song, which references the hospital where Dylan Thomas died.

One of the most original singer/songwriters, and one of the most inventive guitarists, of the last decade, Annie Clark is also blessed with a beautiful, bright, clear and articulate voice, without being flashy or utterly virtuosic. It remains tender and charming in its humility, even when the music reaches its rowdiest peaks. St. Vincent has been compared to many of her pairs, past or present, while her music and vocal performances are less mannered and dramatic than My Brightest Diamond, several light-years more original and idiosyncratic than Florence and The Machine and more talented than the already pretty gifted Bat For Lashes, to name a few of her contemporaries. Besides, there are more brilliant ideas in one of the best St. Vincent's song than in the near entire discography of Kate Bush and Tori Amos together, both names, mostly the former, being far too often namedropped when another female artist appears with an individualistic voice, singular song structures and colorfully textured arrangement. Artists as different as Julia Holter or Courtney Love, and even, hum, Lady Gaga, have been unimaginatively compared to la Bush. But let's not digress further, let's better discover St. Vincent's discography.

Marry Me (2007)
St; Vincent's own recording career started off extremely promising with her excellent debut album "Marry Me". Something of a musical portfolio where the artist synthesized her own personal and imaginatively composed and arranged version of every musical genres, hip hop, rock, soul, pop, glitch, bossanova, cabaret jazz, blues, industrial, Broadway tunes or even noise without sounding like any of those styles. Sometimes several of them are juxtaposed or fused in one single song while still miraculously making sense musically.

7.5 out of 10

Actor (2009)
The sophomore "Actor" could very much be St. Vincent's masterpiece to date, and a little masterpiece, period. It gathers all the qualities of the debut with tighter arrangement and more focused songwriting. St. Vincent is getting more eccentric and experimental, sonically and structurally, while gaining in density and efficiency. Most songs are built like arias worthy of Broadway or Walt Disney musicals at its best. She also goes harder and harder by creating some hybrid of heavy metal and industrial music on such pummeling bullets like "Actor out of Work" or the instrumental bridge on the friendlier "Marrow".

8.5 out of 10

Strange Mercy (2011)
The digital new wave mutant funk of "Strange Mercy", despite all its brilliant sonic wizardry, remains a qualitative impoverishment concerning about everything : composition, arrangement and songwriting. As for the vocal performance, Annie Clark has seldom sounded as convincing, confident and even emotional. It could look apparently paradoxical but "Strange Mercy" is also St. Vincent's most introvert and personal record, somehow Annie Clark's first solo album. However, just like the cover image, the overall production tends to swathe most of the songs into abundant and thickly layered synthetic sounds, sometimes bordering on asphyxiating any sense of feeling or emotion coming out of the instrumentation. Fortunately Annie Clark's voice stays rather untouched. It seems like St. Vincent is slowly drifting towards simplifying her composition while adding more physicality and sound effects, and if "Strange Mercy" can still be very much recommended, the listening pleasure is getting closer to fun than bliss.

7 out of 10

Love This Giant (2012) - a collaboration album with David Byrne
This promising collaboration between two generations of pop mavericks turned out as a disappointment for the biggest part. On a minor note, anyone expecting St. Vincent to get further into her guitars sonic experiments can just get back to her own records. She has decided to focus on carefully crafted horns and ingenious arrangement. A pretty good idea on paper, the problem being that them horns are so omnipresent all over this album that they begin to sound monotonous after a while, surely considering how academic and soulless they were played, this despite the presence of blowers like Alex Foster (of Saturday Night Live house band and some Mingus tributes), The Dap-Kings or Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, to name a few. Besides, it feels like both artists forgot to bring in a real drummer, despite the hollywoodian list of additional musicians. Except for the opener and best track here, "Who", all songs are propelled by drum programmings, which wouldn't be an issue if they were not sounding so mundane and devoid of, well, swing. For the rest, the songs are fine, and Annie Clark's vocals steal the show.

5 out of 10

St. Vincent (2014)

St. Vincent eponymous fifth studio album shows the artist diving even further into overall simplification, and regression, concerning composition, arrangement and song structure, while increasing sound effects to an alarming proportion. The focus is clearly on effects indeed, and appearances, just like St. Vincent's new and horrendous look, some monstrous hybrid of Lady "I'm so avant-garde" Gaga, 70s David Bowie and Klaus Nomi. Annie Clark decided to go totally pop, in her own idiosyncratic way. The guitar is back upfront but most of the time filtered through such an amount of electronic treatments that it merely sounds like another thick, wheezing and buzzing sonic stratum in the middle, above or below all the rest of the generally robotized and compactly layered instrumentation. The production is here at the same time clear and overbearing, crisp and way overcooked, this record feels like layer pastry that was lying in a microwave too long, except again for Annie Clark's voice, the cherry on the blackened cake, which tone is still natural, tender and charming yet more extrovert, almost eccentric at times.

The emphasis on effects and appearances, hence on form, wouldn't be an issue if it wasn't to the detriment of substance : composition, song structures, arrangement and performance. Well, let's begin by saying that the album begins rather fine with the catchy electro-funk of "Rattlesnake" and the very Talking Heads/David Byrne influenced "Birth in Reverse" then the lush yet quite robotic ballad "Prince Johnny", maybe one of St. Vincent's best songs since whatever slower track on the second "Actor". Nothing groundbreaking, but it's enjoyable and tasty, and it's only a beginning. The however stripped back first half of "Huey Newton" creates an atmosphere reminding of the Broadway-like fantasies of St. Vincent's first efforts thanks to a pretty vocal melody and performance with dreamy synth lines until hard rock heavy extremely distorted guitars emerge and it all suddenly falls into some mediocre leftover by The Fiery Furnaces for the second part.

The three and a half first songs of the album are okay but it turns into a hopeless disaster for the entire next two third of it. "Digital Witness" could just have been on "Love This Giant" disappointing session. "I Prefer your Love", a homage to Annie Clark's mother, is a boring ballad with a pathetic one liner of a nonsensical refrain "I prefer your love to Jesus" repeated ad vomitum. "Bring Me Your Loves" is a nerve-wrecking pop dittie where St. Vincent is forcing her narcissistic pop star ambition to the front, begging to become an even bigger pop star. "Psychopath" is even more nerve-shattering with its pretty repetitive and annoying "ah ah ah ah" crap chorus. It could turn any listener into a real psychopath who would wish to crush this record with his or her platform boots. "Every Tear Disappear" is total horseshit, Annie Clark going onto some half-baked PJ Havey mimicry, the rest is garbage. And then there is the lame closer "Severed Crossed Fingers" R&B balladry in disguise that wouldn't even end up on a low budget Walt Disney cartoon copy closing credits.

This is glam-pop/rock for the digital age, and glam-pop/rock of the worst kind. Just like David Bowie on his own early 70s glam era albums, three of four okay songs surrounded by eccentric fillers, the whole wrapped into much charisma enhanced by an overdressed persona. This last St. Vincent's album is another proof that when an artist takes too much care of his or her visual impacts on the audience, the music suffers dramatically. This is all the most disappointing knowing that St. Vincent issued a very sulfurous, high energy, mischievous and mind-blowing two-track 7" vinyl "Krokodil"/"Grot" for the 2012 Record Store Day, which promised way more adventurous music to follow instead of this overcooked polymer pie of an album.

4 out of 10

Sunn O))) & Ulver - Terrestrials (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-05-28T15:00:00.001+02:00

The versatile emperor of doom metal drone Sunn O))) collaborated with the even more diversified Norwegian experimental black metal ambient neoclassical and so on combo Ulver on this three-track album "Terrestrials" that was released early 2014 by Southern Lord. It was initially conceived between 2008 and 2012, and one can wonder why this rather short full length (around 35 minutes) took so long to see the dark of night.

Strings, horns, drums, organs and even Fender Rhodes, on the magnificent, elegiac and surprisingly delightful "Eternal Return", have been added here and there to the now highly recognizable chthonian near impenetrable drones created by Sunn O)))'s guitars and bass of Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson. Nothing new for all the collaborators involved in this project but an interesting collective work and an ultimately gratifying sonic journey anyways.

Terrestrials by SUNN O))) & ULVER

Wovenhand - Refractory Obdurate (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-05-28T12:44:00.003+02:00

David Eugene Edwards is untameable. Since his tormented God-fearing incantations with the now legendary punkish alt-country-folk 16 Horsepower in the mid-90s until this last and seventh full length album by Wovenhand (also spelled as Woven Hand), "Refractory Obdurate", presented here, Edwards seems to get even fiercer with age. Through time, Wovenhand's music became heavier and heavier, a tendency which was very noticeable on their last album, "The Laughing Stalk", in 2012. That album was produced by Alexander Hacke, of Einstürzende Neubauten's fame, now in the re-formed, with Edwards in the line-up, Crime & The City Solution. In the meantime, Wovenhand left Glitterhouse Records to join the more hardcore punk oriented Deathwish, Inc., where Converge and Deafheaven are the most prestigious current artists, a move that confirms Wovenhand's musically more aggressive orientation.

On a side note, the song "Good Shepherd" sounds surprisingly like a denser and beefed up Echo &The Bunnymen's.

"Refractory Obdurate" is without the shadow of a doubt the heaviest record in Wovenhand's already consequent discography, it is full of blood and fury, a particularly intense and spooky listening experience. Dive head first into this powerful record below.

Refractory Obdurate by Wovenhand

Fennesz - Bécs (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-05-27T18:07:00.000+02:00

13 years after Austrian abstract electronic and guitarist Christian Fennesz delivered the lush and colorful little masterpiece "Endless Summer", the musician and composer is back to the Vienna-founded groundbreaking record label Editions Mego for its conceptual follow-up, mysteriously named "Bécs". Fennesz' sixth solo album was released in April 2014 and offers some surprisingly abrasive, moody but moving soundscapes. Fennesz proves with "Bécs" that he's still one of the main masters of the genre. He stands head and shoulders above younger lads like Tim Hecker or Ben Frost thanks to his compositional skills and his attention to details, those with the focus, the vision and the musical eloquence of a poet.

Stream the album below and be enthralled.

IDYLLS - PRAYER FOR TERRENE (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-05-23T16:14:00.000+02:00

This quartet from Brisbane, Australia, came up with their sophomore effort April 2014 almost two years after their already brutal and punishing debut, "Farewell All Joy". This time, IDYLLS offers an extension on their smashing aesthetic with the addition of a screaming saxophone on most of those ten tracks. That band proposes a remarkably relentless and ferocious mix of mathcore, hardcore punk, sludge metal and powerviolence with blast beats, tribal drums, earsplitting guitars, massive bass and soaked-in-wrath vocals. It will be hard to find a more intense album this year, somewhere between The Jesus Lizard under amphetamine and an even rawer Converge. By the way, the latter mentioned band's guitarist, Kurt Ballou, is a.o. responsible for the bright, crisp, detailed although gigantic earth-shattering sound production.

The band focuses mostly on short but very rich and intricate songs, however the ambitious opener "Lied To" licks the seven-minute mark and it doesn't lose in intensity, fascination and, yeah, pleasure throughout.

For those who remember, this album sounds sometimes like John Zorn's Painkiller would be back from hell all covered in sulfur and hatred.

Not for the faint of heart, but highly recommended.

Please stream this harrowing thing below at your own peril. And then download it for frack's sake!

PRAYER FOR TERRENE by IDYLLS

Juana Molina <> FOCUS

2014-05-22T14:24:00.000+02:00

Juana Molina is one of the reason I got back to this blog in the first place. It took her a little less than 5 years to come back with a new album, "Wed 21", and I wasn't willing to let it pass by me in any case. But still, here we are, seven months after its release, so I thought that while Juana is starting her European tour it is time for a focus on this very unique, close to genius, imaginative gentle-lady of a singer-songwriter and composer from Argentina.

First off, Juana Molina is near exclusively singing in her native Rioplatense Spanish, and if she pays attention to her lyrics, it doesn't really matter if one doesn't understand a word of Spanish. She doesn't mind neither as she was herself from a very young age immersed into any kind of music her parents were listening to, mostly in English : classical (Schubert, Ravel), bossanova (Gilberto Gil, Antonio Jobim), jazz (Ella Fitzgerald, Sonny Rollins), rock (The Beatles, Deep Purple, King Crimson), whatever they saw enjoyable, therefore she has a similar approach to near anyone non-English speakers towards songs sung in English, the lyrics are somehow secondary and it doesn't hinder the listening pleasure. As Juana Molina emphasized herself during a recent interview, not understanding or not paying too much attention to lyrics allows the listener to interpret the words the way he or she feels. Oddly enough, Juana's dad was some prominent tango singer, Horacio Molina, and even though he taught her guitar from the age of six, there is no tango influences in Juana Molina's music. On the other side, she spent many summers in a house her family shared with two major artists of Brazilian music, poet and composer Vinicius de Moraes and bossanova star Chico Buarque. These guys, added to what mom and dad were musically enjoying, had a far stronger impact on Juana Molina's art than anything Argentinian, except for native instruments, her dad included.

Juana Molina's biography would deserve a whole book. For example her command of French is pretty good. I had the advantage to witness it for myself, at one of her gigs here in Brussels where she was introducing and/or commenting on her songs or technical failures with much humor and in close to perfect French. Well, her family spent years in exile in Paris following a military coup in Argentina to start with. Should I mention her extremely successful and popular TV comedic acting career in Argentina in the late 80s/early 90s? I just did. From the start, her first call has always been music; a difficult pregnancy made her get back to her initial vocation. But if you're curious, just find out more for yourself. This blog is focused on music and music is what we'll talk about if you don't mind.

So let's dive into Juana Molina's fascinating discography :

Juana Molina - Wed 21 (2013) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:03:00.003+02:00

Five years has passed since the release of "Un Dia" in 2008 and Juana Molina confessed in a recent interview that she barely knows what she actually did in the meantime. What we do know however is that she toured with David Byrne and Feist, she worked with the likes of Vetiver and Vashti Bunyan and she was involved with the Belgian record label Crammed Discs collective project Congotronics vs Rockers. She also toured Europe and Japan within the framework of this project : 20 musicians on the scene including Konono N°1, Kasai Allstars, Deerhoof, Wildbirds & Peacedrums, Skeletons and even Belgian funny band Hoquets for the Brussels gig (of which Juana Molina was the indisputable and charming MC). She also subsequently signed a record deal with Crammed Discs, which took over her last five records onto their catalogue from Domino.
Oh, and she bought an electric guitar : a Gibson SG.

"Wed 21" represents a step further into Juana Molina's aesthetics and her brand new electric guitar brought with it some renewed inspiration. Still, this sixth album isn't a departure from the songstress' previous recordings, it is more an extension of them. A parallel could be drawn with Bob Dylan's passage to electricity in the mid-60s before recording "Highway 61 Revisited", Dylan's songs became sonically more rock while retaining its folk idioms. Although, don't expect our Argentinean Lady to roll on 4/4 time signature and stripped back guitars, bass and drums instrumentation, this is a Juana Molina's album and the introduction of the electric guitar is just one added element to her even more extended sound panorama, a new ingredient however that pushes the artist towards more aggressive and contrasted territories. Therefore "Wed 21" sounds more direct, apparently simpler, more varied, Molina's is back to the shorter song format as well, but the most striking part : all tracks but one, "Las Edades", are uptempo, with some calmer moments here and there.

One of the most surprising song is "La Rata", with its low coldwavy bass introduction quickly livened with a near post-punkish guitar riff and a massive stomping bass drum, it is not far off some of the heaviest songs by a past Crammed Discs' band, Minimal Compact, without sounding anything 80s. Molina's trademark multi-layered vocals and various percussion soon lead us back to more familiar ambiance. Another shock comes with the astonishingly robotik title track, the metallic rattles, techno-like bumping bass drum and buzzing repetitive electronic lines running all through the song make it sound like Juana Molina is backed by a tamer Liars. Sure her trademark polyrhythmic vocals and percussion remain to the fore, but still. "Bicho Auto" and its deep vibrating analog synth line complemented with a mix of metallic and latin percussion lies somewhere between Suicide, which would have gone exotic, and Finnish psych-pop luminaries 22-Pistepirkko. And then, the everything-in-the-kitchen-sink approach of "El Oso De La Guarda", also the longest track getting over the six-minute mark, agglomerates in one single track Molina's stupefying musical imagination, which perches more than once on the verge of insanity. Between its cartoonesque pursuit of an intro and its outro made of multi-layered sine waves and a creaking door, this song contrasts frenetic percussive noise, shimmering guitars and shamanic chants for a mesmerizing experience.

Juana Molina's musical shyness and introversion are something of the past. From album to album, the evolution hasn't looked too striking indeed but try a listen to "Tres Cosas", for instance, then immediately follow it up with "Wed 21", while both records are undoubtedly hers, there is a real metamorphosis going on there, that of a slow moving caterpillar transforming into a whirling butterfly. Even at its poppiest moments, like on both singles, the compelling "Eras", with its clever vocal hooks, funky refrain and easily foot-tapping beat, and the more tribal little creepy "Sin Guia, No", with its knitting guitars and ecstatic chants, or the fast-paced almost ska-lead acoustic guitar jollity "Final Feliz" and the slightly Dan Deacon-esque rolled drums fantasy "Lo Decidi Yo", the album remains a pretty challenging and rewarding listen throughout. Juana Molina has succeeded with "Wed 21" where St. Vincent failed on her latest own, while the former mainly expended on her sonic palette to feed the content of her composition, the latter mixed up form and content to deliver clever sounding music from which most of the soul has been digitally sucked out.

This is the fifth brilliant album in a row from Juana Molina, and her lately wider coverage all over the world, even in the monolingual protectionist US - remember all songs are sung in Spanish, with the exception of the English sung call-and-response refrain in "Eras" - is all the most deserved for an artist who is that persevering, bright, inventive and uniquely imaginative. And yet, with Molina's choice to electrify her music and push the polyrhythmic beats more to the front, her music became somewhat easier to reference with other artists, it all sounds slightly more familiar, more marketable, a little fancier. Almost 14 years after Juana Molina gave a first little masterpiece "Segundo", the world has finally caught up and she is now widely recognized as some musical genius. Better late than never.

8 out of 10

Juana Molina - Un Dia (2008) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:03:00.002+02:00

Juana Molina's underground fame was growing exponentially by the time she released her fifth album, "Un Dia", via Domino Recordings. She saw her song "Salvese Quien Pueda" from "Tres Cosas" remixed by Four Tet in 2005 and she added vocals on The Chemical Brothers's track "Seal" in 2007. Maybe both collaborations somehow gave her the desire to experiment deeper into multi-layered electronics and explore further into her genetic knack for tribal percussion and grooves, in any case "Un Dia" represents Juana Molina's boldest creation to date, at the same time more abstract, more hypnotic, more extrovert and paradoxically more danceable than any of her previous stuff. The singer/songwriter appellation makes no sense anymore, Molina has decided to dive into sounds like some alchemist shaman and the result is one long trip into the realm of the sonically unknown, she keeps pushing musical boundaries.

Alejandro Franov is gone, Juana Molina is near completely on her own with this one; his influence remains audible but his physical absence seems to unleash Juana's huge imagination to the furthest. "Un Dia" is also her most intuitive, spontaneous yet most 'composed' and most adventurous album so far. There is that impression that while recording this work Juana felt as free as a kid left alone in a studio without any boring adult to refrain her to do whatever she likes : she is something like Animal Collective all by herself. Voice, keys, electronics, percussion, guitars are increasingly turning into each other to the point that it doesn't matter anymore who or what does what, each sound could come from any source to form a fantastic organic whole which I honestly haven't heard since Supersilent's masterpieces "5" (2001) and "6" (2003).

The opener and title track starts off most surprisingly with a short near screaming a capella soon followed by an extremely repetitive two-syllable vocal motif and two-note piano until deep low polyrhythmic bass percussion appears and we are embarked on an energetic voodoo dance fanfare, Juana Molina leading the way through traditional head vocals quasi incantation and other rhythmic onomatopoeia. An astoundingly exhilarating experience knowing our Lady's shier and sweeter tendencies. And no guitar on sight. One year later, tUnE-yArDs will make something similar, if more explosive, all over their debut album, and the next one, and the next one.

The acoustic guitar makes a come back on "Vive Solo", leading its way almost lazily, one chord relaxedly strummed, through the song. A more toned down affair closer to Molina's usual mood with delicate percussion rim-clicks or hand-claps or both and a hypnotic sub-bass modulation. Juana's multi-tracked vocals serve once again as a thematic link between the various polyrhythms, a technique repeated through the entire album.

The deceleration is even more sensible on the evanescent and near amorphous "Lo Dejamos", one of the slowest and darkest songs on the album, with extremely low frequency rumbling drones and soft metallic clatters. Extra layers of percussion are added until only minimal electronics and a softly finger-tipped acoustic guitar remain, Juana whispering something that resembles much an actual song. Its end near subliminally vibrates to lead to the next "Los Hongos De Marosa", a much livelier and even danceable affair, which would not pale in comparison to the best techno deconstructionists works, Molina's using a similar technique of adding layer upon layer of looped effects, electronics and beats around her circular guitar pattern to create a rather trance-inducing head-bobbing feet-tapping momentum. The follower "Quién? (Suite)" seems to arch back to the song "Quién?" on "Segundo" but it looks more like a variation on the theme, it is besides totally wordless and completely made up of now favored harmonic and rhythmic onomatopoeia. A rather downtempo groovey thing with some purring synth bass line, which could reflect one other Molina's early inspiration, the purr of the very elevator that brought little Juana to her grandma's apartment, and other various percussion. The song ends up with Juana's slightly nerve-racking extended ululation, something like a high-pitched variation on Tuva's deep throat singing.

Each of those three last tracks last over the seven-minute mark and could be considered like one long suite where Juana Molina's vocals sound remarkably like some warmer and gentler version of Joan La Barbara or Sidsel Endresen experiments with a light touch of Meredith Monk. Compared to these three lengthy pieces, "El Vistado" seems pretty conventional but melodically absolutely beautiful, something like their poppier appendix or summary. "No Llama" disposes mainly of slower melodic embroideries of guitars and bass with more liquid sounding electronics, watery percussion and Molina's live sung mantras, the result being particularly oneiric, psychedelic folk diva Linda Perhacs comes to mind, or even Julia Holter.

It is worth mentioning the presence of guitarist Gareth Dickson on four tracks, he is responsible for an album entirely composed of Nick Drake's songs under the debatable artist name Nicked Drake. Indeed both Juana and Gareth seem to share some similar inspiration from the left-too-early English bard's finger-picking technique on the acoustic guitar.

The closer "Dar (Qué Dificil)" moves the whole album leitmotiv onto ethno-electro-tribal dance music with a fast-paced relentless near techno beat and an acoustic rock guitar riff all wrapped into Juana's singular vocals and colorful bouquet of wood and metallic percussion for a final almost seven minutes shamanic jamboree. I don't know why but it makes me think of J.G. Thirlwell's Steroïd Maximus.

The largest part of "Un Dia" could sometimes looks like Juana Molina was jamming ecstatically with herself while retaining a steady focus on a homogeneous and organized end result. There is something close to the most spontaneous jazz aesthetic all through the different tracks proposed here. This is an underestimated masterpiece from a master of a genre all her own. I could see this album as Juana Molina's own "Rock Bottom".

8.5 out of 10

Juana Molina - Son (2006) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:03:00.001+02:00

We really barely listen to birds, just like the meandering prettiness of Juana Molina's music could leave us rather impassive as listeners while just as for birds, Molina's music deserves closer attention. Furthermore, there is something in her music which recalls bossanova while absolutely not sounding like it, but just like for bossanova, one tends to relegate such music for background purposes. Juana Molina seems to be more and more aware of this somewhat established fact. With her fourth album, simply called "Son", which can equally be translated by 'they are' and 'tune', Juana Molina has produced a recording which seems to summarize the more sonic experimentation of "Segundo" with the more melodic, singer/songwriting emphasis of "Tres Cosas" while extending significantly her sound palette. Besides, if most of the songs get closer to some pop format, almost danceable at times, the arrangement become proportionally more disorienting, strange, unearthly, between a dream and a nightmare, hence more colorful, multi-layered and richer, the result being that the music proposed here wouldn't stand in the background very long. Juana Molina wishes to call the would-be listeners out.

Still, her music stays intrinsically discreet, delicate, subtle, but "Son" shows some of her wilder sides, fiercer, more animalistic, more eccentric as well. The seven-minute "Un Beso Llego" is a striking example of this transformation where Juana is extensively mimicking the whining of cats, her voice being multi-layered towards some still controlled cacophony. Juana Molina has confessed being more and more inspired and influenced by the sounds of nature, something already noticeable in her former works, birds chirping and electronic variations on insects buzz and wheeze can be heard, but it has never been as apparent as on "Son". What's more, keys, synths and electronics as well as Juana's own multi-tracked voice are creating organically never heard before sounds, which seem not to be produced by human manipulation but like emanating from some imagined alien creatures. Where "Tres Cosas" was relatively sober concerning sound effects, they made a huge and efficient return on "Son". However the acoustic guitar prevails as usual all through the majority of the songs, more like a red thread or a line. Few chord changes, they are deployed sparingly, enabling the songs to build horizontally while Juana adds or subtracts sounds to create a theoretically endless music. This is the album strength and weakness, indeed too many songs are starting the same way, with an acoustic guitar and simple yet beautiful chord progressions, then Juana's vocals and/or other sounds are added and so forth. It gives the album a quite monotonous feeling when listened to in its entirety.

Juana Molina's vocals sound increasingly more confident. She still favors a straight quite emotionless singing but she indulges more and more into voice experimentation, going higher and lower, using her breath or expressing new onomatopoeia for rhythmic or harmonic purposes, imitating other existing or non-existing animals, and whatever comes to her fertile imagination. She is also getting more articulate, more relax and it gains some welcoming poise and clarity. This is particularly felt on the two short centerpieces of the album, the oddly medieval sounding which turns into a metallic percussion orgy "Micael" and the ethereal space oddity title track. Franov plays gong on both songs.

"Son" is a difficult album to define, it has the melodic and rhythmic elements of a trippy/tricky pop album while at the same time it pushes the sonic boundaries towards absolutely alien sounding territories. It remains gentle but it contains also freakish, bizarre almost aberrant moments in abundance, its whole being equally distant and close, sympathetic and estranged, colorful and blurry, a dream or a nightmare. Almost a masterpiece is it wasn't for a feeling of similarity between many of those songs, a feeling that strangely evaporates when the album is taken four or five songs at a time.

7.5 out of 10

Juana Molina & Alejandro Franov - AooB (2003) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:03:00.000+02:00

This peculiar album represents more of a side project for Juana Molina and Alejandro Franov, the man whose influence and impact on Juana Molina's near trilogy, which are "Segundo", "Tres Cosas" and "Son", can not be underestimated. (The sentence 'Some of my keyboard sounds were created by Franov' can be found on those mentioned records liner notes.) Alejandro Franov is one of the most important artists of the Argentinian musical underground, a total multi-instrumentalist whose huge curiosity led him to travel all over the world in search for sounds, from any ethnic instrument, let it be a mbira (African thumb-piano) or an Indian sitar or some rare corner of the world percussion device, but also from the very natural environment he would be part of : field recordings are used throughout Franov's already consequent discography, about a dozen albums since the end of the 90s. One of his album can be found on the German experimental label Staubgold, most of the others on the Japanese label Nature Bliss (a very apt name concerning Franov).

As a sound explorer, the very versatile Argentinian is also using electronics in a very idiosyncratic way, disorienting, atonal, dissonant, almost living a life on its own. A track like "Mantra Del Bicho Feo", on Molina's "Segundo", is a perfect example, Franov's soundwaves can be found all over the place, mainly on the bridge of the song. Alejandro Franov sometimes adds some particularly suave and melancholic vocals here and there, somewhere between Caetano Veloso and Robert Wyatt. Last but not least, he is also a pretty skilled pianist, his last album is simply called "Piano Solo" (There are four tracks to stream on the label bandcamp page); he proposes elegant, beautiful and dreamy vignettes inspired by a sacred Argentinian mountain called Piltriquitron.

The cover image of AooB (two intersecting circles) illustrates the mathematical term "intersection" (usually marked with ∩ symbol). Also two circles is used as a sign for stereo sound. A simple but adequate illustration of what is going on here. The album is divided in two mini CD, the first one being A is composed of six tracks closer to Juana Molina's work with an even larger participation of Franov, the second one being B is composed of five tracks where Franov become the main protagonist, Juana being the participant, the declared goal would be to find out where and how both artists intersect.

Side A could sound like more abstract and experimental leftovers from Juana Molina's "Segundo" and "Tres Cosas" with songs led by her now identifiable acoustic guitar lines like "La Mas Grande" and "La Marca". The composition are generally more stripped down, less layered and there are more experimentation with both artists' voices, like on the intriguing "Idioma" and "Rusos", with reversed vocals, and surely the oddly funny "Kortz", Juana seems to imitate some Germanic language with a vocal technique reminding of Norwegian Sidsel Endresen, while the song on its own emulates Yvonne Cornelius' Niobe stuff. Franov delivers some pretty piano lines. There is one song however where to me both artists really and beautifully intersects and that's "Amigo". A pulsating amorphous beat leads the song lazily with both Juana and Alejandro whispering harmonically, high-pitched atonal bowed strings appear, the whole thing sounding slightly Robert Wyatt on its most intimate self.

Side B is closer to Alejandro Franov's work, this would be expected. The too long beyond seven-minute opener "Oberturano y Radar" is a self-indulgent minimal-electronic-meets-neoclassical Pascal Comelade-ian thing. "Rio Primero" displays soft digital motorik akin to German krautrock legends Neu!. Both "Arbol De Pomelos" and "Dame Un sol" are soft folkish nursery rhymes duets with subtle vocals, electronics and guitars. The bizarre closer "Pasando El Mar" sonically illustrates both musicians dreamy states decorated with actual snores, grunts and murmurs.

A quite pleasant, inventive and at times humorous album that doesn't depart too much from both artists' outputs, although some songs don't seem to be really worked out to the full, they are more like interesting drafts than finished musical pieces. "AooB" is worth of a listen (the album is hard to find but you can stream it below at your convenience) if only as an introduction to Alejandro Franov more full-grown, challenging, experimental-world-ambient-music albums. The curious reader can try out this link on Deezer to discover a little further this interesting musician.

6.5 out of 10

Juana Molina - Tres Cosas (2002) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:02:00.003+02:00

Juana Molina's third album "Tres Cosas" focuses more on melodies and singer/songwriting than on abstract electronic soundscapes and polyrhythmic percussion. Molina's vocals are more upfront, she sounds more confident even though it remains closer to whispers than full-throat singing for the best part. The instrumentation is generally more sober, almost anemic at times, and the prominence is given to the acoustic guitar, which Molina plays with much skills and delicacy. Therefore "Tres Cosas" could be more aptly filed into folk music than its predecessor if it wasn't for the idiosyncratic take favored by the artist. Electronic oddities are still present throughout the album, but they are most of the time relegated to the background with some emergence here and there, most notably on songs like the unearthly "Yo Se Que" with its lightly mindnumbing electronic hum of an intro soon accompanied by a tiptoed percussive pulse and Juana's apathetic vocals. Despite its low key atmosphere, this song keeps fascinating all along. The surreal quasi instrumental "Filter Taps" is another electronically disturbed oddity on the album while the wordless "Uh!" with its whiplash sounding percussion and bumpy bass line represents one of the few rhythmic momentum here.

The melodic emphasis is however confirmed on numerous songs like the title track, despite the atonal synth, the dainty nursery rhymes "Salvese Quien Pueda" and "Solo Su Voz" (with Petra haden on violin), the discreetly waltzing opener "No Es tan Cierto", the lighthearted almost joyous fairy tale sounding "El Cristal" and especially the very beautiful, tender and melancholic folkish lullaby "El Progreso", with ambient electric guitars, cello and subtle electronics. The latter could be a cousin to "Busca Bien Y No Molestes" on Molina's debut "Rara".

On the other hand, Juana's voice is leading on the delicate psalmodic song "Isabel" and the heartfelt lament "Curame", one of the very rare emotional instants on the artist entire catalogue, she even dares some very discreet tremolos. Two very beautiful songs that could make one think of earlier luminaries like Vashti Bunyan or even Nick Drake. And there is the welcoming surprise as a closer, "Insensible", a near neoclassical piano-driven song en français dans le texte, which lyrically feels like the woman answer to Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Insensatez".

The compositions on "Tres Cosas", mostly the melodies, are more accomplished than on "Segundo", it brings Juana Molina closer to more traditional singer/songwriting, her voice more than once giving the impression of a bossanova singer who has decided to record a folk-slightly-tronica album. The album is still very singular and unique yet less groundbreaking and innovative than "Segundo". Another pearl though to add on Molina's already intriguing germinating catalogue.

Sound designer Alejandro Franov is still close at hand all over "Tres Cosas", but his contribution is more reserved. He provides, among others, the tasteful piano accompaniment on "El Cristal". Maybe Juana Molina and him decided to save his more experimental side on their next collaborative album "AooB".

7 out of 10

Juana Molina - Segundo (2000) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:02:00.002+02:00

Juana Molina relocated for a short while in Los Angeles and found her calling by the turn of the century with her second album, the aptly called "Segundo", issued by Bla Bla Discos in 2000 in Argentina, then Domino in the rest of the world, from the US to Europe, between 2002 and 2004. Gone are the electric guitars, bass and drums, Juana Molina delivered a very personal take on so-called folktronica for voice, acoustic guitar, electronics and percussion (mostly native instruments like the bombo legüero a.o.). The meeting with multi-instrumentalist and ethnic-ambient-electronic composer Alejandro Franov seems to be crucial to Juana's new aesthetics. Most of the somewhat alien and native percussion sounds found on the album have been created and/or sampled by Franov, this for the decor, the composition are almost completely Juana's creation, with some guests here and there.

The electronic effects pervade most of the songs on "Segundo" to become the main protagonists of those songs, Juana's vocals becoming one of the instruments. All sounds and melodies are circulating, even circumvoluting, around each other to create a compelling trance inducing ethereal ambiance not so remote from Indian ragas or some moody African polyphonic/polyrhythmic jamborees without sounding like any of them. It is particularly noticeable on songs like the opener "Martin Fierro" and the intensely tribal, virtually an instrumental - Juana is limiting herself to 'lalas' and 'nanas' - "Mantra Del Bicho Feo". The opener is a swampy, percussive, disorienting thing where Juana's phrasing could remind Jon Hassell's trumpet voicing. This track can almost be considered a duet with Alejandro Franov, who is also providing the syncopated afro-beat and other strange sounds; it wouldn't be out of place on Molina's and Franov's collaborative album "AooB" (see below). The raga-ish "El Desconfiado" evokes flower-power chants of the 60s, with guest David Miner (best known for having been a member of Grace Slick's The Great Society), while the odd atonal instrumental "Medlong" slightly sounds like a naive Brain Eno's Berlin era electronic experiment.

The longest tracks are the most rewarding and interesting pieces on the entire album. The already mentioned 8-minute "Mantra Del Bico Feo", which is indeed a mantra, as well as the spacey downtempo seven-minute "El Perro", where Juana seems to complain about dogs that are barking for no reason, all with a barking dog sample to make sure the listener understand her concern. Finally, the heady 8-minute "Sonamos", a rather fast pace electro-blues hypnotic jam. Some of the shortest songs shows Juana Molina is very much rooted in soft folk music like on "El Pastor Mentiroso" and "Quiero", still with very discreet electronics. "Vaca Que Cambia De Querencia" is a beautiful lullaby played on piano, Lisa Germano's shadow is hidden in the corner.

Juana Molina's vocals are even more subdued than on her debut, she is most of the time whispering her melodies and harmonies. Compared to her, Lisa Germano or Suzanne Vega sound like Aretha Franklin and Tina Turner respectively. It gives the album a somewhat similar feeling throughout, which could make it sound monotonous or even boring on its whole, the record duration licks the 70-minute mark. This is maybe the only little drawback for this nonetheless extremely personal if not unique piece of work, which set Juana Molina apart from any other musical artists. A little masterpiece.

8 out of 10

Juana Molina - Rara (1996) REVIEW

2014-05-22T14:02:00.000+02:00

Our Lady from Rio Plata started her musical career in 1996 with a modest collection of songs on "Rara", which was released in 1996 by MCA Argentina. This album could surprise anyone even slightly familiar with Juana Molina's later work as it contains mostly guitar-oriented 'rock' songs akin to some more muscular, tighter and funkier The Sundays without reverbs and rather more complex structures. A quite solid if not particularly original album full of fine melodies, clever hooks and some efficient riffs produced by one of the biggest names in Latin rock and pop music, Gustavo Santaolalla, the guy responsible for the film soundtracks of "Brokeback Mountain" and "Babel", among others. Juana Molina has already found her voice, hum, vocally, straight-forward, throaty, a bit detached and velvety, somewhere between Astrid Gilberto and Suzanne Vega. One song could show where Juana Molina is slowly heading, and that's "Busca Bien Y No Molestes", a beautiful, soft, melancholic thing with subtle percussion and tasteful violin and cello, the arrangement are pretty worked out and somewhat shows her further ambition. However, no one was prepared to what came next.

6 out of 10

Miasm - The Dark Roads (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-05-05T19:52:00.000+02:00

Utah-based musician and sound sculpture wizard Jeremiah Savage has created throughout the years a whole bunch of virtual sound libraries, which contain hundreds of materials shaped into new and playable instruments, the last one being KINETIC METAL.

Jeremiah is also a songwriter, a multi-instrumentalist and a poet. Miasm is his latest musical project, "The Dark Roads" being its debut full-length, where our sound artist indulges in his more personal musical tastes all along the nine rather long tracks which compose the album. The songs proposed in this collection defy categorization and definition. They can hardly be called 'songs' in its traditional meaning, they are more like exploration of emotions and thoughts, myths and melancholy, "through progressing music structures that evolve with ideas. Structures that are familiar, like a broken memory or a remembered dream." (Quoted from the album's liner notes) "The Dark Roads" is indeed a world inside, an eerie, atmospheric and, as the title suggests, a dark album whose sound palette is rather close to a very peculiar mix of gothic, post-metal, cold wave, shoegaze and even some industrial elements, maybe thanks to the above mentioned KINETIC METAL library. Despite Jeremiah Savage's sound sculpture works, all songs here give much place to soft and hazy vocals, they are sometimes almost whispered, as well as melodic, here dreamy, there more hard-rocking, guitars, accompanied by a low meandering bass and glacier-speed drumming. The whole thing made me sporadically think of some sleepy The Cure or apathetic The Church. A pretty interesting, immersive, emotional and indeed spooky musical experience which you can discover, listen and download on Miasm's bandcamp or down here.

The Dark Roads by Miasm

Boyfrndz - Breeder (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-04-21T16:30:00.000+02:00

Austin, Texas, is not only Psych Fest (impressive line-up once again this year), it's also the birthplace of many essential psychedelic and post-hardcore bands from legendary 13th Floor Elevators to The Black Angels and White Denim through the crucial Scratch Acid and The Jesus Lizard without forgetting post-rockers Explosions in the Sky and many more. Boyfrndz could be added to this extensive list thanks to their sophomore album "Breeder", via Brutal Panda Records, which dropped this month almost two years after their debut "All Day Pass". If their first album offered some pretty dense and powerful tracks, somewhere between post-hardcore and math rock, the whole sounded quite monotonous, the uniform sound palette and the shy subdued vocals being its main drawbacks.

Boyfrndz's second effort represents a hell of a giant step, not only does the band improve on those mentioned downsides with a more colorful production and stronger vocals, they are further expanding their hypnotic and intricate sound with memorable hooks and some surprisingly emotional deliveries. Math rock doesn't have to be drowned by numbers. It would however be unfair to box Boyfrndz in one musical genre for sure, they are actually rather difficult to label, or let's imagine a more concise and near devoid of guitar solos Mars Volta or a less insanely neurotic Blood Brothers... or maybe let's not imagine anything at all and just listen to "Breeder".

Boyfrndz could very much become the next big thing, this album is epic and anthemic at times, open-eared Muse's fans could enjoy them, if they are not afraid to see their skirts lift up for awhile. Saying this, I'm a little afraid they could become emphatic-for-the-sake-of-being-emphatic, there are some hints here and there on "Breeder", like their fellow city folks ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead or, yes, Muse, or even, no, Yes (the shadow of Jon Anderson has been spotted in some corners), so let's discover them right now : spooking stream this thing below.

Breeder by Boyfrndz

Elysian Fields - For House Cats And Sea Fans (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-04-21T12:40:00.000+02:00

The enigmatic Elysian Fields hit it hard in 1996 with their moody late-night atmospheric album "Bleed Your Ceddar", which was signed on the now defunct Universal Music Group's parent Radioactive Records. Since then, Jennifer Charles and Oren Bloedow, the couple behind the band, fell into some kind of general oblivion while recording more albums mostly released by European labels. The band's mysterious discretion is all the more puzzling considering the general high quality of their now seven full length LPs and excellent live shows (Their March 31st Brussels concert at Le Botanique was sold out).

The oddly titled "For House Cats and Sea Fans" has been issued by French label Vicious Circle last February and it contains first an impressive list of guests. Besides mainstays like jazz pianist Ed Pastorini and drummer Mike Johnson (Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright, Beth Orton), one can find cats like jazz bassist James Genus (Dave Douglas, Michael Brecker, Chick Corea, a.o.), jazz drummer Ben Perowsky (from Dizzy Gillespie to Chris Speed), famous jazz keyboards player John Medeski, experimental artist J.G. Thirlwell of Foetus fame or even cult musician James Chance playing saxophone on "She Gets Down". Elysian Fields' Oren Bloedow is himself a pretty busy guitarist with several solo albums and multiple collaborations while Jennifer Charles appeared on "Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By" Lovage, some John Zorn's records and even guest appearances on two French singer/songwriter Jean-Louis Murat's albums. The cover painting of "For House Cats and Sea Fans" has been created by John Lurie, mostly known as composer and jazz maverick sax player for The Lounge Lizards. Namedropping is hard to avoid with such well surrounded chaps.

Now the music proposed by Elysian Fields remains rather unchanged throughout the years. On this last album they are indeed still delivering dark smoke-filled sometimes eerie but always stylish slightly jazzy dream rock, the focal point being the sensual almost lascivious voice of Jennifer Charles for sure but also the often original musical arrangements which offer much variation in textures and colors from song to song while keeping the whole album homogeneous. This seventh opus could pretty much be one of their best albums with "Queen of the Meadow" in 2000 and "Bum Raps and Love Taps" in 2005. But enough blahblah, please stream "For House Cats and Sea Fans" below.

For House Cats And Sea Fans by Elysian Fields

Eric Holm - Andøya (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-04-17T22:38:00.001+02:00

The debut full length LP for London-based American Eric Holm released by Bristol's Subtext this month is a mind shattering exploration of sounds created by fixing contact microphones to telegraph poles that connect the islands of Andøya, a northernmost island in the Vesterålen archipelago, situated about 300 kilometers inside the Arctic Circle. Eric Holm then mixed, edited and tailored his sound materials into a six-piece soundscape of desolation, solitude, coldness and total remoteness. The result is at times bordering on industrial music with unfathomable syncopated tribal beats as well as the darkest of ambient music with guts-shuddering low end frequencies. The magnificent album cover is a perfect illustration of this challenging and breathtaking album which reveals more and more details at each listen. A strangely natural yet unnatural experience.
Spook it for yourself below (The track "Åse" appears twice, sorry for this).

Source : FACT magazine

White Suns - Totem (2014) ALBUM STREAMING

2014-04-16T21:15:00.000+02:00

New York trio White Suns' third album "Totem" was out March 14th on The Flenser, and the least I could say about it can be summarized in one word : relentless. Two guitars, drums and electronics for a successful yet earaching but ultimately galvanizing fusion of post-hardcore and noise. Still this music can't really be labelled noise rock, the structure of each tracks composing this cataclysmic album is closer to the wildest free improv, only it is indeed structured. However the guitars sonic palette remains close to no wave bands like early Sonic Youth, Pussy galore or later noise combos like Harry Pussy or Trumans Water, the vocals ferocity reminds me of Big Black or Scratch Acid, while the disjointed shattering metallic rattlings joined to various electronic tremors and hellish percussive stomps gather impressions left by bands like Wolf Eyes or Prurient. Despite those references, which are ultimately mine, not theirs, in a manner to situate this album, White Suns produced a more than interesting yet quite terrifying sonic journey. Not for the faint of heart though.
Stream this spooking thing below and tell me what you think of it.

Totem by White Suns