Album Swapping Society

[albumswapping]

Între Două Lumi by Syn Ze Sase Tri [via mediate]

When you think of countries associated with black metal, instantly Norway, Sweden, perhaps Switzerland, and in more recent times, America and France, pop into your mind, but never Romania. It seems like such an odd place for a black metal band to hail from.

This album fits firmly in the modern symphonic black metal movement, with its melodic guitar passages, extensive use of (probably emulated) strings, piano, and chorus, lively drumming with a lot of double bass and blast beats, and shouted vocals. Sadly, to be a debut from 2011, I think it sounds very derivative and generic, although there are some good tracks, such as Ziua din Urmă and the instrumental Măreţia Întrupării. 

There really isn't much else to say. The album is decent, but unmemorable and generic. I have to admit though, the album cover is incredible.

» nil

[albumswapping]

The Aristocrats by The Aristocrats [via RandomDigits]

I needed something hot to blast during a summer day, and this might just be it. It's some... I suppose you could call it experimental metal? Combines a variety of metal and jazz tropes (gotta love dem walking basslines) and some wah-wah pedals, then randomly switches between going full-blast and somewhere lower. It's experimental because a lot of the transitions are incredibly abrupt and, due to the fact that it's a trio, the sound is somewhat sparse. Still, you get some pretty sweet riffs like, all the time, non-stop. Also wah-wah pedals. I am a huge sucker for wah-wah pedals. The almost complete lack of song structure kind of gets on my nerves after a while, though.

» xwd

[albumswapping]

Kivenkantaja by Moonsorrow [via Ktulu]

I've had great difficulty finding something to write about this, yet I absolutely love this album. I must have listened to it at least 10 times since it was rec'd, and it never gets old. I love it every time. It just sounds so epic, so big, and it sets up the atmosphere amazingly well.

I do not speak Finnish, so I cannot comment on the story being told in the lyrics, however, the music and atmosphere created within paints a picture of a battle of some sorts taking place. You've got everything here: slower, more atmospheric section, fast, intense sections, more folky sections with different instruments, acoustic sections, slower, more intense sections, everything. Every song is full of emotion, and you can feel what the story is about.

The music is simply fantastic. There are no other words to describe it. Production is very good on the album (you can understand most of the words being spoken, though if you don't know Finnish, they may not mean much. Still, if you have a copy of the lyrics, you can definitely follow along. There's just not enough praise that I can give this. It is just amazing folk metal, by far one of the best albums I've listened to in a long time.

The only thing I can say is don't listen to the YouTube album upload, I feel the reduced sound quality does not do it justice. Go buy the thing, if you even slightly like folk metal. Hell, get this if you like atmospheric black metal like Windir, Negura Bunget, Bathory (especially the later albums like Nordland I and II), I think you get the idea. I love this album, and I wish I had discovered Moonsorrow's music much, much earlier.

» mediate

[albumswapping]

Automat by Automat [via nil]

By a strange coincidence I'm already familiar with part of this album from Radio Soulwax's D&SCO mix where The Genus is used as a transition track between Sunday Morning Fever and Welcome Aboard (at around 11:20). Due to the mixing you can pretty much only hear the higher synth parts, so it's nice to hear the rest of it now.

Anyway this is a neat combination of space disco and progressive electronic. (No, not that progressive. The early synth and new wave stuff.) This means that you literally combine a space disco beat and bassline and everything else is progressive electronic noodly stuff. It works pretty well! All aspects are fairly well done. It's not super-catchy but it sounds good, and combined with the beat to keep things moving this is great general cruising music. The first three tracks (which are the A side) even flow together smoothly, and I'm probably always going to be a sucker for that. Also of note is the passages where the beat drops out completely, and that's still decently well done.

In general I would advise against dropping this into any mix not designed in some way to be chill-out or so, since it's not the fastest and the beats aren't super-crunchy, due to the fact that every sound was made by an experimental monophonic synthesizer. Which, if you think about it, is kind of impressive, but it still doesn't have a forceful drive, since that's not exactly what it's trying for.

Robots are awesome.

» xwd

[albumswapping]

Songbird Suite by Susie Ibarra [via RandomDigits]

Listening to Songbird Suite, my first thought was that it was both avant-garde and accessible at the same time. Structure is thrown out of the window in a group of pieces that oscillate between free jazz and free improvisation, but this album is marked by a sense of fun and lightheartedness. Part of the reason for this is its melodicism, its adherence to mostly major keys (and adherence to keys in general). On the other hand, this melodicism is achieved through controlled insanity. The performers on this album should be commended for either having a gift for pounding randomly, but pleasantly, on their instrument, or for being able to memorize incredibly complex, precisely composed pieces. Free jazz/free improvisation, by all reasoning, should not sound this nice; rather than being chaotic for the sake of being chaotic, Songbird Suite provides a thoroughly pleasing sense of the chaotic, like falling into a pit of harmonic, perfectly tuned bells.

The question here, then, is whether or not I prefer this version of free jazz/free improvisation, or its classical noisy, jarring, challenging texture. I am pleased that this album has changed my perception of the genre; however, Ibarra's approach is too restrained to make a highly memorable impression. Here, the aesthetic is influenced by micro elements as much as macro. For instance, in the opening track Azul, a violin is beautifully abused while the piano provides bizarre variations on a simple theme; but, I can't help but think how much synergy could have been achieved had the drummer, playing the same line throughout the whole song, captured more spotlight with a few unique, drum-bashing fills. Similarly, the album's driving force seems to be the maintenance of a nature-inspired atmosphere, so much so that it trades out the element of jarring surprise that often characterizes the genre. Ultimately, the album focuses on melodicism more than I think it should have; a more insane album, yet one that remained somewhat melodic, would have been an instant classic in my mind. However, it is still very listenable and unique, warranting a recommendation.

» TommyWiseau

[albumswapping]

Sielu, Linna by Raate [via Rose]

Sielu, Linna is a relatively short album, consisting of two ten minute tracks, and one twenty minute, five part suite.

As the first track opens, one immediately gets a sense of the first few albums by Burzum in the instrumental work. This is made even more apparent when the vocals come in, as this band's vocalist sounds eerily similar to Vikernes. The second track offers slightly more variety. I mean... there are blast beats.

The clear hilight on this album is, of course, the five part suite. There is a nice blend of evocative melodic black metal passages with rich texture and folk passages which almost create a sort of ambient soundscape. 

Overall, the album retains this sense of early Norwegian black metal throughout its runtime, but the sound comes across as more sophisticated, more focused, and generally better executed. Recommended for those into the genre.

» nil

[albumswapping]

Black Mahogani by Moodymann [via xwd]

One of the reasons I never say I listen to everything, is that the number of electronic dance music (and related) genres I can identify by sound is very small. Trip-hop, breakcore… that's pretty much it! So when xwd asked me if I liked house music, I only knew that I had no idea what it was! He then asked if I'd be interested in listening to a house album that also had jazz elements. I listen to jazz. I can even identify three or four subgenres. And I like to discover new genres of music.

Having listened to this album several times, I can say with certainty that I like it. The music is varied but quite coherent and it's physically impossible for me not to move to the beat when it gets more pronounced. At this point I can't really pick out favourite tracks; I've just been enjoying the ride.

Do I know what house music sounds like now? My point of reference coming to Black Mahogani was jazz. I can tell that parts of the music are totally not jazz, but I don't know how much would be left if you took away the jazz elements.

I need to listen to more house music.

» RandomDigits

[albumswapping]

Cypher by Spektr [via nil]

Spektr are a French black metal act, and possess the requisite amount of weirdness and surreality to fit comfortably within the national scene. French black metal in general is known for some of the strangest and most impenetrable ever produced, full of projects that approach the genre from a perspective steeped in atonality and a very abstract sense of malevolence. Cypher is an extremely competent example of the form, sporting a very spiky guitar tone and frequent vocals samples (mostly in English, interestingly). It putters along in this way quite well for its 45 minute runtime, atmospheric dark ambient segments and other compositional quirks keeping it from becoming too flat and boring. Nothing spectacular, but an enjoyable listen.

» gloomp

[albumswapping]

UFO by Guru Guru [via TommyWiseau]

This was quite a bit different from what I was expecting. TW said this would be psychedelic rock, yep that definitely fits the bill here. So does "experimental" and "ambient." I ... kinda really like this ... not really sure why or what I exactly enjoy though. The music is mostly (99.99%) instrumental here, there's very little vocal work here. There's definitely a jazz-inspired flavour in every song. Every song has a damn good groove to it. These are not conventional songs though; there's no verse-chorus-verse structure, instead it feels more like a jam session of songs that worked well (if you're used to this type of music, this shouldn't be a surprise). The guitarist kinda goes off and does his own thing most of the time, soloing away while the drummer (and frontman) and the bassist keep that groove going. It works extremely well. Lots of weird and experimental sounds from that guitar as well. It's like every song on this album was recorded while under the influence of certain popular mind expanding substances from the 70s ... (my favorite song is called Der LSD-Marsch: starts off soft, builds up slowly, has a steady groove, and has a really awesome drum solo). Either way, this is definitely psychedelic rock, definitely trippy as all hell, definitely good, and strongly recommended. If you at all like early 70s rock, you will definitely like this. Easily 8.5/10.

» mediate

[albumswapping]

Russkaja by Energia [via mediate]

I'm going to be real honest here, if you get something in a major key with a straight beat, moderately interesting bassline, and some kind of off-beat syncopation, and set it to a moderately fast tempo, I'll probably like it. I think. I don't want to test this theory of mine too hard, but given that this more or less describes this album and I think it's pretty cool, I suppose that's a good starting point.

Anyway, this is some kind of Russian ska thing? That's my best guess. mediate said it's like, folk rock? I'm almost positive this is ska. I don't speak Russian but there are occasionally things shouted in English that make about as much sense as most other things with random English phrases shouted. It's got an awful lot of energy behind it, which makes sense because the title of the album has an exclamation point behind it. Also powerchords and stuff. It's fun! You could probably throw this on while driving too fast or doing something destructive for cognitive dissonance. I love playing things with horns and stuff while blowing things up. One time I played the tank battle in Battlefield 3 while blasting fun.'s Aim and Ignite and it was pretty funny.

I really do appreciate the raw aggression offset by the inherent cheesiness of a full horn section. There's so much power here you can't let any of the songs go over three and a half minutes or someone in the band will pass out. I can't speak too much for the rhythmic complexity here, but these guys seem pretty good. Especially that drummer on the fast songs. I could barely keep up in my head on Autodrom but that dude was holding the beat nice and steady. I should note there are some slower songs too, but they've still got a lot of energy behind 'em.

If I'm in the middle of forgetting to brake for corners and this album comes on, I'm definitely not skipping it.

» xwd

[albumswapping]

Radio Tank Mix by A. G. Cook [via glmox]

Theoretically, writing this review should be difficult to do because of my complete inexperience with contemporary dance music. My jam is Hi-NRG and "alternative" disco like what Bowie was doing on Station to Station; any popular dance music from the past five years just reminds me of the times in college where I've been out of my comfort zone - orientation week, being forced to go clubbing, partying, et cetera. However, the majority of the time I hear contemporary dance music nowadays, it is used in a context where it serves a unique artistic purpose, either subverted or subverting the status quo. Perhaps I bring up this point because I watched The Bling Ring yesterday, which utilizes a barrage of modern-screaming genres in a pop-art context, daring the audience to leave their standards behind. Spring Breakers did a similar type of thing with brostep and trap rap, perhaps trumping The Bling Ring by crafting a euphoric, loving appreciation of those genres through party scenes that made partying seem fun.

There are two reasons I bring up those filmic examples: firstly, I have no context to talk about Radio Tank Mix, being completely vacant any knowledge of EDM after Hi-NRG. Thusly, I can only really talk about this mix through a medium I'm experienced with, such as film - the second reason I talk about film is that, transposing those two movies' treatments of music, I can get at what I think Radio Tank Mix is doing. Snippets of dialogue throughout (one from Freaks and Geeks, I'm certain) conjure up the theme of adolescent sexuality ... I use the word conjure, because this mix doesn't at all represent what it is like to want a sexual partner as a teenager. This is a great bad teen movie version of sex, where sexual awakening is a Carly Rae Jepsen song. This through-line isn't condescending, though; it is pure camp, nostalgic of the silliness of that universal-ish experience. Granted, I'm sure this isn't the first mix to have that sort of approach, but it was a way to hook me to the music.

Aesthetically, I'm told that this is "UK Bass", but I have no idea what that is. I did notice a lot of British accents, though. There are some strange moments, but again I have no point of reference when it comes to contemporary dance music so I'm not sure of the degree of this strangeness. My favourite moments are the bubblegum section at the beginning, the super-early-nineties parts around halfway and 3/4 of the way through, and the part near the beginning that mixes a glee-club Pictures at an Exhibition with music that I swear was on my Magic School Bus Explores the Ocean game. Overall, this is a very listenable mix, but not one that can transcend my genre preferences.

» TommyWiseau

P.S. you can get your hands on this mix right here.

[albumswapping]

Beautiful Lifestyle by George & Jonathan [via xwd] ... I'm ... at a loss for words here ... for the past 2 weeks or so, I've been listening to this album, still have no idea what to write about it. Let's try this, all of the songs are good, really really damn good. They mixed in varying styles of music in each song, so you have very dubstep songs, funky as hell songs, but a common trait is all round pretty happy, kinda poppy songs. I like what they've done here a lot, just can't really describe it. You've got songs that are totally different coming back to back to each other, like The Next Best Thing, Dubstep Daycare, and Burning Up Inside; then again another trio of confusing placement with Hissy Snake Popout, Unicorns Forever, and Planet Funk, where all of the songs are completely different styles ... yet it works so well. I highly recommend you check it out ASAP, because it's damn cool what they've done. Just a warning, their site uses lots of flashy colours with their music player, so if you are prone to epileptic seizures due to flashing lights, may want to click play and change tab, because the songs are really damn good. Site can be found here. Great album, loved the songs.

>> mediate

[albumswapping]

Low by David Bowie [via TommyWiseau]

The music was pretty, sometimes, but I'm not a big fan of his singing. I don't have much to say because it didn't leave an impression on me. I don't even have any favorite songs.

>> Aidiera

[albumswapping]

Dystonia Duos by Joe Panzner & Greg Stuart [via gloomp]

And once again gloomp attempts to "expand" my "musical horizons" with ""noise" "music"" (imagine I had to get someone to make finger quotes around my finger quotes there). Except this time I think he succeeded, because I don't want to run until the hurting stops. I mean, I'm not going to play this again, but maybe I can use it to freak out old people.

Anyway, this is apparently some of the best that "electro-acoustic improvisation" has to offer. I honestly don't know why it has that name, it makes me think of a Kplecraft jam session. Hey, we've got a hacked NES, some drums, and a sax, let's jam! I don't know what this solo is going to turn out to be! Then again that's electro-acoustic jazz, so, something totally different.

I will say though, it's not the worst thing I could think of. It's unnerving, sure, really loud in a lot of part, but it doesn't come randomly out of nowhere, it slides in and out. There's some definite progression to it, though I honestly don't know where it's going. Maybe it's going nowhere, just like all of our lives! Deep. But at the very least it wasn't an hour of static.

I have no idea what was used to make this album, but based on some of the sounds and pitches I heard, I will have to guess a dial-up modem of some kind was involved. There's a lot of cheap microphone noises, with humming and hiss, but they go in and out so I have to assume that was a stylistic choice of some kind.

This is more of a single-album experience, and it's not like noise music has anthems anyway, so the tracks are pretty much all roughly the same. Organ b/w Timpani Solo gets points for reminding me of how much Homestar Runner likes the term "b/w" (backed/with), i.e. "Pork b/w Beans." Casa de Pedras had some nice bass to it. Also at the very end, when it faded out, my ears started ringing and it could've been part of the music and I wouldn't know.

If you're into this sort of thing, I'm sure it's already mysteriously made its way into your music collection like whatever that thing in Evil Dead 2 was that had the camera in first-person view as it zoomed around the woods. Maybe you'll enjoy this more than cutting off your hand with a chainsaw.

I'm going to go listen to Brazilian funk now. You know, smooth everything out.

>> xwd

[albumswapping]

Diamond Mine by King Creosote & Jon Hopkins [via mintnut] This is a pleasant to listen in terms of individual tracks - a soft-tenor male voice on top of a mellow classic guitar/piano/etc. melody - but it gets annoying after two tracks. Tracks sound very similar to each other, like those of the other 3579265 indie rock bands that follow the exact same formula to create pleasant songs, which is why I was glad that the album ran just below of 35 minutes.

>> Tunco

[albumswapping]

Symbolic by Death [via mediate]

mediate rec'd this to me because of the presence of Cannibal Corpse in my last dot FM, but while Death and Cannibal Corpse are so heavily associated as two of the most classic death metal bands, in my eyes they operate on two completely different planes. Cannibal Corpse had and always will have a sense of humour, not only in their eww lyrics but about themselves and death metal in general; a fine example is that bass fill in Addicted to Vaginal Skin, which is so out of nowhere and stupidly fast to the point of hilarity (and awesomeness). Contrast this sensibility with "Symbolic", which has some of the fastest double bass I've ever heard (kudos to the drummer's calves) and decides to show it off under riffs that don't particularly pop, be it poor songwriting or unexciting production. Granted, 1,000 Eyes ends with a string of double bass that might implode your headphones, but when the lyrics of the song are considered (hint: the song is called 1,000 Eyes, you really needn't guess hard what the lyrics are) you know that Death is taking it much too seriously. Symbolic and Zero Tolerance piqued my curiosity with their ferocity, but the latter 40 minutes aren't very interesting. (Except in small bits. For instance: I recognize those Mastodon guitar harmonics in Crystal Mountain! What thieves!)

>> TommyWiseau

[albumswapping]

Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook by Ella Fitzgerald [via ortsz] I'll keep this short. This album is relaxing, music is great. I listened to both sides of the album, fully worth it. Just go grab it, do yourself a favor. Good smooth jazz never fails. 10/10. Loved it, will listen again. Thanks oughts!

>> mediate