#analogx

[datacentercafe]

Rambusがデータセンター・インターコネクトIP企業のAnalogXを買収へ

Rambusは、低消費電力でマルチスタンダードな接続が可能なSerDes…

View On WordPress

[aleasesrestaurant]

Album reviews 5/27/15

Rockapella To N.Y.: Oh. My. Golly. If you're excited right now, you're a 90's kid. (I'm actually an 80's kid, shhh.) I started this off with the Carmen Sandiego soundtrack, which, being a soundtrack, actually features other artists. Still, if you haven't heard the full version of the theme song, do yourself a favor and look it up. This album, meanwhile, is from 1992 and one of their Japanese releases, because apparently they were big in Japan. This is a really great way to get acquainted with them. In the studio, they're able to make significantly more layered songs than I'm used to hearing; so this is basically like half of Youtube before Youtube was even close to existing! They have a knack for crafting catchy melodies and interesting compositions. These guys are definitely talented, so hopefully I'm in for a good ride. 6.5/10 From N.Y.: Interestingly, it seems they start off all their albums with the same little intro, and it's not it's own track. This one is the companion to the last release, and features mostly, but not all, covers, including songs like "Zombie Jamboree", which was their first hit, "Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress", "Pretty Woman" and "Hound Dog". So this one's a lot more "rocky", as their name suggests. Interestingly, it ends with "Tokyo Yo-Yo", just like To N.Y. But, overall another fun album. 6.5/10 Vocobeat: I'm skipping over the Christmas albums because they're Christmas albums, though thankfully they aren't all covers of the moldy oldies. So this one's from 1994, and I believe it was their debut outside of Japan. The one change, likely thanks to the time period, is just a hint of hip-hop in some of the songs, like the opener. This is a very different album from the first two, but one thing it's not is bad. It's got a lot more standouts than the other two, for one. Also, I love it when the bass singer gets to take lead vocals. 6.5/10 Lucky Seven: Moving ahead to 1996 after also skipping a best-of release. This is another cover album, with classics like "Dock of the Bay", "Surfer Girl", "Stand by Me" and "Up on the Roof". Maybe it's just that I've heard these songs all my life, covered and recovered, but this one doesn't feel quite right. 5.5/10 Rockapella: This is far from a comprehensive discography, ending in '97, before they even got signed Stateside. Nowadays, Rockapella continues on with none of the founding members (though at least two are from the Carmen Sandiego years), but with this, we're still on the "slightly hip-hop, slightly soul" thing. And it just doesn't do anything for me. Again, there's very little that stands out, and though it gets better toward the end, I'm finding myself glad that this is ending here. 4.5/10

Sean Altman- Seandemonium: Sean Altman was one of Rockapella's founding members, their tenor (so "lead singer", more or less) and main lyricist. This was his first solo album, from 1997, when he left the group to pursue a solo career. It’s a collection of originals, Rockapella songs (at least "Falling Over You"), and short interludes, which there are a TON of. It's not all a capella, though there is a lot of that as well, and the album on the whole is distinctly vocal-driven. It's a pretty light-hearted, energetic record, about even with the mid-range Rockapella releases, but with some different things to offer. 5.5/10

Calibretto 13 Adventures in Tokyo: Back in college, I was majorly into pop punk and had a habit of finding random bands because pop punk. And of course, I am only just now getting around to finding more music by the ones I used to like (maybe one song of). These guys did a song called "High Five", that I do still like, so here we are. This starts off with "Why Can't I Be on MTV?" which is pretty indicative of the type of punk this is, funny and iconoclastic. They have a distinct sound, with a lot of acoustic guitar and something of a surf rock vibe on tracks like "Cruisin' the Strip". There's also a lot of fucking around, which isn't too surprising. Pretty standard teen angst, fight the power stuff. 5/10 Enter the Danger Brigade: This one starts with "High Five" and features a cover of "Ballroom Blitz". The production feels a little more mature, but they've really ramped up the anti-religious screed. Not much of an improvement, overall. 5.5/10

AnalogX Cast Out Into the World: This is a case of a group I don't listen to anymore, but they were on my list, and I was able to download all their albums for free from their website (click the name above), so hey, let's see what we got here. This is some decent bleepy techno, which is what I was expecting. It's got something of a futuristic video game soundtrack feel to it. Overall, it doesn't do much, as most of the tracks are extremely basic and repetitive, but if this gets better as time goes, I could see enjoying it more. 4/10 Springtime in Paris: This appears to have a lot of remixes of songs off the first album. It seems a step up. There's still a lot of repetition here, but it takes longer to notice it; I'm enjoying more. Still nothing sticking with me, though, not to mention it's a really long album. 5/10 Buzzsaw: This is honestly pretty dull. Though I feel like it's more planned out, as albums go, the music itself feels like a step back from the remixes. Notably, however, this ends with "Source Code", which is the single tune that brought me here. Crazy. 4.5/10 Tranquility Lost: Ah, now things begin to change! Less with the bleepy, now a broader set of synths and a slightly tweaked style. I'm starting to find standout tracks, like "Organic". 5/10 On the Net: This features the first vocal track! Not that I can say much about the vocals: they sound like someone on the internet with a lot of vocoding. That said, I could describe this album similarly to Tranquility Lost. Things are looking up! 5/10 HackSaw: I finally kept my first song out of this discog, from an EP called "MidStream". As for this album, interestingly, it starts off indsturial then moves to jungle. And while the music is overall very much 2000's electronica, branching out has really done this artist a world of good. 6/10 Cole: Here we go. 2006 and everything culminates. The vocals are better, the production is better, the genres are diverse but the album is cohesive. There are remixes of songs, or something like it! Tracks like "Will You Go Up" and "The Time Is Right" go to show how far AnalogX has come as a musician. Large portions of this bring to mind 90's video game soundtracks with vocal songs, or even anime. This is a very unexpected pop album at the end of the discography, and definitely a worthwhile place to start getting acquainted with AnalogX. 7.5/10

Warrior Fighting for the Earth: It's time for some metal! Journey with me back to 1985, when bands were hairier and sang about defending metal and conquering the earth. These guys are cut from well-used cloth, but this is a fun album regardless. If you were into this kind of thing, make sure you give Warrior a listen! 6.5/10 Ancient Future: Their second album didn't come out until 1998! They sound a bit more Alice in Chains now, not surprising for bands of their era who tried to make a comeback a decade later. There's a song here about Saddam Hussein, what? Anyway, they really do sound like Alice in Chains, or maybe Skid Row, but not as good as either. This is a total disappointment. 4/10