Scorn - Yozza

So far, all of the reviews I've done have been favourable so I thought it was about time to write one that is less so. I don't know anything about Scorn but I got hold of the Yozza EP after being recommended it by a friend. I have to say that I really am not impressed with it at all. I first saw the artwork and was excited as it looked very cool, just my taste in art. However, my excitement soon ended when I listened to it. I suppose the artwork is a good representation of the music; cold, dark, industrial, bleak. These are usually qualities I like in music but not so much with Scorn. I'm not even sure what kind of music it is. There is an element...

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Jackson C. Frank - Jackson C. Frank

Although certainly not a new album, Jackson C. Frank's self titled album is a fairly recent discovery for me. I have heard his songs for a number of years though, as will many other Nick Drake fans.  Nick Drake, undoubtedly a fan Drake recorded some cover versions of Jackson's songs which, in some ways, became more famous than the originals after the Drake family started to hand out copies to fans which and subsequently made their way on to numerous bootleg releases.  There is good reason for Nick Drake to record the covers. You can hear Jackson's influence on all of Drake's album, and they share a very similar style. Jackson,...

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Ghazal - The Rain

Ghazal is quite an unusual group. Not only because of the style of music that they play but also because of who the members are. Shujaat Khan is part of a musical dynasty. His legendary family has produced a line of seven generations of musical geniuses. His father, Vilayat Khan, is one of the most highly regarded sitar players ever, a giant in Hindustani music. As far as I know, Shujaat is the first member of this family to break away from the confines of ragas to explore other genres of music. This is not the first non-raga music that he has made but it could well be the most impressive. His partner in this project is Kayhan Kalhor, a Kurdish...

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Ozric Tentacles - Yum Yum Tree

The Ozric Tentacles have been around for years and years. They have only one remaining original member since they formed two decades ago but have released twenty eight albums in that time. They are one of the most prolific and original bands of the past fifty years yet they have never achieved mainstream fame.  You could be forgiven for never having heard of Ozric Tentacles. Although giants at an underground level, they are barely known by the majority of people. That said, they are a legendary band and you will almost have heard an artist or group that have taken inspiration from them.  When I heard that Ozrics were playing in the...

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New Design

I've been playing with some templates and the design of the blog. I think it looks a bit better but I'd love to hear your comments about it. There will be a new review later, I haven't decided what yet thou...

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Liquid Stranger - The Arcane Terrain

I've been a fan of Liquid Stranger for a while. He is quite a mysterious character. hailing from Sweden, he claims to have little interest in listening to music, aside from his own presumably, and that his main influence is the music from early computer games. In his early works you could hear this clearly but his albums managed to cram in styles such as ambient, jazz, dubstep, psychedelica, reggae, dub, and dancehall. The Private Riot His previous two albums, The Private Riot and Mechanoid Meltdown, were almost masterclasses in dubstep. They were both powerful, clean and very tightly produced albums that set very high standards for other...

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Murcof - La Sangre Iluminada

Mexican producer Murcof produces ambient electronic music that is rich in textures and imagery. This is his sixth album and is a little bit more spacial and ambient than his usual offerings. The last album I heard from him was Remembranza, which was excellent, full of glitchy, orchestral and almost dubstep pieces, many of which went on for seven or eight minutes. This album has a very similar sound except without the glitchy dubstepness. The album is made of twenty tracks, generally only a minute or two long. There are more textural sounds and more of a focus on the ambient element, the result being a rather well put together, thought...

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Back To Normal!

After a slight technical hitch I've managed to get the blog back to normal so go ahead and read my latest review of the Venetian Snares EP, Cubist Reggae...

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