Archive for March, 2010
Kids in Glass Houses Dirt Review
March 29th, 2010 | Author: admin
“This is not the way we planned it.” So reads the first line of this second album from Welsh quintet Kids in Glass Houses. But despite the concession that the future looked radically different during the days before their debut left a considerable dent in the domestic rock scene, this young band can’t be displeased with where they find themselves in 2010. Dirt is poised to take them from support slots with Lostprophets and Paramore to headline performances at the nation’s larger venues.
Produced by Jason Perry – formerly of Old Folks-rockers A and a songwriter for McFly – Dirt takes the well-executed but ultimately generic pop-punk via post-hardcore racket of 2008’s Smart Casual collection and introduces the kind of choruses that will sound incredible when chanted by an arena-sized crowd. While opener Artbreaker I delivers impressively muscular riffs, it’s not long before the group’s more commercially viable influences – The Beach Boys, The Police – bubble to the surface. They’re not channelling these artists in a sound-alike sense, but these Kids have studied well the compositional phrasing of their heroes, the transitions from punchy verses to anthem-in-waiting central motifs. They display a discernable nous for crafting immediately catchy songs as acceptable to mainstream radio listeners as they will be to those schooled on the likes of New Found Glory and Glassjaw.
The latter group provided the band with their name, while long-standing emo-punks New Found Glory contribute guest gang vocals on Maybe Tomorrow. The following track, The Morning Afterlife, is something of a side-step. It’s a slow-burn ballad that, with the guitars turned down a touch, would have sat prettily on Boyzone’s latest. This is not to be read as a minus point, however: so unashamed is this band’s incorporation of pop elements that one can’t flag it as a fault, and so open are they about the mainstream artists that have affected them every bit as much as hardcore acts that the end results don’t feel insincere.
Dirt does feel a little top-heavy, many of its most striking numbers – Sunshine, Lilli Rose (Don Henley for the Green Day market), Matters At All – arriving within the first half-dozen tracks. But the overall progression from record one to two is impressive, and following a Lostprophets model fans can expect album four to be their career landmark. As another highlight sings: “the best is yet to come.”
David S. Ware Saturnian Review
March 29th, 2010 | Author: admin
Making an album from a free jazz concert seems something of a misnomer. Can music created as an event, an improvised performance, become a fixed object packaged for repeat listening? Indeed it’s difficult to know when – as a 40-minute, freeform, honks-aplenty solo saxophone recital – you’d turn to your collection and pop Saturnian on the CD player. Not first thing Monday, perhaps. But do so in the right frame of mind and the sound of David S. Ware hits you first time and gets better with ever spin.
It’s difficult not to equate the uncompromising urgency and emotion of the playing with Ware’s successful recovery from a life-threatening illness last year; this was a very personal comeback moment shared with an appreciative audience. The American’s prowess as an improviser – heard elsewhere in a fine discography of quartet recordings – is presented here in its rawest form, recorded alone on a New York stage with no colleagues or chords for company.
From the opening octave leaps of Methone, Ware’s soprano saxello probes and prods repeatedly at various intervals of pitch, reflecting a post-Coltrane interest in sound – timbre, tone, a uniquely-saxophonic-if-that’s-a-word flourish – rather than sense – clear melodic lines or phraseology. Overt jazz language is eschewed as Ware works with short thematic scraps which are repeated, mantra-like, varied and then thrown away with exciting spontaneity. There’s a good example of this in Pallene – the concert’s central piece for alto – in which a fragment from Thelonious Monk’s Straight No Chaser is stumbled upon, taken up and then cast aside.
As with similar solo ventures from saxophonists of his generation (Anthony Braxton, Evan Parker, Dave Liebman…), Ware’s skill is in sustaining invention in the face of utter freedom. The pieces form as peaks and troughs on a graph, moving between episodes of contrasting energies (fast to slow) and shifting through pitch-constellations (low to high, to Saturnian) towards the ever-ascending climax of Anthe.
How to Convert wma to mp3
March 25th, 2010 | Author: admin
At present, virtually no one can imagine our world without music. We can hear it everywhere. Being a true art, music became a very important part of our everyday life. We can hear it on TV, Internet, radio, in players, etc. At the same time not all mobile phones, players, or iPods can support audio files of wma format. In such cases we have to convert our music files in
wma to mp3.
But how one can perform converting of wma files to mp3 ones? The answer is very simple! The market has a wide variety of audio converters. Almost all of them are very convenient and handy programs. They can be downloaded online or purchased in the nearest computer store or department. These software applications differ by their set of options and interface. Quite often, we cannot decide which wma converter to prefer because all of them seem to be just the same and with no differences.
We recommend you to convert wma to mp3 with the Factory Audio Converter, which is the best audio converter in the market. It is an advantageous and convenient audio program which is created by Softplicity. Softplicity is famous not only for this audio converter but also for a lot of converters which help to convert virtually all audio formats. As to the Factory Audio Converter, its main advantage is that it can convert not only one but a whole batch of files! You don’t even have to open the converter every time you are going to perform converting wma to mp3. It can be run from the desktop of your PC directly. And it is possible to convert not only wma format but wav to mp3 as well.
This beneficial application allows you to convert more than 30 most wide-spread file formats! For example, you can convert audio files which are downloaded from Facebook and Youtube. It is known that audio files downloaded from these websites have quite a strange format. Luckily, now it is not a problem for you because you have an opportunity to download the Factory Audio Converter right now!
In case you want to start to use the Factory Audio Converter, then launch the program firstly, select the files you want to convert and click any file format you need. If you don’t want to launch the converter, press right mouse button, select “wma” and “wav converter” and specify to which audio format you want to convert your files to. Wma and wav audio files can be converted to mp3 ones in the shortest time possible! It is very easy and genius, isn’t it! And that’s not all! There are other ways to convert your audio files. In case you use command line in converting wma to mp3, you will change file formats via other applications. In case you have no idea how to use the command line, Factory Audio Converter will assist you with the list of converting options.
You should also keep in mind that the Factory Audio Converter is characterized by a very user-friendly interface. This converter is of a very high quality. It is just your best choice! Download the Factory Audio Converter and enjoy all the advantages it can provide you with!
Justin Bieber My Worlds Review
March 23rd, 2010 | Author: admin
Justin Bieber is a young man with a sweet voice who has been transformed into a huge entertainment machine. His CD insert lists everyone involved in his career so far, from the studio engineers and executive producers to the legal team and even the lady responsible for “grooming” that perfect hair. There’s no room for lyrics and barely any for photos.
My Worlds is Justin’s debut mini-album My World expanded, incorporating the tracks released as My World 2.0 in the US. It has been released in two halves because of an early, insatiable demand for songs, once his YouTube appeal was translated into a record deal.
Now, for all the talk about this album being by a teenager, for teenagers, there’s not a lot going on here which is unique to modern youth. Most people know what a first dance is, for example. And even the fustiest of grown-ups can work out what an “eenie meenie minie moe lover” is, if they think about it hard enough.
In fact it’s the songs which try to show understanding of the teenage world which fall over easily. Somebody to Love is a straightforward plea for a soul mate; it says something we’ve all felt, whereas I can safely say that no-one has ever compared love to maths homework, as they do in Common Denominator.
But despite the clunky moments, there’s ample proof that Team Bieber know exactly what they’re doing and who they’re talking to. As you’d expect, it’s the ballads that hit the hardest.
Stuck in the Moment is the classic doomed-love tragedy: they can’t be together, but they cannot bear to part. Naturally it mentions Romeo and Juliet, and Bonnie and Clyde. Up is the flipside, in which Justin realises love makes him invulnerable.
That Should Be Me, the grand finale, is going to cause nothing but emotional pandemonium in households and bedrooms all over the land. It’s a sobbing ballad in which Justin pleads the girl who left him behind (how could she?) to take him back.
Gorillaz
March 23rd, 2010 | Author: admin
Gorillaz are a British virtual band created in 1998 by Damon Albarn of Britpop band Blur, and Jamie Hewlett, co-creator of the comic book Tank Girl. The band is composed of four animated band members: 2D (lead vocalist, keyboard), Murdoc Niccals (bass guitar), Noodle (lead guitar and occasional vocals) and Russel Hobbs (drums and percussion). The band’s music is a collaboration between various musicians, Albarn being the only permanent musical contributor. Their style is a composition of multiple musical genres, with a large number of their influences including: dub, hip hop, alternative rock, electronic and pop music.
The band’s eponymous debut album, released in 2001, sold over seven million copies and earned them an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records as the Most Successful Virtual Band. It was nominated for the Mercury Prize 2001, but the nomination was later withdrawn at the band’s request. Their second studio album, Demon Days, was released in 2005 and included the singles “Feel Good Inc.”, “Dare”, “Dirty Harry” and “Kids with Guns”/”El Mañana”. Demon Days went five times platinum in the UK, double platinum in the United States and earned five Grammy Award nominations for 2006 and won one of them in the Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals category. Gorillaz have also released two B-sides compilations and a remix album. The combined sales of Gorillaz and Demon Days had, by 2007, exceeded 15 million albums. The band’s third studio album, titled Plastic Beach, was released in 2010.
Son of Dave Shake a Bone Review
March 20th, 2010 | Author: admin
It’s hard to deny what a straight-up bundle of joy the most recent rebirth of the blues has been. Whether it’s Mumford & Sons mingling bluesy moonshine with UK folk and alt-Americana, Amy Winehouse’s gin-soaked 60s soul take on proceedings, Jack White’s guttural, fire-filled side-project The Dead Weather or Seasick Steve’s shotgun shack shimmy, the passion-infused genre is music at its most exhilarating, revealing and powerful. Son of Dave – the nom-de-blues of one Benjamin Darvill – knows this more than most.
Shake a Bone is Darvill’s fifth solo record – not counting the handful he made in the 1990s with his former band, Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm hit-makers the Crash Test Dummies. A close sonic relative of the one-man whirlwind that is the aforementioned Sir Seasick – but with noticeably more beat-boxing – Canada-born Darvill’s own harmonica-heavy and grunt-laden style also contains hints of the dusty south London gypsy stylings practised by gospel-punk collective Alabama 3.
Relying heavily on basic 12-bar blues and huskily intoned lyrics about wayward teens (She Just Danced All Night) and busted sets of vintage wheels (Broke-down Lincoln) over stripped-down shuffling, it’s pretty obvious that Darvill isn’t particularly concerned with reinventing the musical wheel. That said, there is something terribly satisfying about the primitive nature of his yelps and purrs and the relentless pounding of the lo-fi drumbeat. Every song seems to have been infused with a steamy, clandestine hoe-down atmosphere, making the dozen tracks on the record sound as if they belong more to a blistering, intimate live show than they do a slickly produced album.
Recorded and mixed by hardcore legend Steve Albini, with Darvill on production duty, the immediate yet lived-in feel of the record is perhaps no surprise. Gentler numbers, like saucy slow-burners You All But Stay and Guilty, sit in comfortable contrast to the record’s rowdier moments, of which the funk-inflected Ain’t Nothing but the Blues and the beat-box-driven Undertaker are chugging, grinding dirt-pop highlights.
College kid outsells rap stars Student’s EP tops iTunes hip-hop charts first week out
March 20th, 2010 | Author: admin
NEW YORK – The name “Sam Adams” mainly has been associated with several American historical figures and a popular Boston beer — until now.
The city of Boston is laying claim to yet another Sam Adams: an upstart Trinity College rapper who emerged from obscurity when his primarily self-produced EP, “Boston’s Boy,” debuted atop iTunes’ hip-hop digital albums chart. Outpacing the sales of hip-hop superstars like Lil Wayne and DJ Khaled, the 22-year-old’s set sold nearly 8,000 digital copies in its first week.
Adams’ single, “I Hate College” — a remix of the Asher Roth hit “I Love College” — has tallied more than 1 million views on YouTube. He also counts more than 25,000 Facebook friends and close to 2,000 followers on Twitter.
Autechre Oversteps Review
March 20th, 2010 | Author: admin
Despite what over-analytical spoilsports might have you believe, Rochdale masters of electronic experimentation Autechre are a uniquely visceral entity. At their most tangible, indeed, the duo – long-time pals Sean Booth and Rob Brown – are less mathematical, intelligent dance music nightmare, more punk-spirited joy to behold.
For nearly two decades, across 10 albums, the acid house/original electro/hip hop-schooled Warp stalwarts have deconstructed techno and beyond into fascinating, ever-evolving abstract shapes. Oversteps is certainly no exception to their outwardly difficult aesthetic and could, on initial listens, get thrown in with unforgivingly tricksy 2003 set Draft 7.30.
Disregard the fact that the song titles largely resemble a Scrabble game with a corrupted Eastern European supercomputer, however. Beneath the icy exterior, deceptively warm hearts beat, rushing synthetic blood at thresholds with almost maniacal glee as they smash apart linear constraints.
Those already familiar are swiftly on reassuring ground. Second track ilanders is classic Autechre, lunar synth lines partially harking back to feted 1995 release Tri Repetae’s affectingly eerie atmospherics, fractured beats built and demolished with sentient android accuracy. It’s engrossing, an alien landscape you simply can’t extricate your ears from, every barbed glitch progressively snagging further wisps of your hearing.
There isn’t, it’s accurate to report, much immediacy here. But that was never Autechre’s forte. True to form, the immersing osmosis of repeated plays is the only method of absorbing Oversteps’ depths. A few moments do land instantly, though: known(1) re-imagines then mechanises ancient oriental zither strains with the unfolding beauty of an origami swan; O=0 chimes and tingles with Philip Glass-worthy dexterity; st epreo’s dense thicketed beat undergrowth grabs your cochleas.
And once Yuop evaporates into the ether it’s more than apparent why many people don’t exactly get Autechre, even plentiful converts who assume that they do. Perhaps Oversteps’ mantle even nods to the extra unnecessary layers of deep rumination their wares often attract. But by maintaining a ferocious appetite for streaming across territory few electronic musicians possess even a perception of, Autechre continue to test themselves and listeners alike with stunningly intricate results.
North Atlantic Oscillation Grappling Hooks Review
March 18th, 2010 | Author: admin
Anyone thinking that the Brighton-based FatCat label had something of a monopoly on Scottish talent might want to reconsider. Sure, that The Twilight Sad, Frightened Rabbit and We Were Promised Jetpacks share a stable is impressive; but there’s plenty more imagination seeping out from rehearsal spaces north of the border.
The latest act likely to cause a stir amongst even the softest of southerners is North Atlantic Oscillation. The trio’s name – it’s a climactic phenomenon – implies a prog sensibility, and there’s certainly plenty of invigoratingly inventive musicianship on show. But like stateside influences The Flaming Lips, NAO understand the necessity of incorporating pop elements into their often heady concoctions, and the results are consistently engaging.
At times the three – founders Sam Healy and Ben Martin began as a duo, with Bill Walsh joining later on bass – conspire to craft tunes that summon the spirit of Grandaddy, if the Modesto rockers had been raised under grey skies rather than the azure blue of Californian climes. There’s a playful spirit to pieces that click to electronic beats before carrying themselves away on washes of sublime, super-amplified six-strings; but there’s an understanding, too, and respect of restraint – Ceiling Poem is evidence of the band’s deft handling of building suspense through understatement, only to release the pressure in a wonderfully bellicose, yet oddly bucolic fashion.
Drawing Maps From Memory – already issued as a single – is a close-enough cousin of the angular alt-rock of mainstream-conquering countrymen Biffy Clyro, and should NAO produce more fare of this vein in the future, a similar crossover is certainly a possibility. But head-turning moments are largely those where the band expresses a degree of individuality: Hollywood Has Ended might echo Errors in its electro-pulse backbeat, but the hazy vocals – distant, diaphanous – lend it an organic heart that the Glasgow indie-dance champions occasionally obscure with circuitry chatter. 77 Hours is a propulsive-of-percussion number of real class that the album pivots on, displaying as it does several sides of NAO’s character in a single, albeit multi-faceted setting – think Teenage Fanclub as heard through Holy F*** filters.
In 2009, fellow Scots The Phantom Band attracted acclaim with their Checkmate Savage debut, but failed to translate critical kudos into commercial appeal. NAO have produced a first record every bit as special, but one feels they’ve greater potential to follow Biffy, and the FatCat three, into the brighter lights of the biggest stages.
Sony MDR-V700 DJ Headphones
March 17th, 2010 | Author: admin
The Sony MDR-V700 DJ Headphones use a 50mm driver with neodymium magnet to provide high-quality sound. You get powerful bass, clear treble, and 3,000mW power handling. Swivel earcups allow easy single-sided monitoring on shoulder and their sleek, silver metallic finish gives these Sony DJ Headphones a business-like look. Foldable, coil cord, gold-plated stereo UniMatch plug.