Múm - Peel Session [Fat Cat 2006/2007]

Back in 2002 the glitchy and beautiful Icelandic electronica act Múm recorded four tracks, (five if you include the amalgamation of the two songs on the opening track), at Maida Vale Studios in 2002 for BBC Radio One’s infamous remembered John Peel show.

On “Peel Session” Múm is cached moving away from the warm naivety of ‘Yesterday Was Dramatic – Today Is OK’ to a more sonically detailed approach, more commonly associated with their recent or current output. The songs are significantly different versions of songs that will be familiar to fans, but probably embraced by new listeners who missed out on this great act as well.

Rumour has it that their long awaited follow up on 2004’s “Summer Make Good” will be released during spring 2007 and that the sound of the material is somehow linked together with “Peel Session”. Their label Fat Cat reports that “The band are now an expansive collective, blurring the distinction between live band and electronica.”

I wouldn't say that this is the best record they ever did or anything, but as a teaser for the new album it works perfectly fine. And no one is as exited as I am about their forthcoming stuff.

Have a listen:

http://www.myspace.com/mumtheband

Top 5 Albums of 2006 by Niklas

Like David wrote:
2006 was indeed a really fucked year in many ways.
But there sure were some good records coming out.

Here's my top 5 (in no order except that the first one is my favorite...):


The Bronx - S/T
Yes, according to me, this is the best album of 2006.
It has everything that I like about the first Bronx album, and it does everything a little bit better. It's a great punk-rock n' roll album. This is one of my all-time favorite records.

The 3 best songs: History's Stranglers, Oceans Of Class and Dirty Leaves


And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead - So Divided
One of my favorite bands. This is not their best record. At all. But it's still a good record, and it's better than alot of other records I heard last year.

The 3 best songs: Stand In Silence, So Divided and Life


+44 - When Your Heart Stops Beating
So, in the battle between +44 and Angels & Airwaves I have to say that Hoppus/Barker are the winners. They made a better record than former Blink-182 bandmate Tom Delonge. And this is a good pop-rock record that I still enjoy listening to a lot.

The 3 best songs: Lycanthrope, Cliffdiving and Chapter 13


The Drips - S/T
Two guys from The Bronx (the band, not the place) released a side-project album (with some friends) under this name some months before The Bronx major-debut came out. This is also a really good punk-rock n' roll album.

The 3 best songs: I'm Gone, Old Sex and 16, 16, Six (this might be my favorite song of 2006).


The Blood Brothers - Young Machetes
So, I just got this CD in the mail. And I've been listening to it a couple of times. Yes, it is a bit annoying at times. But I really enjoy it too. I think this album has some of the best songs that I've heard by The Blood Brothers. This is really cool.

The 3 best songs: Set Fire To The Face On Fire, Laser Life and Spit Shine Your Black Clouds

David's Top 10 List 2006.

[Me during new years eve... yeah. I'll stop smoking... next new year. hehe ]

So here’s my top 10 list of 2006 in no particular order. I think that the year of 2006 that was a fucked up year in many different ways sure had some great music to offer.

David Gilmour - On an Island

Lisa Miskovsky – Changes

Thom Yorke – The Eraser

Múm – The Peel Session

The Bronx – The Bronx

Copeland – Eat, Sleep, Repeat

The Knife – Silent Shout

Yusuf – Another Cup

Anna Ternheim – Separation Road

Tom Waits - Orphans

DANIEL LOEFGREN - The Engine [Norinism / BST]

Swedish hockey player Johan Garpenlöv was once teamed up in the same line as two Russians with the typical name-ending -ov in a Florida-based NHL team. Obviously there wasn't room for the two dots on Garpenlöv's sweater. So in combination with his relative anonymity and the relative ignorance of the hockey fans of Florida he was naturally quickly reduced to "one of Russians" in the Russian line.

Daniel Loefgren got rid of his dots in an attempt to create an internationally acceptable artist name (it seems / I guess). He sounds international alright. But still Swedish in some ways. Loefgren likes creating those moody, atmospheric blankets as a foundation in his music. Long sweeping notes are ever present and I come to think of fellow Swedes Jettie sometimes. The album "The Engine" could use a little more variation. It gets interesting (as opposed to being good falling asleep-music, which is good let alone, don't misunderstand me) in the song "Deeper into Nothingness" and "This God is Dead" when pulse and drive is added.

So, it's beautiful alright, but it doesn't float my boat all the way to shore. Lay off the frailty for a change and throw some desperation in there. Right now hockey gets my heart pumping harder.

Keep new Swedish music coming our way!! We appreciate it a great deal.

Listen to Daniel Loefgren at: www.myspace.com/danielloefgren

LUPE FIASCO - Food & Liquor [Atlantic Records - 2006]

So, another Hip-Hop review right after the other one?

Yes. And I don’t know where to start with this one. Lupe Fiasco’s “Food & Liquor” is my favorite album right now. I bought it about 5 days ago, and I can’t stop listening to it.
I think it’s a really good record, it’s Lupe’s first and I’ll make sure to keep an eye on him in the future as well.

“Food & Liquor” reminds me a little bit of Kanye West, and the first time I heard Lupe was on the track “Touch The Sky” from Kanye’s latest record “Late Registration” (Roc-A-Fella 2005). This is the same kind of Hip-Hop, and it makes me feel good. And like The Roots this has none of your usual gangsta-rap lyrics.

Here’s the 2nd verse from “Kick, Push II”:

“You see his mom was a crackhead and his father couldn't be contacted / He lived with being different, was combated / Amongst the other things on his young, black head / And see, his girl was a white girl / But, just cause she was white, see her life wasn't light-world / She, too had the drama thick / Had a daddy and a momma, but her daddy used to momma hit / Daddy caught something, chasing fatties made her momma sick / Couldn't afford the medicine, pimped it to the pharmacist / As suicidal feelings would rise, switch over to transitions, helped her conquer it / Pays for her momma's pills with a sponsorship / A cell phone bill and a Honda kit / And that's why she skates with him / Someone to feel her pain and her place to be”

It’s hard to pick some favorites on this album, but if I had to pick 5 I think I’d go with: “Real”, “Just Might Be OK”, “Kick, Push”, “Sunshine” and “The Cool”.

Anyway, like I wrote at the top of this, this is a really good record, but I think I’ll probably be calling it a great album in a couple of days. One of the best of 2006, be sure to check it out.

For further info & listening: www.myspace.com/lupefiasco or http://www.lupefiasco.com/

THE ROOTS - Game Theory [Def Jam - 2006]

I haven’t been listening to The Roots very much in the past, and if I remember correctly the first time I heard them was back in 1999 when they released “Things Fall Apart”. I thought they were pretty good. I also remember them having a hit with the Cody Chesnutt song called “The Seed” in 2002, but I never really paid any attention.

Anyway, when I heard that there was a new album coming I listened to some of the new songs on myspace. It sounded really good and I went down to a recordstore downtown and bought a copy of “Game Theory”.

One thing that I like about The Roots is that they’re a band (a guitar-player, a drummer, a bass-player and so on), and I think that’s really cool. And there’s some really good music on here as well, it’s kind of funky stuff and it makes me feel good. My favorite songs on this CD are these: “Game Theory”, “In The Music”, “Take It There”, “Here I Come”, “Long Time”, “Clock With No Hands”, but it’s an overall good album.

The lyrics are good as well, here’s the last verse from “Clock With No Hands” for example:

Yo livin’ in turbulent times, the blind leadin’ the blind / Some call it evolution, some say intelligent design / You say you want a revolution, you out of your mizind / You son destitute and they pop all in the prison / My man’s back in the jam, he like the back of my hand / He just attracted to scam, he right back in the can / I never sleep walk when you dead you get your shut eye / I’m on the first thing in, I’m leavin’ on the red eye / My brother back in rehab, just had another relapse / Within himself it’s like he’s been fightin’ the inner jihad / Tellin’ me ain’t nobody true when they pretend to be that / So closer than friends that’s where I keep my enemies at / To any parties concerned, it’s time to live and learn / Until we’re able to grow, forever bridges will burn / My thoughts free as a bird that’s just about to emerge / And every action that’s heard, it speaks louder than words…

So this isn’t your usual gangsta-rap lyrics with bitches, cool cars, violent behavior, drugs and money (don’t get me wrong I can enjoy that as well. “The Chronic” by Dr. Dre is one of my favorite rap-albums), but from what I understand The Roots was never about that kind of stuff to begin with.

Like I wrote in the beginning I haven’t heard so much of the earlier releases from The Roots, so I can’t really compare this to the older stuff, but this is a good record, and I don’t think you’ll be disappointed if you’ve enjoyed The Roots before.

For listening, go to: www.myspace.com/theroots or http://www.theroots.com/

Lisa Miskovsky - Changes [Stockholm Records - 2006]

Lisa Miskovsky has once again chosen to work with Jocke Berg, and when they do so everyone knows that it simply can’t fail. The first single “Mary” sure proved that. I don't know if it’s going to be as huge as the mega hit “Lady stardust” from 2001s album “Falling Water” (where Jocke Berg also was the producer and co-songwriter) but its a great song.

The cooperation Miskovsky / Berg sure is a winning concept. The songs are now dressed up in full stage costume and feel very big and solid. Where “Falling water” came off as a narrow little country road with a more naked sound, this 12 song album called “Changes” runs you over like a ten lane motor highway.

Lisa sings awfully well as always. There is really not anything to complain about except that after listening to the 12 songs a couple of times I feel that because of its massive production the over all feeling is that “Changes” tend to get a bit too similar and thick.

But I like this record, I like it very much.

Listen to the first single “Mary” here:

http://www.myspace.com/lisamiskovsky

The Mars Volta – Amputechture [GSL/Strummer/Universal - 2006]

“Mars Volta's Amputechture Inspired by Immigrant Marches, Possessed Nuns” All right?! Fair enough...

No one can question their skills as musicians and innovative music creators, but what happened to the song writing? Maybe the possessed nuns transferred their demons and bad spirits on to the band.

When their first EP “Temulant EP” came out some years ago I was so exited and I also thought their following debut album “De-Loused in the Comatorium” was really impressive and innovative with great arrangements and well played melodies. I played it over and over for a whole summer. And still do sometimes.

They took it a step further with “Frances the mute” that did tend to get very annoying during some moments with too much guitar solos and to long “jams”. So when I read they were going to put out another record I hoped they would get back to doing some great structured songs, but of course they didn’t.

The new record feels like 60 minutes of never-ending guitar solos that gets on my nerve and makes me want to kill Omar A Rodriguez-Lopez’s amplifier and smash his guitar. I can’t think of nothing else than Santana mixed with some shitty neo-metal band on acid trying to be Frank Zappa. His guitars (sometimes its like seven of them playing different solos at the same time) are just too much in every aspect.

The lack of defined song structures in the songs is too obvious and the ego of Omar’s skills as guitarist destroys the rest of the bands accomplishment and greatness. I mean in an 11 minuets long song he’s playing his solos over 8 of them. Since the guitars are mixed too high and are all over the place all the time, filling every little gap there is, it is impossible for the listener to catch the breath and you simply can not hear or don’t care what the others are playing.

I doubt the others in the band really find the sounds he tweaks out of his guitar all over the picture that satisfying so why doesn’t some one just tell him to shut up?

Best song is “Vicera Eyes” with its great trumpets and Jaga Jazzist influenced guitar riff.
But that’s that.

Listen to some new songs here:

www.myspace.com/themarsvolta

HELMET - Monochrome [Warcon Records - 2006]

When the last Helmet album “Size Matters” came out like a flash from a clear sky the other year I responded with a surprised fear, mixed with a little tiny spark of excitement. I thought Helmet front man Page Hamilton was gonna let sacred cows stay sacred and let the 1997 Interscope release “Aftertaste” remain the last and final Helmet record. Obviously I was afraid that putting a new album out would smudge my nostalgic and rightfully loving feelings towards Helmet’s earlier work., stretching from the naively noisy “Strap It On” (1990) to the super well produced “Aftertaste”. Hearing the first two sneak previews “See You Dead” and “Speak and Spell” made me think Hamilton might be getting away with the completely reshaped band and the comeback that seemed to be based on the existence of a contract that included several more releases. Even though I expected (and had appreciated) more experimental stuff influences in the veins of what Hamilton made under his own name and flag for the “Chicago Cab” soundtrack in between Helmet records I accepted and bought the new Helmet record.

Now however there’s a new CD out again. Entitled “Monochrome” it embodies everything I feared with the last album. Even though I try to follow it seems to lack all ambition and direction. This is a half pathetic mish-mash of all old Helmet stuff in an incomplete package. Bad sound, poor singing and songwriting plus the kind of metal vibes that sincerely scare me. Need I say more? I’ll try to quickly forget about this mistake and let the vivid spirits of Page Hamilton and Helmet rest in well deserved peace.

Suggestion: Go out and buy a Helmet album today! But make sure you start with any of these three: “Meantime“, “Betty” or “Aftertaste”.

Listen to Helmet music at their offical website: www.helmetmusic.com

THE DRIPS - s/t [White Drugs/Wichita 2006]

Ok, The Drips kind of sounds like The Bronx. The Drips and The Bronx shares two members, the guitar-player and the singer (the main songwriters of both bands, I think).

It doesn’t matter, both bands are great and this (the first) album by The Drips is definitely one of my favorite albums of the year. I can’t get enough of it, I play it all the time and I really don’t get tired of it.

Like both the albums by The Bronx this is a perfectly short record (11 songs in about 27 minutes). This CD also contains some really, really good (punk) rock (n’ roll) songs, and “16, 16, Six” is one of the best songs of the year so far. It might just end up with the title by the end of December.

So, my advice, to you my friends is that you check this one out if you like The Bronx...


Find out more and listen to some songs at: http://www.myspace.com/thedrips or http://www.thedrips.com/