Tag Archives: cd review

CD Review: Gay Paris – The Skeleton’s Problematic Granddaughter

The Skeleton’s Problematic Granddaughter is the debut LP release from Sydney four piece GAY PARIS and from all accounts, it’s a damn good one.

  Gay Paris list themselves as Swamp Stomp/ Shack Funk/ Bastard Rock, and that’s exactly what this album delivers. The growling, gritty vocals of WH Monks complemented by dirty guitar driven rock riffs and killer drumming. There is an underlying 80’s stadium rock vibe throughout and with songs like “My First Wife? She Was A Fox Queen!” setting the stadium rock anthmatic standard.

One noteable variation came in at track 8 “Soliloquy From Either Station”. Slow chant stomp with Elvis styled vocal and haunting violin hovering above. An unexpected highlight.

Rating: 7.5
The Skeleton's Problematic Granddaughter - Gay ParisThe Skeleton’s Problematic Granddaughter – Gay Paris
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Social Distortion – Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes [CD Review]

Review: Ben Hosking

  Social Distortion has managed to create an aura around themselves over the last three decades that has placed them into the realms of punk rock royalty. Perhaps it’s the ice cool, slicked hair, hotrodder image of Mike Ness but more likely it has more to do with the band’s uncanny knack for writing sweet, sweet country-infused, rockabilly punk rock.

It’s been a number of years between drinks for ‘Social Distortion. Their last album was 2004’s ‘Sex, Love and Rock’N’Roll’ – a stunning disc that no doubt left the guys wondering if they could ever top

themselves. The extended pause could also be the result of Mike Ness’ various other distractions like the aforementioned custom cars and his other musical projects including the awesome countrified Mike Ness Band.
Continue reading Social Distortion – Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes [CD Review]

Alexisonfire – Aussie Tour 7inch [Album Review]

Review: Ben Hosking

  We all like to feel special sometimes. You know, when your loved one showers you with praise for looking more dapper than usual or those ever-rarer moments when the boss makes an example of you for a job well done. The art of releasing tour-specific singles, EPs or albums with bonus discs is certainly nothing new and there’s little better way to celebrate an impending tour of your favourite band than with a disc full of new or previously unreleased songs. Alexisonfire decided their recent Australian tour was just the kind of event that deserved such a release.

Continue reading Alexisonfire – Aussie Tour 7inch [Album Review]

The Boat People – Dance to My Pain/ Antidote Double A-side Remix Package – CD Review

Review: Lana Harris


Buy Album Here
  This double a-side release features tracks from the recently released Dear Darkly, creating a target audience of people who love The Boat people singles but who won’t commit to buying a full album, and fans who love The Boat People so much they’ll buy this just for the remixes of the two title tracks.

The CD opens with ‘Antidote’, which is a very sweet love song, a well crafted pop tune, and the last time on this CD that guitars are able to take the front of stage. From ‘Dance to My Pain’ and onwards through the remixes, synthesisation and beats take over. C’mon, Boat People, just admit it: you want to be a dance act. Sure, sure, not a traditional dance act,

but a revitalised, fresh, Aussie pop influenced electro outfit who, every so often, get to wear a furry animal costume on stage – even if it’s done in the spirit of irony.
Continue reading The Boat People – Dance to My Pain/ Antidote Double A-side Remix Package – CD Review

Bring Me the Horizon “There Is a Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let’s Keep It a Secret” – CD Review

Review: Ben Hosking
Bring Me the Horizon (BMTH) have divided opinions since their arrival on the scene with 2006’s ‘Count Your Blessings’. While they certainly have their legion of fans – as evidenced by their recent chart success here in Australia – many more have been very vocal about their ‘hate’ for the Sheffield, England quintet.

2008’s ‘Suicide Season’ did well to win over some of the haters with its focused deathcore approach. However, it will be their newest release ‘There Is a Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let’s Keep It a Secret’ that will turn the tide for BMTH.

Only young tykes when they started, BMTH have clearly done some growing in the intervening six years. The addition of Jona Weinhofen (Bleeding Through) on guitars, backing vocals, keys and programming in 2009 has also brought a welcome intricacy and depth to their sound.
Continue reading Bring Me the Horizon “There Is a Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let’s Keep It a Secret” – CD Review

Filter “The Trouble with Angels” – CD Review

Review: Ben Hosking

  At least in this country, Filter has never attained the level of success that they deserve. Besides a couple of chart-bothering flirtations with tracks like ‘Hey Man, Nice Shot’ and ‘Take a Picture’ way back in the mid-to-late 1990s, Richard Patrick and company have travelled unfairly under the radar. Hopefully the Cleveland, Ohio group’s luck will change with the release of their fifth studio album, The Trouble with Angels.

For those not familiar with Richard Patrick’s talent, take note: he began his professional career with industrial genius Trent Reznor as a touring guitarist

with Nine inch Nails between 1989 and 1993. After this he started Filter in 1995; Patrick’s bread and butter ever since – although certainly not his only musical preoccupation.
Continue reading Filter “The Trouble with Angels” – CD Review

Midnight Juggernauts “The Crystal Axis” – CD Review

Review: Natalie Salvo

  Batten down the hatches, the Midnight Juggernauts ‘difficult’ second album, The Crystal Axis appears to be anything but that. Instead, it uses analogue harmony walls and experimentation aplenty to craft 12 striking tracks (well 11 plus an overture) with a destination of the sun’s core. Onboard we journey via new tangents and those crazy panoramic retro screens of old.

The trio employed a lot of live experimentation to get here. The jams err on the side of prog rock and spaced-out sonic landscapes. They billeted together in a remote and isolated house on the NSW

coast with only synthesisers, keys, guitars, drums, racks of pedals and other electronic gizmos for company. The jams even found their way into the recording process and at times this adds a unique character to the music, while at other moments feels as though a bit too much fat was left on the bone.
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Timothy Carroll “The Deepest Dive” EP Review

Review: Victoria Nugent


TimothyTimothy Carroll
  After listening to The Deepest Dive, I couldn’t help but be slightly disappointed, but not because of the quality of the music. Rather, it’s a bit sad to think that this EP will be the last we hear from Timothy Carroll for a while, thanks to his impending move to Sweden.

The Deepest Dive comes a year after the release of Carroll’s debut album For Bread & Circuses and is full of laidback folk tunes, all tying into the theme of change and moving on. It’s a lush listening experience, with the EP boasting exceptionally pretty cover art to boot, taken from a set of French tarot cards.

Continue reading Timothy Carroll “The Deepest Dive” EP Review

Steve Vai “Where the Other Wild Things Are” CD Review

Review: Ben Hosking

  Being a huge Steve Vai fan, it’s hard to confess that we reckon the Great One’s latest CD falls a little flat. A live CD, recorded at the State Theatre in Minneapolis, the vibe of the whole album leaves you feeling a little unsatisfied.

As usual, the performances are perfect – Vai’s choice of backing musician is always spot on. The set list was well paced; including classics like ‘The Audience is Listening’, ‘Liberty’ and ‘For the Love of God’ from his groundbreaking 1990 album ‘Passion and Warfare’. But for the most part, it all just feels a little dead.

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The Bank Holidays “Sail Becomes A Kite” CD Review

Review by: Victoria Nugent

  When listening to sophomore album Sail Becomes A Kite by The Bank Holidays, I couldn’t help but smile. The Perth band, made up of Nat Carson and Bekk Crombie on guitar, James Crombie on bass and Stuart Leach on drums, clearly has a talent for producing delightful indie pop. The songs on Sail Becomes A Kite are largely reflective and sweet, with buoyant moments shining through as well. There’s a reason why this band are considered Perth’s pop darlings, producing some amazing, highly enjoyable music.

Continue reading The Bank Holidays “Sail Becomes A Kite” CD Review

Five Star Prison Cell “Matriarch” LP Review

Review: Lana Harris


MatriarchMatriarch
  Based in Melbourne, Five Star Prison Cell began destroying young people’s hearing in 2005. They’ve since completed an impressive array of tours including supporting Bloodduster in Oz and Dillinger Escape Plan in the US. Matriarch represents the third album for the four piece line up which includes vocalist Adam Glynn, guitarist Mark Holain, bassist Cameron MacDonald and drummer Marc Whitworth.

Their sound is often described as ‘math metal’ (which refers to the group’s use of complex rhythmic structures and structuring songs using unusual time signatures), and the tracks contain a lot of syncopated sounds. But beneath these labyrinthine twists and turns in the songs is enough

good, strong riffage to impress upon those of less technically inclined the fact that Five Star Prison Cell also makes tracks you can bang your head to easily.

As soon as the album starts, you are hit on all sides by the power of drummer Marc Whitworth. He drills the sounds into your mind from every direction simultaneously, forceful, but more layered and interesting than just a wall of sound. The momentum he starts during opening track ‘I Curse This Vessel’ just keeps building until ‘Modus Operandi’, which appears just before mid way on the album. This was the stand out track, a mountain of sound, a blistering explosion that would crack apart even five star cell walls. As it finishes, its hard not to wonder where it could go from there, how the pace could be maintained. Then ‘Paramountain’ begins, and the band takes a step back, providing a space in which to rebuild and change direction, a space whose intro is narrated in Greek.

Having made some room, the second half of the album provides for more appreciation of other band members. This is particularly evident on ‘Loss of Gravitas’ which is a tremendous display of the power of Glynn’s vocals, an exploration in low range growls amidst strong screaming, and also on ‘Forlorn’, which brings MacDonald into the spotlight and strange as it sounds, provided some groove elements to the track, demonstrating the band’s commitment to creating interesting music by doing things differently. Although lyrics throughout are not easily distinguishable, an exception is found in the final track ‘Lamia’ on which the amusing sentiments can easily be deciphered (but they’re not really suitable for printing!). Matriarch was an enjoyable album and one which those not versed in the sub genres of metal can still enjoy as a good dose of satisfyingly heavy music.


MatriarchMatriarch – Five Star Prison Cell

Related:
Dillinger Escape Plan + Maylene and the Sons of Disaster @ The Hi Fi, Brisbane 25 May 2010 [Live Review]
Review: Dillinger Escape Plan @ The Metro Theatre – Friday May 21, 2010
Interview: Ben Weinman – The Dillinger Escape Plan
Audio Interview: Ben Weinman – The Dillinger Escape Plan *The Audio version*
The Dillinger Escape Plan – Australian Tour – May 2010 (TOUR DETAILS)

The Dillinger Escape PlanBuy: The Dillinger Escape Plan from iTunes


Rolo Tomassi – “Cosmology” [CD Review]

  Review: Ben Hosking

For the uninitiated, young UK group Rolo Tomassi (named after a character from the movie LA Confidential) is a scary listening experience. Hell, they’re still a scary listen even after a few rotations of their 2008 debut album ‘Hysterics’.

Fronted by diminutive blonde ingénue Eva Spence, the group play what has been affectionately termed as punk-jazz, whilst on occasion thrown in with the mathcore crowds.

Continue reading Rolo Tomassi – “Cosmology” [CD Review]

The Break – “Church of the Open Sky” [CD Review]

Review: Lana Harris

  Ah, the beach. Golden sands, blistering sunshine and pounding waves are all an integral part of Australian culture, so it’s perhaps surprising that we haven’t heard more surf rock acts spring up locally. Instead, the genre is much more heavily associated with American waves, Hawaiian surf shacks or perhaps the laid back vibes of San Francisco.

Well, The Break are out to change that. They’ve taken rockers who are a part of Australian culture (drummer Rob Hirst, guitarists Jim Moginie and Martin Rotsey, from Midnight Oil) added in

an American who recently moved to Hobart (ex Violent Femmes bassist Brian Ritchie) and created a surf rock record that should see Australia in general, and The Break in particular, usher in a resurgence of this laid back style of music. Continue reading The Break – “Church of the Open Sky” [CD Review]

Mike Patton – “Mondo Cane” [CD Review]

Review: Ben Hosking

  The prolific Mike Patton returns with a project unlike any that have come before it. Sung entirely in Italian, the album ‘Mondo Cane’ features a 40-piece orchestra, choir and band.

Listeners have had hints of Patton’s multi-lingual abilities in the last, such as tunes found on earlier Faith No More releases. However, ‘Mondo Cane’ sees the twisted genius using his talents to pay homage to other songwriters, including his beloved Morricone, who penned the track ‘Deep Down’.

Continue reading Mike Patton – “Mondo Cane” [CD Review]