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The guy asked for a review in the forums.
Ask and ye shall receive a review. But be care of what you wish for.
I don't think a bad review is what you wanted. It's not what I wanted either - I hate giving bad reviews. I'd much rather rave on about great music.
Anyway, it's an *honest* opinion. But it's still only an opinion. It's not the Truth Engraved On A Stone Tablet by Mr Truth wearing a Truth costume and singing the Truth song in Truthland. So you can ignore it completely:
Review
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Low-fi is ok so long as it doesn't get so low that it grates/bores.
I tried to imagine an evening out over at a student squat. Someone's lit up a cigarette and got his old beat up guitar out, and is singing some stuff sincerely, if not very well.
Even trying to imagine it that way, looking past the production quality, nothing grabbed me. Maybe if I were in my most teenage angst-ridden period I could maybe have vaguely liked Wicked Disease. But the pieces really needed better production and a far stronger imagination than I could bring to bear on the music to even stand a chance. I didn't feel the music really had anything special even with the music going through a huge Imagination Filter Processor to clean it up and make it sound professional.
With the ultra-lo-fi production that these pieces actually had, a listener would have to be a total masochist to listen to this. Or maybe be a neophyte emo goth girl who's just left a boyband/horses phase and wants to progress on to slashing her wrists.
Basically a guy playing guitar and laying tracks down with an uncritical ear. I guess we've all been through that when starting.
I got the impression it aimed to be pensive. But it ended up being pretentious.
The tracks consists of rhythm guitar strums that don't really go anywhere. On top of that you have a few meandering solos that are deep in a superficial way. Or is that shallow in a profound way? I'm not too sure.
In any case the music made me wince now and again as it struggled and stumbled along.
The voice wouldn't have been so bad if the music had been ok. After all, if mumbling old Bob Dylan can do so well, then there is hope for us all. But the music was not good enough to redeem the reedy voice.
At least he tried. Which is more than I can say for myself, because I gave up at the start of the 6th track.
Boogying blues, played competently and with feel.
There's really only so much you can do within the cliches of the blues. The trick then is to do it beautifully - and they do exactly that with a variety of boogies along with a mouth harp accompaniment.
They also venture off into borderline funk, without getting too funky for my tastes - generally keeping the spattering and wailing feel of the blues during those forays.
Great for when you're in a daytime boogying mood (as opposed to the "I wake up in the morning..." kind of slow blues).
Pick it up if you're a blues afficionado.
Bizarrely, there seems to be *another* band called lithium (http://www.jamendo.com/en/album/561/ - pretty good by the way). Or maybe this is the early demo tape version before he formed Lithium and his music changed a bit and became much tighter. In any case, it is very confusing.
His pieces certainly sound raw. Raw is good, usually, but here the mix does come across as annoyingly bad, with an over-emphasis on the voice. That I can overlook, but what really gets me is that when he goes into guitar-wank mode - the timing sometimes goes uglifyingly out of sync. Still, we've all done that when starting, and anyway, if you push yourself, you improve, and hell, at times it even sounds ok, so I'll even forgive him that.
He labels his stuff punk - maybe it's an attempt to cover the fact his playing is still so raw - traditional punk often had people who were barely musical. It's not punk really - it's plain old guitar rock. Not that it really matters, but just so people know what they'll be listening to if they pick this up.
On the plus side, the musical ideas he has are fine. It is just that polished versions of these would be such a vast improvement. So he needs to really listen to the sounds he's making with fresh ears, and improve his skill at making music. A tip, for what it is worth: playing with other guys, bouncing off ideas will dramatically improve his skills and sense of musical timing.
The title track, Imagine, starts off fairly relaxed, then suddenly strides forth, comes up to you and whacks you around the head. Lovely. Sheena can be my dominatrix any time!
There's something about a cute babe like Sheena who flails her arm windmill fashion, and wields and thrusts her phallic-symbol-ridden guitar with her legs akimbo like in the album cover. And then don't forget the imagery of tough black boots, juxtaposed against the fluffy cute skirt. Oh yeah. The album suits the title track just fine.
Imagine was a fine, exhuberant, piece, and if she can give it that energy when playing live, guys will be tripping over their own tongues and drowning in their own drool.
Abstrait was ok, but just not as good. Like a B side to a single, I guess.
I listened to this album with growing irritation as I went through the tracks. Maybe someone agrees with the opinion I formed:
The lounge bar type of musical backing is cool. The voice is lovely. The mix is fine. Probably the words are good (my french isn't good enough to figure that out). What's missing is the way the words frame their melody - it doesn't fit with the music, and what we do hear is usually too weak in melody to carry a counterpoint. It's like hearing a poem that doesn't rhyme - sometimes it will work, sometimes it won't.
Now, if you have lyrics that wander about like that, they should have their own strong melody. Most of the time these lyrics don't. Not only that, Sophie's trying to fit them in to the rhythm of the song and a lot of the time it doesn't work.
Argh. It bugs me especially because there is potential there! But it needs a smart producer who can imagine the final sound to steer the talent towards that sound.
For what it's worth, here are my tips: try figuring out harmonies for the voice, and multitrack the voice to make that part stronger. Try mangling the lyrics so they fit the structure of the backing better.
It's not going to be applicable to many of the pieces, but thinking like that may help you lead the piece to a better outcome.
Looking back at this review, I realise I may have offended you. That is not my intent. I apologise for savaging your pieces like this - just please take it constructively. If you like, go ahead and savage my pieces in return. I'm fairly thick-skinned.
Punk rock, complete with scowls, rebellion, oi-oi articulation, pogoing, raw thrashy garage energy and loads of shouting. I'm wiping the spittle from my face already. They have a good sound, good backing, good vocals (except the singer *really* lost his energy in Palestine, making it come out really tired).
Too bad they don't have an outstanding song. The material they have is ok, but every single damn piece sounds too much the same as every other piece.
OK, so that's not necessarily a bad thing - eg, Blondie in the late 70s, but then she had song material that grabbed you right away - these guys don't. Though, come to think of it, the backing sometimes sounds Blondie-ish (eg in Mental Powers - that characteristic rhythm-rolling-with-the-drums is pretty reminescent of Denis).
These guys'll be good fun live on a smokey pub night. Or if you are a spotty teenager who likes to pogo around the bedroom, sing into your hairbrush and scowl into the mirror.
Ah... memories...
...ahem.
Yeah, baby!
If you aren't into this kind of music, you'll hate it.
But if you appreciate death metal, you'll probably love Mortad Hell. The sound engineer did a good job (maybe he got nervous after they dismembered the producer and used him for the album cover). Anyway, the sound engineer had good musicians and well laid out tracks to begin with, and so the result rocks. These guys deserve to do well, and they get a big thumbs up from me.
Now can you stop looking at my neck like that and fingering that saw please?
OK, grindcore. In French. What's the hell is that going to be? Sophisticated growling with "oooh la-la!" and "Zut alors!" thrown in?
Intrigued by this album's offensive title, as well as the cover image, (which is about as easy to decipher as the words to the music, but seems to depict SM coprophagy), I really had to listen to this.
Ah well, the vocals weren't growly and guttural enough for me. The guitar-driven blasts were kinda cool though. Like jazz in some ways, but the drums were too mechanical compared with the organic feel of, say, good old Napalm Death. I have no idea if they were drum machines or not.
The nice thing is, that without comprehensible lyrics that go on about death and torture and whatever, you can connect better with the angry feelings he wants to get across.
Oh, yeah, definitely listen to the cookie-monsterised rockabilly "Le Concert" - a quirky piece.
Grading this is tough. I didn't like the mix - but that might be the stream. With a good mix, and of course if you're into grindcore/death metal (a big if!) you owe this a listen. The guys have poured their heart into it.
I pity the people who are not utterly gaga over this band. And I'm sure those people pity me because I am so utterly gaga about this band.
Still, music is a fairly subjective thing.
So, here's my subjective opinion:
Try^d and Vavrek are musical geniuses. I don't mean they're technical wizards or anything like that. I mean they have music and musical feel in their veins, and through chemistry or magic or whatever the hell you want to call it, their stuff writhed and wriggled and coiled together and melted together into something new.
Something new that rose up, grabbed me by the head, stuck a slippery tongue through my ears, went down to my chest cavity and wrapped itself like a throbbing anaconda round my heart, twitching with the beat.
And it has happened not just with one or two pieces, but a whole bunch of them.
If I were a woman I'd demand to have Vavrek's babies or something.
OK, there's stuff I don't care for either, but ... what a huge shortlist of truly brilliant pieces we end up with still:
Empty: love the reverse distort guitar samples or whatever they are. And the tune.
Sunlight: after an odd start it settles into a wistful tune. And what a fine tune it is too.
Witness: What a groove. I prefer the Holowatch Screaming Club Mix of this - get that if you can - it's probably on their home page somewhere. What a fine tune.
This: Beautiful mellow groove. What a fine tune (do you see a pattern here? Yes?).
World that you know: Poignant. Love it. Fine tune, of course.
Rewind: Another fave to rave about. Can't get that tune outta my head.
Our Lives Change: How the hell did they manage to keep churning out such beautiful tunes?
Healing Luna: Not as great as the rest in my humble opinion, but stands out all the same. I mean, you can't get past that lovely tune.
These guys are deservedly a top Jamendo download. So damn talented, it's flabbergasting.
Whatever happens, Try^d, do try^nd keep that magical interaction between the musicians going. You have something special there.
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