Category: Music
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Magari – A Crescent Dream (progressive rock/ post-rock)
Sometimes possessed of the dramatic bombast of its prog roots, and drawing its stylistic features from all over, this music mainly takes the textural approach characteristic of post-rock. It most resembles the traditional sounds of progressive rock on ‘Oceans Away’, the third movement of this three part composition, particularly in…
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Diane Marie Kloba – I Am An Unknown Artist (avant pop)
‘Avant pop’ is a term that has been bandied about at various times, in various contexts, and it is one that Diane Marie Kloba has applied to her own work… It may take some listeners a while to hear past the somewhat challenging surface of this music. Once they do…
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The Little Unsaid – Into The Faceless Night (folk/ alternative rock)
Original songs in the style of folksong aren’t ‘folk’ in the sense of ‘traditional music’, and nor in fact do they actually sound like any traditional music ever did… this is a collection of finely crafted songs in a style that draws heavily on that tradition, with some rock elements,…
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Raising Maisie – “Etc, Etc” (indie pop)
Studio Dog Records, 2010, CD album, 34m 38s, £7 http://www.myspace.com/raisingmaisie http://www.liveunsigned.com/Raising_Maisie/ Raising Maisie are not badass, intimidating or scary in any way. Neither are most hardcore, extreme metal or gangsta rap artists, but Raising Maisie aren’t pretending. Pretension is no part of their uncomplicated, well crafted, concise and extremely entertaining…
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VA – Dusty Curtain Face Sampler (various styles)
Dusty Curtain Face Records DCF-001, 2011, CD album, 73m 8s, £? http://www.hobopope.com/fr_otherbands.cfm Dusty Curtain Face Records are about as DIY and low key as a label can be, based on their founder/ producer/ engineer Paul Rhodes’ realisation that he could use some cheap, semi-functional equipment in bands’ rehearsal spaces to…
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Monday Musings: Exciting Times In Music & The Week’s News Roundup
It’s definitely an exciting time to be active in music, for a host of reasons. The industry is in flux, and it’s fascinating to watch its convulsions as the market works out what sort of distribution mechanisms it’s going to support. There are new technologies for musicians springing up on…
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The Scoobs – Is It Now? (world groove fusion)
self released SCOOBS001, 2009, CD album, 49m £5 http://www.thescoobs.co.uk/ It’s only a few weeks since I reviewed a Scoobs gig, and what they do live is very similar to what’s on this recording. I get the impression that all or most of these tunes have been honed and developed through…
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Artificial Sun Project – 62204 (ambient/ electronica/ IDM)
self released, 2011, DD album, 68m 8s £name your price http://artificialsunproject.bandcamp.com/album/62204-2 http://www.facebook.com/pages/Artificial-Sun-Project/224311699231 ‘Ambient’ is a term that has carried many meanings in music. As originally coined by Brian Eno it referred to an approach which placed intentional sound in the habitable environment without necessarily making it the focus of…
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BaianaSystem – BaianaSystem (Brazilian/ Guitarra Baiana)
Guitarra Baiana is both a Brazilian musical style and an instrument: the instrument is a small solidbody electric guitar, derived from the cavaquinho, whose origins predate the American inventions of Leo Fender and Les Paul (although not the solid bodied Hawaiian guitar). The musical style was a 1950s instrumental genre,…
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Simon Little – Mandala (ambient/ solo bass/ jazz)
One of the tracks on this album is titled ‘Ohm Is Where The Art Is’: it’s awfully tempting to run with that, and build a critical edifice around the idea of ‘ohm’ signifying a metaphorical sense of impedance or resistance, but to be honest, I’m pretty sure Simon Little’s artistic…
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She Makes War – Disarm (gloom-pop/ singer-songwriter)
War isn’t the first thing that springs to mind: there’s a lot of female performers out there with a far more aggressive image, but there’s certainly a strength and a sense of resistance in the persona that Laura Kidd articulates through her music as She Makes War. This is dark…
Oliver Arditi 