Masta Ace - A Long Hot Summer

Ill hip-hop. This one's quite special since it's a concept album. The premise is set in the first track; Masta Ace and Fats Belvedere are countin' stackz, and Masta Ace says that you may be wondering how they got all tha cheese. The story is told throughout the album.

A Long Hot Summer is conscious, hard-hitting, entertaining, and deep. Ace really brings the heat with his lyricism, covering topics like poverty, life in the hood, street violence, and his fate. Soda & Soap is a creative track, in which he makes frequent allusions to different soda drinks and soap products ("She danced at this club and made the guys holler / And in a minute, made like a thousand dollars", "Everybody now and then bound to struggle / I just grab my wife and we lay and snuggle / We talk about the ivory coast, how one day / We gonna sail on the tide and get whisked away"). The skits don't ruin anything at all, since they're crucial to the storyline here.

Highly recommended. Not the kind of hip-hop you'd see every day; don't miss out.



Listen to: Da Grind, H.O.O.D., Beautiful, Soda & Soap

Robert Rich - Illumination

Dark, deep, and brooding ambient.

I like it.

Mono - Under the Pipal Tree

You know what sucks about Mono?
Their music really doesn't change much from album to album; generic stuff.

But you know what doesn't matter about Mono?
Their music really doesn't change much from album to album; generic stuff.

Why?
Their music contains so much energy and beauty.

I really don't know how they do it, because their albums sound really similar. Their songs are formulaic (typical post-rock crescendos, build-ups, climaxes, soft parts, etc). But I really had a hard time putting this album down as soon as I hit play.

Corea - Los Peores 7 km de mi Vida

Screamo band Corea, hailing from Spain (lol?), dropped this great album in '04. They fall under that screamo/post-rock category, with bands like Envy and City of Caterpillar. Corea differs quite a bit from these two bands though. The post-rock parts in their songs are really unique, with some unconventional and complex clean guitar playing. Also, Corea adds noise elements to some of the songs on this album. Sounds like it really wouldn't work in the middle of a screamo album, but underneath the wall of noise are some beautiful guitar melodies and singing (this would be on track 6, entitled "Siete Kilometros"). There are moments of absolute brilliance on this album, but there are some mildly dull moments. Still an impressive record overall.

Arvo Pärt - Alina

Beauty in minimalism. Simple piano parts, simple string parts, yet highly effective.

True music for reflection.

Arvo Pärt is the man!

Gaiser - Blank Fade

(Jon) Gaiser puts out a really lovable ambient/minimal techno record with Blank Fade. It is a really long album (running time of almost and hour and a half), but I felt that listening to the whole thing was an entertaining experience and well worth it. Encompassing atmospheres; groovy rhythms, sampling, beats (lol); I think that it's all here.



Check out: Face Down, Descending Order

The Streets - A Grand Don't Come For Free

UK hip-hop? Yeah, it exists. And Mike Skinner does it pretty well here.

This one's a concept album. It's kind of like an everyday life story of your average drug-head. The story is rather practical, and so, you might find it not very interesting at first, but some of the lyrics will make a fun listen.

The album starts off with a sampled horns section, and then Skinner lazily wheezes out "it was supposed to be so eaaassssyyyy". You'll probably laugh if you hear that part, and then you'll laugh even more once he starts "rapping". My first time listening to this album, I thought I wouldn't be expecting much since Skinner has a terrible flow/no flow whatsoever. His flow sounds really careless, almost as if he was narrating his story to somebody, in verse. If you're looking for virtuoso-like MCing, don't listen to this. There's something about that flow though. I don't know how to describe it (lol fail), but it adds a lot to the atmosphere of the album. Like on "Blinded by the Lights", The Streets writes about this drug trip, and as if it was happening at that moment, his flow as he tells the experience makes it sound really real. Also, there's a good amount of humour throughout the CD, and that makes me want to listen to it so much more.

The beats are really simple. Garage(-influenced) kind of stuff, with some piano and guitar samples, as well as synth melodies. Not that this is a bad thing though, since I like these beats. A lot. (I'm a fan of that UK grime/dubstep/garage sound, so that explains it.)


Listen to:
- It Was Supposed to Be So Easy
- Fit But You Know It (this one's hilarious)

Uusitalo - Tulenkantaja

Well here is a nice electronic album by mr. Sasu Ripatti under one of his names, Uusitalo. This isn't house-y like his Luomo work, or glitchy like his Vladislav Delay stuff. Instead, we have some electronic dance/techno-ish music.

I certainly like the approach here. Nice and light, with simple beats and interesting synth melodies. The first couple of tracks are kickin', but the rest of the album (starting from the half-way point) seems to drag on.

I'd still recommend it. This is a great record.



Check out: Paskaa Musaa, Odottava Peto, Kalajuttuja

High Contrast - High Society

Some pretty good drum and bass going on here, in that groovy liquid funk style. It has its great tracks (Racing Green, Twilight's Last Gleaming), and it's not-so-great tracks.

I'm not much a fan of vocal sampling in drum and bass, but I guess it works fairly well on this album.



Check out: the aforementioned songs

Cannibal Ox - The Cold Vein

Hailing from Harlem, Vordul Mega and Vast Aire drop this tight hip-hop album. It's abstract, it's intelligent. Both MCs are amazing; they have great flow, and absolutely stellar lyrics. Their diction is Mega Vast, and they create some rather interesting, vivid imagery ("Yo it wasn't even like that / I wanted my cardiovascular to fight back" -- The F-Word). The topics covered on the album are pretty unconventional. Well, actually, not really. Relationships, poverty, New York life, self-superiority, etc. But they describe each topic with such incredible and creative lyricism ("You were a stillborn baby / your mother didn't want you but you were still born" -- Iron Galaxy). Sometimes, I felt that some of the lyrics made no sense, but it took me multiple listens through this album to see what was going on. This is abstract material.

El-P's beats are really cool. They're relatively slow, atmospheric, hazy, and thick. He throws in some bizarre samples, some that sound like 8-bit audio pieces.

It does have a running time of around an hour and 15 minutes, but that's not so much of a problem for me since the lyrics are truly captivating.

Ill shit. Check it.



Listen to: Iron Galaxy, Raspberry Fields, Vein, The F-Word, Painkillers, Pigeon

Godspeed You! Black Emperor - lift yr. skinny fists like antennas to heaven!

Welcome to post-rock, where there are millions of bands who sound like each other.

Except for a few. Godspeed You! Black Emperor is one of those few.

lift yr. skinny fists like antennas to heaven! is without a doubt one of the most innovative post-rock releases of our time. If you've ever come across this band and were intrigued by the song lengths... well then. Each long song is divided into smaller movements, making parts a little more distinguishable. The movements are usually triumphant post-rock compositions (with epic build-ups), ambient pieces, and sometimes even silence. Sounds like it wouldn't work out, but to me, the mix is perfectly fine and the album flows well.

My favourite song (yes, song. that includes every containing movement) here is definitely "Sleep". What I love about this band is that the violin/cello/whatever bow instruments they use add so much to the music. The second movement of "Sleep", "Monheim", is an hauntingly beautiful post-rock piece. The build-up of reverberating guitars and drums leads up to an explosion of emotion, which is almost a march-like piece with an effects-heavy guitar melody. The movement dies down into a subtle and quiet guitar interlude, until it begins it's build-up into the third movement of the track, "Broken Windows, Locks of Love pt. III". This movement is the absolute highlight of the album for me. It's sublieme, and it just leaks and drips emotion. As stated, the bowed string instruments contribute so much to the music, and in this particular movement, the violin melody (mixed with guitar harmonies) is absolutely stunning.

Enough fellatio towards one song (lolol)... the other masterpieces on this album contain brilliant movements to them as well. The atmospheres throughout the album are wonderfully grandiose. There are a lot of emotions evoked through listening to this. I guess I won't explain them all that much though... just buy the album and see for yourself the magic held within this record.

Wu-Tang Clan - Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)

Whoa wait, so I haven't reviewed this yet?

... >_>

Well it's an obvious classic, if you had not known that already. When this album was dropped in stores, it was probably the most original and fresh hip-hop album of its time. There are so many new ideas presented here. Where to start?

The lyrics are absolutely insane. In many ways. They're hardcore, raw, vulgar, violent, really friggin' creative, aggressive, innovative, etc. By first impression, you might think that nine members would be hard to listen to. But hell naw. Surprisingly, each member of the Wu is distinct from one another. Ghostface Killah has got the loud and high-pitch voice, GZA has some superb lyrical skills, Inspectah Deck has a sick flow, Ol' Dirty Bastard's voice is totally wild, etc. Each MC brings the energy on his turn.

And now for the beats. They rule. Even to this day, they are still unlike anything I've ever heard. RZA really knows what the fuck he's doing. Each beat carries a really intense atmosphere. Some are dark as hell, some are chilled out, some are hard-hitting. The sampling here is genius, and really appealing to me -- piano samples, horn samples, organ samples... RZA's got it all.

This review might be a little incoherent, but that's only because there are oh so many good things to say about this album that I lose track of my thoughts. hah


Listen to: every song!!!!!1111