Three years ago to the day I started this blog after finishing my freshman year of high school. Yesterday I graduated, and will be travelling across the country to attend college in the Fall. It goes without being said, but I have changed drastically both as a musician and a person since I created this blog. While travelling down the archives of this blog is a trip of nostalgia for me, it’s also a tad embarrassing to see how the trivial problems of my high school personal life bled into a lot of the posts. There’s a lot of great commentary on music contained within some of the posts, but as a whole it’s time for me to move on from this blog.
Music is just as important to me today as it was when I started blogging, if not more so. Whether it be jamming for hours on end with my friends, traveling the country to catch as many Phish shows as possible, listening to as much newly released black metal as I can, or writing and recording original compositions, music is the glue that holds together my existence. I hope that in the 267 blog posts I have posted I have managed to convey this passion and share my joy for the musical arts with others.
I’m eagerly looking forward to the rest of the summer, as I plan road trips with friends, travel to music festivals, and spend as much time as possible with the people who have made the last four years of my life as amazing as they were. However it will also be a bit of a lull for me musically, since any musical project I started now would be forced to end before leaving for college, therefore making the whole process futile. However, once I have relocated to Portland, Oregon I plan to make musical connections as quickly as possible and hopefully start some new projects. When this happens I plan to start a new blog that will document the next step of my life.
I would sincerely like to thank anyone that has ever visited this blog. Seeing as how I originally created this merely as an outlet for myself, the fact that it has reached just shy of 19,000 hits is almost unbelievable to me. Just as I’m closing a chapter of my life, I am now closing the blog that was intertwined with it.
OSI was formulated as a progressive rock supergroup by ex-Dream Theater keyboardist Kevin Moore and Jim Matheos of Fates Warning. The group’s self-titled debut album, which featured progressive metal behemoth Mike Portnoy on drums and acclaimed producer Steven Wilson at the boards, was very much the sum of its parts. Elements of Dream Theater, Moore’s solo work, and progressive rock/metal were all fused to create an addictive and interesting album. The project was only intended as a one-off, with no future releases planned. However, once Moore and Matheos realized they both had gaps in their schedule, a follow-up was recorded.
Free took the sound of OSI in a totally different direction, abandoning the progressive metal influences and instead focusing on a blend of alternative metal and electronic music. The result is a highly atmospheric rock album that combines edgy guitar riffs, electronic soundscapes, and Moore’s tired and droning voice to create something truly unique and special.
“Go” is the third track on the album, and begins in a subdued and melancholic mood. Like most of the project’s songs, the lyrics tend to deal with the depressing side of relationships. However, unlike groups with similar lyrical themes (such as Nine Inch Nails), Moore’s lyrics give off an air of indifference instead of angst. Electronic sounds dominate the beginning of the song, and are joined by acoustic guitar accompaniment.
Moore finishes the verse first by saying “And now I’ve hurt someone,” but in the second verse, after some time has passed, he continues by saying “now I’m having fun.” Although it seems his actions have caused hurt in someone, it doesn’t seem to bother him at all and he is capable of blocking it out and continuing his life. This theme is continued in the chorus, where he states that once he falls asleep, he “will let this go.” The depressing nature of the music suggests that Moore’s lyrics are simply understatement, and although he believes he will be able to “let it go,” something is deeply troubling him.
However, about halfway through the song, after Moore has finished singing, there is a change in tone. A triumphant sounding synth line comes out of nowhere that changes the entire mood of the song. Suddenly the listener is optimistic about the future instead of depressed, and it seems that the subject of the song was indeed able to “let it go.” By simply adding this one musical line, OSI manages to tell a story in its song, by showing the progression of someone who is first depressed but manages to move on past the incident.
The triumphant sound continues for a while, before Moore’s voice comes back in to sing the first verses and chorus of the song again. However, knowing that the subject of the song is successful in their quest to “let it go,” this reprisal is nowhere near as bleak as when it is first sung.
“Go” is an interesting look at how even the simplest changes in structure, or the addition of just one musical element can drastically change the course of a song. Moore and Matheos take the listener on a journey of acceptance and revival, all within the confines of a 4 minute song. It’s a great song from a great musical group. Listen to the song below and feel free to discuss “Go”, OSI, or anything else with me in the comments section!
Sorry this is a day later than normal! This completely slipped my mind yesterday. Unfortunately I’ve been fairly busy, so I wasn’t able to listen to any 2011 releases this week. I will be listening to the new Boris albums sometime soon, however, so except commentary on them for the next week in review.
Genre: Mathcore
“Irony Is a Dead Scene” by Dillinger Escape Plan
Generally regarded to be one of the most extreme and technical bands in any of the “-core” genres, Dillinger Escape Plan have proven themselves time and time again to be creators of chaotic and forward-thinking sonic assaults. Irony Is a Dead Scene, released between their first and second full lengths, captures the band in limbo between vocalists. During this time period they collaborated with the famous Mike Patton of Faith No More fame. It’s an interesting pairing, that yields some incredible results. This EP is abrasive, dissonant, and hyper-technical, yet Patton’s vocal contributions give the album an odd avant-garde flair. For those who enjoy both experimental and hardcore music, this unique EP by DIP is a must-listen.
“Frances the Mute” by The Mars Volta
Genre: Progressive Rock
Frances the Mute is perhaps the pinnacle of modern day progressive rock. Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedrix Bixler-Zavala, the masterminds of TMV, essentially abandon their post-hardcore background entirely on this album to fuse a wholly original sound drawing on influences as varied as ambient noise to Latin American rhythms. The result is mesmerizing; during almost every second on this album there are multiple musical ideas playing off each other simultaneously. Normally this would result in an exhausting listen, but the music is so well arranged that it never becomes overwhelming. The album opener, “Cygnus….Vismund Cygns” does an excellent job of introducing the listener to the variety of sounds they will be exposed to on the record, “The Widow” and “L’Via L’Viaquez” are the more ‘accessible’ numbers of the disc, “Miranda That Ghost Just Isn’t Holy Anymore” provides the most atmospheric section of the record, while the 30 minute album closer “Cassandra Gemini” is personally one of my all time favorite songs. This is progressive rock that is technical without being indulgent, creative without being derivative, forward thinking while not overly-intellectual, and sentimental but not sappy. An absolute must-listen.
Genre: Progressive Rock
“Re-Traced” by Cynic
When I heard that progressive metal behemoths Cynic would be following up their 2008 masterpiece Traced in Air with a EP of acoustic versions of previously released material I was a tad disappointed. Thankfully, Cynic rises well above this description and completely re-works some of their best songs to create entirely new interpretations that sound entirely fresh. These are not the same songs with slightly different instrumentation. “Space for This”, for example, is re-worked to sound like an electronic glitch-hop song, while “Integral Birth” almost works better as a soft rock song. The EP also ends with an entirely new song titled “Wheels Within Wheels” that is just as captivating as anything on Traced in Air, which bodes well for future releases. Leave it to Cynic to turn a ‘remix EP’ into something incredibly interesting!
In this new blog series (which I hope to publish weekly) I will take an in-depth look at an individual song; interpreting its lyrics, examining the music and its structure, and placing it into context within the artist’s discography. For the first installment I chose the Nine Inch Nails single “The Day The World Went Away” from 1999′s The Fragile.
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The Downward Spiral was a masterpiece. It received almost universal critical acclaim, sold quicker than hotcakes (it’s been certified platinum four times over), and pushed the socially awkward Trent Reznor into superstardom. Given the album’s suicidal concept and bleak view of humanity, the public was expecting (perhaps even hoping) for Reznor to go the way of Cobain; burn out in a brilliant flame. Needless to say, this situation would be difficult for any artist, and Reznor responded by pushing off the release of new material for as long as possible.
The Fragile
The Fragile wasn’t released until the fall of 1999, over 5 years after the release of The Downward Spiral; essentially an eternity in the recording business. The angst ridden teenagers that bought Spiral and fell in love with Nine Inch Nails graduated high school, then graduated college, and probably got a respectable job in-between the releases of the albums. Reznor hadn’t stayed static himself, for The Fragile was a radical departure musically from its predecessor. Gone were the relentless blasts of industrial noise, heavy metal guitars, hyper-programmed drums, and mechanical glitches of the past. If The Downward Spiral was an album made by machines, The Fragile is an album made by the Earth. Decay is a central theme of the album, and Reznor pursued this theme by using instruments that were flawed by design and even out-of-tune. No song better shows this shift in style better than the album’s first single, “The Day the World Went Away.”
“The Day the World Went Away” was released to the public in the summer of 1999, months
Single album art
before the release of The Fragile and the public’s first glimpse at what the new Nine Inch Nails album would contain. The song is essentially the polar oposite of The Downward Spiral’s lead single (“The March of the Pigs”), emphasizing the differences between the two albums. While “March of the Pigs” began with a lengthy and intense drum pattern, “The Day the World Went Away” features no percussion at all.
The song begins with faint drones, the remnants of the song that precedes it, before a wall of noise hits the listener like a bulldozer. This wall is made up of electric guitars that buzz more than they play individual notes, echoing the production of My Bloody Valentine’s classic album Loveless, which used guitars to create huge droning soundscapes. The intensity of this section builds as a synthesizer is layered on top of the guitars. Just as quickly as this aural assault begins, it cuts off suddenly and returns to the quieter sound of the song’s beginning. Reznor’s delivers his vague lyrics at this point in a rather subdued fashion, and the song slowly disintegrates upon itself as the sole guitar slows down the riff it has been playing until it reaches complete silence.
It is a common belief that this song’s lyrics relate to the death of Trent’s grandmother, and given this information, the first verse seems to narrate a eulogy begin given at a funeral while echoing the album’s theme of things falling apart (“I’d listen to the words he’d say/but in his voice I heard decay”). Despite the huge loss the narrator has suffered, he still seems to be finding some sort of solace (“there is a place that still remains/it eats the fear it eats the pain), and the song is as optimistic as it is melancholic. The lyrics are brief, and consist of only this one verse.
After a second of silence, the song comes roaring back and the wall of guitars returns as a new progression is played. The vocalist eventually returns to the mix, singing a wordless melody that is as chilling as it is catchy. The carless nature of this melody almost suggests that the singer is mocking death itself as he hums “na na nah, na na nah.” The song then falls apart and the instrumental track “The Frail” begins.
“The Day the World Went Away” is an unusual choice for a single, considering the song has only one verse, no refrain, no percussive element, and an extremely unconventional structure. Nevertheless the song reached #17 on Billboard’s Hot 100, perhaps an indication of the public’s interest in the long awaited release of new Nine Inch Nails material. However, “Starfuckers, Inc.” would be far and away the most popular single from The Fragile.
A music video was originally planned to be released for “The Day the World Went Away”, and was partially finished before it was canned. The video was supposedly filmed in black and white, and featured footage of a funeral (further evidence to the meaning of the lyrics). Those involved with the project have stated that the video was canceled because “Trent thought it was too personal, because of the connection of the song with his grandmother.” “The Day the World Went Away” went on to become a live fixture of Nine Inch Nails shows during the Fragility tour that followed the release of the The Fragile, often making its appearance during the encore.
Still image from the unreleased music video
In many ways, “The Day the World Went Away” defines Nine Inch Nails during The Fragile-era due to its focus on organic instrumentation and lyrics that focus on the decay of life. It’s a powerful and enchanting song that is just as powerful today as it was when first released. Listen to it for yourself, and leave a comment if you have something to share about the song!
A couple of the best releases so far of 2011 dropped this week, so read on to learn what some of the hottest new albums are all about…
Genre: Screamo
“Parting the Sea Between Brightness and Me” by Touche Amore (New release)
Those who pre-ordered this album on the label’s website were thanked with a free digital download of the entire release, which is how I was exposed to TA’s latest well before the release date. Touche Amore burst onto the scene with their seminal debut LP, …to the Beat of a Dead Horse, which showed the band perfecting their melodic take on skramz. Parting the Sea shows the band fleshing out this sound further, so while it’s not a huge leap for the group sonically, it’s still amazing to hear the band doing what they do best. The songs are incredibly aggressive (blast beats even make rare appearances), chaotic, yet still surprisingly melodic. It’s great to see a bands keeping the screamo scene alive, almost 20 years after it was created, but it’s even better to see them offering fans some of the best music the genre has ever seen. Anyone remotely interested in skramz, or for those who are curious to see what “real” screamo is, there is nowhere better to look than Touche Amore.
“Diotima” by Krallice (New release)
Genre: Progressive Black Metal
Taking the progressive black metal scene that seems to be taking shape in New York City to ever greater heights, supergroup Krallice ascends to the top of the pack on their full third length. The album is relentless and tiring, reaching 70 minutes in length and featuring four songs over 12 minutes long. Nevertheless, the band’s sound never grows stale or boring, and the musicians are adept at keeping the compositions interesting with very subtle yet deliberate shifts in melodies or structure. The highlight of the album is “Litany of Regrets,” which features a pulsating, chaotic sounding rhythm. Diotima is an album that is bursting at the seams with creativity, and is a must-listen.
Genre: Black Metal
“In Carbon Mysticism” by Winterus (New release)
This debut LP by USBM band Winterus perfectly complements melodic yet intense black metal riffing with a poor production to create a trance-inducing release. Production can be tricky for raw black metal groups, for if the poor production is overdone, the record can become unlistenable. Thankfully Winterus avoids this trap, and the production fits the music perfectly. Guitars buzz above the mix, playing well-written riffs and melodies, with the drums plodding away solidly underneath. A very respectable release recommended for those who like their black metal raw!
Today marked the date of the tenth Longitudinal Expanse jam session. Julian (whom I have played with at musical groups at school as well as in How Big Is Africa?) joined us as a guest musician on drums. He recently acquired a great deal of expensive recording equipment, so we had quite a bit of fun setting up and sound checking before the jam. The audio quality of the jam was extraordinary, so even though I had forgotten to charge the batteries of my videocamera and was thus unable to film the session, I was confident that we would still have a record of our improvisational journey.
Nonetheless, glitches happen, and although the jam was fully recorded and sounded excellent on tape, the audio files were accidentally deleted, and the recording of the jam was lost forever, making this the first Longitudinal Expanse jam session to not be archived for further listening.
Technical glitches aside, the jam itself was quite extraordinary, and marked the first jam session where no shifts in instrumentation occurred. Normally Charlie and I switch back and forth between different instruments with regular frequencies, but today I stuck to guitar, Charlie plucked away at the bass, and Julian bashed away marvelously on the skins. Since the three of us have played together many times before, a musical chemistry clicked between us instantaneously.
As is the norm, the jam shifted through a variety of phases and moods. It was, as a whole, one of the heaviest jams to date, and featured a great deal of “noise rock” riffing. It was an incredible amount of fun, and the three of us plan to reconvene sometime soon to jam again. Next time I promise it’ll be recorded, hopefully both on video and tape!
I listened to a lot of 2011 metal over the last week, so prepare yourself for a particularly blackened “Week in Music” post…
Genre: Black Metal
“Aesthethica” by Liturgy (New Release)
Liturgy is a Brooklyn based black metal group that specializes in composing melodic yet atmospheric pieces that build up to tremendous walls of noise. It’s a technique the band has become quite adept at, and highlights such as “High Gold” are quite entrancing. Taken on a track by track basis this album is quite amazing, however as a cohesive whole it suffers somewhat. At almost 70 minutes in length, the band’s style does become a bit tiring by the end of the ride, and the interlude tracks (“Helix Skull” and “Glass Earth”) sound out of place, killing some of the album’s momentum. If this album had been slimmed down to a 40-45 minute release it would have been one of the best of the year, but as it stands, it requires a bit of patience to get through. Nevertheless, the high points of this album are incredible, and more than worthy of a listen.
Genre: Melodic Death Metal
“Ferne Tage” by Ära Krâ (New release)
Self-proclaimed “true” metal heads usually shake their head in disgust when the genres of ‘melodic death metal’ and ‘metalcore’ are discussed. It is true that both of these subgenres tend to be more geared to the mainstream than the extreme mainstays of black, death,and doom metal. However, to say that melodic death and metalcore haven’t produced fantastic albums is simply ignorance, and Ära Krâ, newcomers to the scene, prove once again that artistic integrity and originality can exist within these supposedly mainstream scenes. The band plays fuses melodic death, metalcore, post-rock, and even a tinge of black metal to create a hyperkinetic and heavy slab of catchy yet compositionally interesting metal. The band has honed in on an incredibly unique sound on their first release, and they could be the next “big” thing a few years down the line once they release a proper LP. Highly recommended!
Genre: Black Metal
“Ashlands” by Rev 16:8 (New release)
The lastest album from this Swedish band is a brutal slab of well written, traditional sounding black metal. The group takes obvious cues from bands such as Dark Funeral and Marduk. The songs are fast and unrelenting, and with the furiously paced drumming set high in the mix, the album gives off an appropriate air of claustrophobia. Rev 16:8 won’t be winning rewards for originality anytime soon, but Ashlands is a solid album that is easily recommendable. Those of you who like “no-frills” black metal should quite enjoy this release.
Another week, another round of good shit that I listened to (including one of the best releases so far of 2011)!
Genre: Black Metal
“Roads to Judah” by Deafheaven (New release)
Deafheaven is an exciting newcomer to the extreme metal scene that combine elements of post-rock, black metal, and “classic” era screamo (i.e. Orchid, Ampere) to create an intense album of hard hitting metal with an emotional punch. The band displays a creative flair that sets them apart from any other group in the genre; the group has a very unique and powerful sound that hits the listener like a freight train. This is without a doubt one of the best 2011 releases so far!
“You Always Start It/Ordinary Things” by xxxy (New release)
Genre: Future Garage
This two track single from UK future garage/dubstep musician xxxy is a fun and entirely danceable trip through tribal sounding rhythms and grooving bass lines. “You Always Start It”, the A side, is the clear highlight due to its ever changing structure while “Ordinary Things” is a more chilled out song that will let the listener calm down after the fury of the first track. Both songs are excellent, however, and this single is more than worthy of a download by anyone looking to expand their dubstep collection or listen to some cutting edge 2011 dance music.
Genre: Acid Jazz
“First Aid Kid” by Plaster
Looking for funky ass jazz that combines the grimy and pulsing bass lines of IDM with the swing and melodies of jazz? Look no further, for Plaster has manages to fuse such disparate styles into a cohesive and consistent whole with this LP. It starts off rather inconspicuously, with rather simplistic beats tarting off the album, but the jazz elements become much more pronounced as the songs progress. First Aid Kid presents the listener an interesting blend of genres that will sure to interest electronic and jazz aficionados alike, while providing some truly awesome dancing music in the process. Check it out!
Last Friday I attended a Lightning Bolt concert with Charlie and one other friend, but before we left for the show, we got together in Charlie’s garage and did what we do best – jam. The ninth Longitudinal Expanse jam session is a tad louder and heavier than the last few have been (perhaps in anticipation of Lightning Bolt), so look forward to plenty of sludgy riffing and noisy rock. We had one new goodie this time around; an RC-2 loop pedal that I received for my birthday. It was only used prominently in one section, but I’m sure that as I become more comfortable with using it, the pedal will receive more attention in future jams.
The whole jam was captured both through a soundboard recording and a video recording. The soundboard recording isn’t terribly shabby in terms of audio quality, so I have included it as a download below, both in CD quality FLAC and high quality MP3. The video is slowly being uploaded to YouTube over the course of the new few days.
Thinking and driving go hand in hand for me, and today I had a lot to think about as I drove home from school. Par for the course, as my thinking started following a path of its own, I began to feel inspired musically. As soon as I got home I shut myself up in my room and spent an hour working on a song based off the feelings that were surrounding the moment. Unfortunately, it was at this instant that I realized I was no longer in an active rock band.
There are many reasons why How Big Is Africa? fell into inactivity, but I think one main reason led to its downfall. The musical interests of our five members were simply not aligned enough to write music together, and we never settled upon a sound which we all could get excited about. I’ve realized since then that the fewer members a group has, the more likely a singular vision can be reach. So this afternoon, I decided it was time to start a new project.
The minimum number of members that a performing rock group can have, with rare exception, is three; a drummer, a guitarist, and a bassist. Guitarists and bassists are a dime a dozen, it’s quite easy to find one interested in being a band. The bane of my existence is the drummer dilemma; I can never find one interested in the musical directions I want to take a project. It was today that I decided that by being the drummer myself, this problem could be alleviated.
This of course assumes that I’m capable of performing as a drummer. I have never had formal training, despite always having an interest in the instrument. Nevertheless I have spent a good deal of time banging away on a kit, and have slowly started to pick up the fundamentals. If I actually got serious about the instrument, I believe I could quickly pick up the basics.
I’ve been talking both with Matt and Charlie about this idea since I have gotten home, and they both have expressed an interest in giving this a shot and seeing where it goes. We would be aiming for a really grungy/garage rock type of sound. Noisy and loud but full of raw energy and melody. I wrote the lyrics to a song today, and began working on some music to accompany it. Hopefully we’ll meet up sometime this weekend and see if this simple idea, born from a car drive home, will go anywhere. I’m cautiously optimistic; the three of us love playing together and share enough common musical ground to work together on projects. Scheduling conflicts between us should be easily managed, and the three of us are friends. On the other hand, I’ve had an incredible number of promising musical ideas end in disappointment and failure. I honestly have no idea if this project will get off the ground. But if it does, it could be an incredible experience.
I’ll end this post with an excerpt from the lyrics I wrote today:
“Boredom hangs in the air I breathe
And interest is something I try and grasp
If all of the world is a fucking stage
We’re all actors reading off the same damn page”
The title of the piece is “We’re Singing the Same Song, But We’re in a Different Key.”
Posted by Kevin 
