Saturday, May 28, 2005
I always have a song inside my head
I feel so bad for not posting a lot these last few weekends, but I'm just really lazy... What else can I tell ya? Anyway, I got to know what my written-exam would be yesterday. It stood between English and math, and math came out the victor. Ach, the bad guys win, but that's how it is in real life because I'm not living a movie. Or am I?!
There's a good thing about all this, believe it or not, and that is that I've got four brand spankin' new cd's to get me through the late nights of doing math to come. Just look at it:
[Insert photo here later] (This is one of the reasons my post came a little late... I wanted to take some photo's but the memory-card from the camera wouldn't go into the computer so I could upload them... that bastard memory-card)
Isn't that a gorgeous sight? The truth is that I've had these cd's a little over a week now, so I've had the time to listen to most of them many times, and now I'll give you my "professional review on most of them. Let's just see how many I manage to get through.
The Arcade Fire - Funeral
System Of A Down
Couldn't find a picture of the album-cover, or a publicity shot with good quality so I'll have to make due with this one. I was very worried that this album wouldn't meet my expectations when I pre-ordered it, the single BYOB was so and so at first. It was a good song, but I still had a gut feeling that the album wouldn't cut the cheese when I received it.
What first struck me about it was (and this is probably one of the few things Mezmerize has in common with Funeral) that the cover looked absolutely gorgeous. From what I'd seen from pictures I wasn't at all impressed about the artwork, but when I got it I took a 180 and got... well, impressed.
First listen through I thought that it was mighty happenin'. It sounded heavy, catchy and it had a lot of Daron Malakian's wonderful vocals. Oh, and a surprising keyboard/vocordy track. Second listen I got less impressed and started to wonder if my childhood-heroes had lost it. I heard through it one more time while looking through the lyric-sheet. The second thing that struck me was that Daron had not only made the music for some of the songs, but also contributed with the lyrics, and made songs all by himself. This was interesting, and I instantly blamed this for why I didn't instantly like the record.
A couple of days later, after listening to /reading a lot of good reviews about the album I decided to give it another go. And then it all came together. The album suddenly became a fun ride, with amazing hooks, lyrics and that good ol' SoaD punch. As one reviewer put it "SoaD is not only a heavy force to be reckoned with on this album, but they also come up with amazing hooks that even Justin Timberlake could be jealous of, this is a contemporary metal-classic." He said it in Norwegian and I'm not sure if it's exactly what he said, but it was something along those lines, and I agreed with it.
I don't think it was the good reviews that made me enjoy the album, because I'd only seen positive reviews of it before listening to it the first time, but I just think that it's album that takes time to really shine through, at least for an old skeptic as myself. Two thumbs up for the armenians!
I really should do some math/Norwegian tomorrow but I'll see what I can do about a Million Dead review on their great new album. Right now I'm too tired to focus on that.
So to the bed to sleep it is.
Znoozers.
There's a good thing about all this, believe it or not, and that is that I've got four brand spankin' new cd's to get me through the late nights of doing math to come. Just look at it:
[Insert photo here later] (This is one of the reasons my post came a little late... I wanted to take some photo's but the memory-card from the camera wouldn't go into the computer so I could upload them... that bastard memory-card)
Isn't that a gorgeous sight? The truth is that I've had these cd's a little over a week now, so I've had the time to listen to most of them many times, and now I'll give you my "professional review on most of them. Let's just see how many I manage to get through.
The Arcade Fire - Funeral
First up is The Arcade Fire with their debut album Funeral. I'll admit that I'm VERY late in the matter of acquiring this wonderful piece of music, but as my time mostly consists of being a skint student I have to prioritize. And this album was definitely worth the wait. The band is from Canada (or so I believe), so naturally they mix English and French in the lyrics and it's just breathtakingly beautiful at times. I'm not listening to it as I write this so it's a bit hard to get down how it made me feel, and pull out strong/weak points, but you'll just have to bear(teehee) with me. I'm actually listening to the album I'll be talking about next, and that's the glory of System Of A Down's Mezmerize. Maybe I should save this Arcade Fire-thing for later, seeing as the Mezmerize now has me all pumped up and ready for some fisticuffs, so I'll just move on to SoaD:
System Of A Down
Couldn't find a picture of the album-cover, or a publicity shot with good quality so I'll have to make due with this one. I was very worried that this album wouldn't meet my expectations when I pre-ordered it, the single BYOB was so and so at first. It was a good song, but I still had a gut feeling that the album wouldn't cut the cheese when I received it.
What first struck me about it was (and this is probably one of the few things Mezmerize has in common with Funeral) that the cover looked absolutely gorgeous. From what I'd seen from pictures I wasn't at all impressed about the artwork, but when I got it I took a 180 and got... well, impressed.
First listen through I thought that it was mighty happenin'. It sounded heavy, catchy and it had a lot of Daron Malakian's wonderful vocals. Oh, and a surprising keyboard/vocordy track. Second listen I got less impressed and started to wonder if my childhood-heroes had lost it. I heard through it one more time while looking through the lyric-sheet. The second thing that struck me was that Daron had not only made the music for some of the songs, but also contributed with the lyrics, and made songs all by himself. This was interesting, and I instantly blamed this for why I didn't instantly like the record.
A couple of days later, after listening to /reading a lot of good reviews about the album I decided to give it another go. And then it all came together. The album suddenly became a fun ride, with amazing hooks, lyrics and that good ol' SoaD punch. As one reviewer put it "SoaD is not only a heavy force to be reckoned with on this album, but they also come up with amazing hooks that even Justin Timberlake could be jealous of, this is a contemporary metal-classic." He said it in Norwegian and I'm not sure if it's exactly what he said, but it was something along those lines, and I agreed with it.
I don't think it was the good reviews that made me enjoy the album, because I'd only seen positive reviews of it before listening to it the first time, but I just think that it's album that takes time to really shine through, at least for an old skeptic as myself. Two thumbs up for the armenians!
I really should do some math/Norwegian tomorrow but I'll see what I can do about a Million Dead review on their great new album. Right now I'm too tired to focus on that.
So to the bed to sleep it is.
Znoozers.
