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Anyway the place was really crowded, due to being a sell out show so being as short as I am, I have the great advantage of getting people’s head into my camera and recording video was out of the question because it would be impossible.

I would say Los Campesinos! started off a bit slow as it was a little hard to get the crowd into it. Gareth was talking to fans though when they tuning their instruments. One of my concerns turned into fruition, with 7 members and the raging of instruments the vocals tend to get lost or drowned out this was especially the case for Aleks as at times it was impossible to hear her. Gareth has some pretty good stage presence pacing around back and forth across stage and at one point climbed up 10 feet in the air on the speakers.

Musically Los Campesinos were sharp for the most part, it is a great spectacle watching all 7 members playing. They were enjoying themselves as well and it seemed like everyone was out there giving their best effort.

Definitely the highlight on the night was during the song “You! Me! Dancing” where the crowd finally got the groove and starting jumping and well..dancing. It was probably one of the better live moments I’ve been to. That song alone make the concert great. Otherwise nothing really matched the crowd intensity to that song but they were overall pretty good.

It Started With A Mixx by Los Campesinos!

My Year In Lists by Los Campesinos!

Jeffrey Lewis and The Jitters opened the show and it might’ve been one of the most interesting and unique sets I’ve listened to/watched. I never checked out their music so it was bit of “surprise me” kind of thing and indeed they did. They started out with a slow space rock piece but they won over a lot of the crowd with the short story on “Champion Jim” the brief history of Communism part 3 and The History of Punk Rock from 1950-1975 in New York. Musically I’m still undecided about them but definitely the creativity in their live show sets them apart.

Photos below:
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Anyway I’m not here to review them quite yet, I’m here to offer some Ting Tings swag, in the name of two guest list spots to their show on June 16th, 2008 at the Mod Club in Toronto and we’re giving two consolation prizes, two copies of their CD “We Started Nothing”.

Some contest rules:
1. Only open to Canadian citizens (considering the US gets so many perks, we deserve something)
2. Contest ends on June 10th
3. To enter just leave a comment in this post with a valid e-mail. If you want two entries to the contest you can sign up via e-mail to my feed.
4. If you manage to win the tickets, you can pass and take a CD if you’d like.

Thanks to Groundswork Marketing and Columbia.

That’s Not My Name by The Ting Tings

Shut Up And Let Me Go by The Ting Tings

The story behind The Submarines seems kind of funny, they dated, broke up, wrote songs about each other and then shared these songs and got back together to make their first album Declare A New State.

The first song I instantly became enamored with was the “Xavia”, it was a gentle pop song, maybe typical and I think at face value it shows off what The Submarines are exactly, mixing in a perfect balance of male and female vocals while adding some guitar elements that enjoyable despite being “simple”. The next track I instantly liked was “You, Me & The Bourgeoisie” it’s an upbeat pop song though after some time I think the pop novelty wore off. The next track I dug was “Thorny Thicket” and soon the rest kind of followed.

While I don’t think any track has “Brighter Discontent” potential…that’s simply an awesome track the rest of the album is pretty solid and there really isn’t any disappointments. Nothing overly great unfortunately though you get the sense The Submarines are just as capable as any other bands. Some pretty nice pop elements, good singing in every song. Lyrically not as strong as I would’ve liked though.

Rating: 3.75 out of 5.
I’ve become picky with my pop it seems but generally my top of the year is some kind of independent pop.

Brighter Discontent by The Submarines

Xavia by The Submarines

You, Me and The Burgeoisie by The Submarines

Buy this album at: Insound

Thanks to The Rock Blogger, I was introduced to Have A Nice Life, a shoegaze/industrial/metal duo from Connecticut. They self-released their debut album, Deathconsciousness this past January. It features a two-side disc set with a 70-page essay-type book that revolves around the history of religious symbolism and ideology, focusing on Antiocheanism, a religious cult that centred around the teachings of a sketchy character named Antiocus (can’t find any other info on this, so whether or not the entire book is based on some fictitious character, I don’t know, but regardless the general idea is compelling, to say the least). For awhile, you could have ordered the real thing, but it sold out and now the album is only available for digital download, and the booklet available in a .pdf format.

Deathconsciousness is a very interesting album, and like all concept albums, it requires full attention to really enjoy it. I’ll talk about it in a little more detail later, but for now I just want to focus on the music. Musically, Have A Nice Life blends shoegaze, industrial, and metal…very reminiscent of My Bloody Valentine (as has been mentioned in almost all reviews) and its shoegaze goodness, featuring lots of lo fi drone, reverb and distortion in their music. They also denote some post-rock qualities (kind of reminds me of Red Sparowes and Godspeed—probably the metal features), as in “A Quick One Before the Eternal Worm Devours Connecticut.” A lot of reviewers call it inconsistent, but I think I can understand why, as this album was in the works for about five years before its release. The second disc is a bit more consistent than the first, goes with the concept itself, too; the first disc seems a little lighter and sillier, not to mention some of the titles are pretty quirky.

The concept behind Deathconsciousness is just exactly what the title is—to be conscious of the tedious truth of inevitable death; really, it’s a stab at existentialism, and to quote the booklet, “And It begs the question – “What is the point?”” I don’t want to mistakenly say something about the concept of what the band was trying to present, and really, they don’t try to really argue its point…but I find the idea of it interesting: to question religious and spiritual convictions, ideas of life and death, morals and values, etc.

An awesome concept album, I highly recommend it. It really does require a lot of your attention (hence my late post), but is absolutely worth it.

Check out this link for instructions on buying the album.

Have a Nice Life – Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail

Have A Nice Life – Bloodhail

South the first track off Changes, incorporates the classic punk sound consisting of palm muted overdriven guitars and a drum backbone. The track further adds flare with the use of a piano, but finally the entire mood of the song is set by the vocals. The vocals are a combination of both Colin Baylen and Shaun Profeta, and are key to A Cursive Memory’s success. The vocals are slightly high-pitched, very soft, but most importantly outrageously mellow. Without the vocals, I might have thought the instrumentals for South were for a more upbeat song, but the singing definitely sets the direction, and this is noticed throughout the entire album.

The second track, Everything, follows in similar fashion. A more aggressive melody combined with the perfect voice, leaves little left to say. However, this track has easily become my favourite, and for one main reason. Although the sound is quite similar to other tracks, it’s the catchy lyrics that win me over this time around. The vocal tune of Everything, is just incredibly addictive and makes for a very fun, entertaining listen. The guitars follow in suit, and play an extremely catchy riff. The drums and synths add the finishing touches, to what has become my favourite song off of Changes. Remaining quite mellow, it still has very catchy aspects which is the selling point for me.

Skipping to The Piano Song, this is obviously one of the songs that uses softer sounding instruments. With the piano as the feature instrument, it is backed by what sounds like an acoustic guitar (or clean electric) and delicate drums. The vocals add to the emotions of this song, creating a very sad and powerful listen. Everything works very well together to give listeners just an incredible surge of passion and sentiment. The raw emotions can be heard from the piano, guitar, vocals or drums alone, but combined create an electrifying atmosphere of beautiful sounds.

Changes is a really great debut, it consists of an overall mellow theme, but uses a variety of background melodies. Being able to create so many different sounds yet remain consistent is what A Cursive Memory has done, however ironic that sounds. It’s truly hard for me to describe A Cursive Memory, because I feel they are a different breed of pop-punk, but still fit quite well within the genre. The best thing to do is to check them out for yourself, because Changes is an album that’s both entertaining and inspiring.

Check out their Myspace for official tour dates and album info.

A Cursive Memory – Everything

A Cursive Memory – The Piano Song

After listening to all 36 songs on NIN’s Ghosts I-IV, I would pigeonhole this album along with all NIN remix albums into an “experimental” category rather than include it in the NIN discography. If you bought this album expecting good new NIN materials, you’ll be very disappointed.

Ghosts I-IV consists of 36 instrumental tracks. Most of the songs aren’t very instrumental and there’s a lot of bass and static and distortion sounds. All the tracks on this album sounds basically like old NIN classics without the vocal, guitars, or energy. This is kind of disappointing because they did make the theme for Fight Club and it was so good.

There are some tracks that are quite nice and relaxing to listen to but the way they’re mixed together just sort of made everything a mess and nothing is very memorable. After the first couple of songs, everything actually start to sound kind of similar. I can group every track on this album into two categories: “hurt”-sounding and “closer”-sounding.

All in all, It would make a nice soundtrack to life and is something I would listen to while doing homework or working or maybe even sleeping if I take all the distortion noise tracks out but it’s nothing to rock out to.

1 Ghosts I

5 Ghosts I

9 Ghosts I

Download Ghosts I here.

Buy the album at: Amazon, Insound, cdUniverse

1. Queens Will Play by Black Mountain
2. Queen of The Nile by Dragged by Horses
3. Squalor Victoria by The National
4. A King and A Queen By Okkervil River
5. Some Things Last A Long Time by Beach House (long reign as Queen)
6. Fast Blood by Frightened Rabbit (first known carrier of hemophilia in the royal family)
7. Monarch by Feist
8. Song of The Sad Assassin by Why? (numerous assassination attempts)

I decided to check this album due to strong reviews, early pre-record release hype and a track that was just off the charts sick in “Machine Gun”. The album wasn’t far from expectations as I was kind of expecting something weird and probably causing an outer-body experience as if I was high…maybe drugs would make this album 10x better?

There are really very few comparisons I can make, I think my knowledge is limited on the subject but the atmosphere feels a little bit like Burial’s Untrue where there’s more of a dark/eerie spine-tingling atmosphere created with the music coupled with Beth Gibbons sincere voice.

I know this music is pretty darn good but sometimes it’s just I don’t feel like I like it as much. It has more to do with style rather then actual substance so it’s a personal preference (or my brain) that I won’t enjoy this album as much. The elements are great, it’s a great electronica album from every sense of the word and while there isn’t anything I could change, the line between best and great is quite thin. Like there were rumblings that “The Rip” should be one of the best songs of the year but it didn’t quite win me over until the 5th listen and even then I’m not sure I would recommend that to the masses.

Definitely an album that has artwork written all over it but it’s not for everyone (though that’s not a bad thing). I really don’t know how this album will be for me for a few months from now…maybe I’ll go back to it and say “Wow I lowballed them” or I’ll just forget it and I’d be happy with the review.

I’d like to give this album a top score but hey remember it’s just a blog after all and it’s quite possible that the only people that take us seriously is ourselves
Rating: 4.25 out of 5.

Machine Gun by Portishead

The Rip by Portishead

Buy this album at: Insound and Cd Universe

I haven’t had this Sunday spot filled out for a long time and I’m looking for a writer to consistently write a post once a week.

The only thing I’m looking for is someone who is passionate about music, writing and HTML skills don’t need to be tip-top (but I’ll expect improvement over time).

If you think you have different tastes and can add something to our website and would like to write to a sizable audience (on pace for more then 20,000 unique visitors and close to 40,000 hits this month) and receive some of the “perks” that we bloggers do (can’t pay anything at this moment but will look to once this website receives a bigger audience) please contact me, Allan at acheng88@gmail.com

Quitzow’s vocals aren’t perfect but I guess you can call it the trademark of indie female vocalists like Karen O, kind of rough but highly entertaining regardless. Kind of a mix of Karen O from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Love is All’s Josephine Olausson. Both good singers in their own right but rough around the edges that it goes well with the music.

I don’t have anything to review this weekend so apologies for the lack of a review.

Sponsor (It Didn’t Mean A Thing) by Quitzow