Blogcritics Category: Music: Electronica

Music Review: Stars Like Fleas - The Ken Burns Effect

Jordan Richardson — Tue, 6 Jan 2009 16:39:02 EST

Audacious and endlessly beautiful.
Amorphous and calculated at the same time, the music of Stars Like Fleas creates wraith-like music that has no issues burying itself in the listener’s consciousness. Based out of Brooklyn, of course, the band is the invention of Shannon Fields and Montgomery Knott. With components of avant-garde jazz, noise rock, indie rock, and electronica,...

Music Review: Colour Kane -A Taste Of

Jeff Perkins — Sun, 4 Jan 2009 17:42:41 EST

Travel up and beyond the lowlands with Colour Kane.
Have you ever tried to eat a doughnut without licking your lips? For me, at least, it’s impossible. Now here’s an equally unachievable challenge. Try and review A Taste Of, by Belgium dream pop artists Colour Kane, and not include words such as dreamy, soaring, atmospheric, or the oft quoted ‘blissed-out’.Colour Kane emanate...

Music Review: Indie Round-Up - D'Haene, June Moris, Back Door Slam

Jon Sobel — Fri, 2 Jan 2009 18:01:27 EST

In a world of hyper-talented young musicians, Back Door Slam plays truly impressive stuff, because it feels real.
D'Haene, VinylD'Haene's new disc is spring-loaded with hard-locked rhythms, chunky guitar riffing, and metalized melodies sung with a bluesy, soulful inflection. If, vocally, D'Haene tends to be a touch more convincing on more easy-going fare ("Took Me So Long"), that's because of the soulful quality that defines his...

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Fri, 2 Jan 2009 18:01:27 EST

Music Review: Nina Simone - Remixed & Reimagined

David Bowling — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 08:49:26 EST

Nina Simone's music is remixed and issued on vinyl. It doen't get much better than that!
The Sony BMG label began its Remixed & Reimagined series in 2006 and the music of Nina Simone was the first release. The concept was to allow assorted club DJ's to recut songs of classic artists in modern form. It may seem like an odd idea, but the results proved at least interesting and, in places, excellent.This album was originally...

Music Review: Innerpartysystem - Innerpartysystem

Jordan Richardson — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 23:31:31 EST

An impressive, speaker-rattling introduction.
Filled with zealous sparks of brilliance and shards of pop/emo/punk/electronic/dance awesomeness, Innerpartysystem’s self-titled debut is a speaker-rattling thunderbolt.Based out of Pennsylvania, Innerpartysystem began out of the remnants of an emo band. Singer Patrick Nissley and drummer Jared Piccone were members of Thirteen Over Eight...

Music Review: Various Artists - Verve Remixed Christmas

Sterfish — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:55:15 EST

A great disc to add to your not-so-traditional holiday music collection.
After four acclaimed collections, the Verve Remixed series finally gets in the holiday spirit with Verve Remixed Christmas. This new collection lets loose a variety of remixers on holiday tracks by jazz greats like Nina Simone, Count Basie, and Ella Fitzgerald. While purists will probably bristle, fans of compilations like the Christmas Remixed...

Music Review: The Japanese Popstars - We Just Are

Jordan Richardson — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:38:33 EST

A devastating and gorgeous debut.
Devastating and gorgeous all at once, The Japanese Popstars’ We Just Are is one of the most enthralling records of the year. Much in the same way Bristol’s Fuck Buttons unloaded obliterating noise on one of the best albums of 2008, Street Horrrsing, The Japanese Popstars have similar ferocity in their approach to the ultimate purity of...

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Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:38:33 EST

Music Review: Boards of Canada - Music Has The Right To Children

Andy Peterson — Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:26:51 EST

Electronica's eureka moment: probably the only classic album not reissued in 2008.
By the early 1990’s we had become familiar with the paradoxical idea of dance music that you couldn’t dance to. As rave ground to a nihilistic halt, the Warp label’s seminal Artificial Intelligence series precised a change of direction, it's roots deep in the eloquence/elegance of the first wave techno that had been originally...

Music Review: RL/VL - Chagrin

Jeff Perkins — Mon, 8 Dec 2008 08:38:00 EST

Is it real or is it virtual? Welcome to the strange world of RL/VL.
Just who is RL/VL? What does it stand for? What does the title of the debut album Chagrin actually mean? These were the questions that I had in my mind when I opened this intriguing CD. I was even more confused when I saw that the album had taken a far from straight journey. I found the CD, originated in Belfast and had arrived here in France via...

Music Review: Paul van Dyk - Hands On In Between

David R Perry — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 23:29:27 EST

The companion to Paul's previous album, In Between, receives a solid, if homogeneous, remix treatment.
In Between was, overall, a bit of relief after Paul van Dyk's previous artist album, Reflections. It returned not only to the feel of a mixed-album journey, but also to songs and styles that more suit Paul's own style. Reflections found him reaching too much for turns at pop radio, many of which just fell disappointingly flat. And although In...