Long Distance Calling

Hey guys, what's up? Have you read Batch's first review?

Well, let's get on to business, I'm going to talk a little about this great band called "Long Distance Calling". I have to give credit to my dear friend Jackie M. for this one since it was her who introduced me to the great awesomeness of this band.

Long Distance Calling (LDC from now on, sorry for those of you who hate abbreviation) is an instrumental rock band from Germany featuring two guitars, a bass, drums and some guy messing with a synth. They are different to other bands of the scene in, I'd say, two important aspects:

They are instrumental. Mostly no voice, no lyrics although they have some collaborations...

They don't have have complexity as a goal, but as a tool. Their songs don't include awesome 17/8 breaks or incredibly complex harmonies, instead they tend to add up sounds, ambients, riffs and synths to create some 'reachable' atmosphere, to get you underwater or make you feel like flying on complete darkness.

Sorry for getting poetic, let's hear some examples of what this guys are about:

That's the official videoclip for the song and also their very first one. It's, as usual, a relatively long song and it takes some time to get itself started...

The song plays with sounds, switch from acoustic to electric and go from completely peaceful sections to absolute distorted riff-madness.

By the way, that would be LDC's first long album, from 2007.

Another sound I'd like you to hear is...

...this one. By the way, I hope you are not listening to this in your laptop. Laptop speakers usually cut low frequencies so you'd be missing out on the incredible bass...

I promise I'll review something with some more rythm next time. 'til then, enjoy.

: 3

Irepress

What's up, guys.

First of all, sorry for being late and waiting until today to write my first review. It was a very weird week traveling here and there in some of the weirdest places I ever was, and it's time to get back to my obligations.

Today I'm going to talk about Irepress (pronounced like in "Irepress-ible").

The band, this fantastic band with just two albums released did something that it's difficult when you're writing tunes within the supersaturated post-metal scene: having your own style.

As it happened with Isis, the quality of their releases goes in crescendo -but maybe this is a hasky appreciation considering their small discography-, from just an interesting group to something really cool and original. Their songs are long (about seven minutes like most songs in this genre) and have an experimental touch that reflects their desperate quest for perfection.

I'll have to admit, it's hard to describe Irepress with words. It's even hard to coceive them. The best way to understand this group is by listening the products of their awesomeness. Samus -from their first album Samus Octology- is maybe the most emblematic of all their tracks:

In their second album -Sol Eye Sea I- they played with more complex structures marking a huge difference with the rest of bands of the scene. Their first attempt of introducing lyrics -which, in their opinion, it's something they always wanted but they simply couldn't because it's hard to find something that fits what they're doing- results in a notable success like is proven in my favourite track, Barrageo:

We're looking forward for their next releases. What more to say, I'm sure they'll give a lot to talk about, hope they release something soon!

Rasputina

Here we are again. This weird chicks and the bearded man in the middle are the members of Rasputina. They aren't exactly 'underground' (neither are them well-know) but I enjoy them. x3

Rasputina is a cello-driven, steampunk-looking, New York-based band leaded by Melora Creager... Who, according to wikipedia, used to play gigs with Nirvana when they needed a cello...

Their unique, darkish but beautiful style is never hard to recognize (probably, even if you don't like them.) So let's give them a try (not original videoclip):

Hating it or loving it?

The cello is pretty awesome anyway... : )

Here goes a slower one...

This one includes some slow cello solo...

I want to hear some opinions. Does this kind of music bore you? Are you loving it?

: 3

Alcest

There we go! This is one of my favourites at the moment. Particularly this one song.

Alcest have been around for ten, eleven years now and have two albums out, both absolutely fantastic. They started as one of these Black Metal projects that over time become less and less pure Black to turn into some kind of "big atmosphere" sound. There's still some "blast beat" on it, but it's not like listening to Mayhem at all.

Alcest can really fill the room you're in and get you to a state of ataraxis and serenity. Their sound is big and epic and vocals are completely relaxing. Even the most calmed parts are plenty of that magnificent feeling.

I'll let you judge yourselves.

This is from their first album:

All those "clean" acoustic parts are, with the vocals, the magic of this great band.

Now, from the last one:

So, here's a question to debate: Do you find Alcest's music "dark" or even darkish?

Neige, the guy behind all this would be annoyed as hell if anyone did. ; )

Please, comment!

Brief Introduction: BatchDrake

Live long and prosper, guys.

Because Nirei said most of what this blog is all about, I'll talk a little about me.

As Nirei, I'm a Spaniard willing to write about awesome music. Yep, I say awesome music because I consider our musical spectrum wide enough to describe it in terms of how awesome it is instead of styles and stuff. The text subtitling our blog name may be confusing, but the truth is we will talk about neat tunes, whatever they are, whoever composes them and whenever they were brought to the world.

Nirei may bitch about his English but I have to admit I'm not better than him - the only time I had the chance to speak English it was pretty lame - so you can expect the most grotesque and systematic rapes against grammar from me. Don't feel awkward if you want to correct us. We'd really appreciate it!

Brief Introduction: Nirei

Welcome to this our humble blog.

We are a couple of guys from Spain who happen to like pretty weird music, and since we were not too happy to see you can't really find many specialized websites or magazines reviewing our kind of music we've decided to start our own music reviews blog.

That's what you're reading right now.

On this blog we'll be making some noise about some forgotten bands and some that are simply not enough well-known. Kind of stormy, atmospheric, somewhat depressive and noisy but melodic stuff... You'll soon find out what I'm talking about. ; )

Also, I gotta say my English has gotten kind of rusty on the last three years, but I can take it if anyone is willing to correct any misspell or nonsense I write down. :3

And so, that's pretty much about it for now.