Brume d'Automne - Fiers et Victorieux

Genre(s) - Black metal
Origin - Québec, Canada
Year of release - 2005
Bitrate - 160 kbps
Size - 58.54 MB

Québécois black metal has its own sound as fans of the province's scene will acknowledge, and Brume d'Automne are a good example. It is, however, hardly exceptional and there is little about the music I should specifically direct your attention to. Hmm, just the one thing. Those easily overlooked traditional interludes? Very cool. Numéro II especially is so unreal it seems to change the mood of the whole album. It is difficult to keep from doubling back to time every time it rides the airwaves. On se roule, on se roule... une fille abandonnée!

1. La mort d'une patriote
2. Le sacrifice des guerriers paysans
3. La forêt est leur tombe
4. Traditionelle I
5. Notre héritage
6. Le combat de nos pères
7. Traditionelle II
   
8. Le visage de la haine
9. Fiers et victorieux
10. Quand les morts s'agitent
11. Traditionelle III
    

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Martyrdöd - In Extremis

Genre(s) - Blackened crustcore
Origin - Sweden
Year of release - 2005
Bitrate - 192 kbps
Size - 53.43 MB

Okay, so Martyrdöd are a blackened crust band from Sweden (where else?) and their music is, well, solid as a brick and twice as hard-hitting. No breathing holes. Fucking fast, filthy, pissed-off shit that stops at nothing, never once (okay once) relents the barrage. These guys sound as determined as they sound desperate and I mean REALLY like playing as loud and fast as they can is the only thing still keeping them alive. If that makes you think the music is a bit one-dimensional you may be right, but the raw anger is intoxicating and somehow you can't stop thinking this is what punk was always meant to be like. The sound is filled out a bit by letting the tones flow over into each other and I guess that's the black metal influences right there, else I can't really pinpoint them. Who cares. "The power of crust compels you", and you can take that literally.

1. Din aura av sorg
2. In extremis
3. Hör varningen!
4. Kollisionskurs mellan två världar
5. Vägen ur
6. Antagonisten
7. Utanförskapet
8. Tämjda människor
9. Ljusbringaren
10. Välkommen till dödsriket
11. Tyst vår
12. Kollektivt självmord
    

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Krux - Krux

Genre(s) - Traditional doom metal
Origin - Sweden
Year of release - 2002
Bitrate - 128 kbps
Size - 50.48 MB

I'm eating so in the meantime I might just prepare an entry for your enjoyment and schedule it for somewhere this week.

A supergroup of sorts, Krux is manned by (ex-)members of such bands as Candlemass, Therion, Opeth, Entombed, and other giants of the Swedish metal scene that teamed up to play some colossal doom. Very. Colossal. Doom. Stuff from the old school, the kind that has to be really convincing it it wants to impress me. And that it does. The music strides with confidence, and maybe just a pinch of arrogance (can you blame them? In fact, would you dare?), and it tramples the earth where it goes. All that without losing the catch - check out the refrains in Popocatepetl and Omfalos. If you hadn't extracted it from the above: this stuff is huge and you deserve it.

1. Black room
2. Krux
3. Nimis
4. Sibiria
5. Omfalos
6. Enigma EZB
7. Popocatepetl
8. Evel rifaz
9. Lunochod

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Vibrasphere - Archipelago

Genre(s) - Psytrance, ambient
Origin - Sweden
Year of release - 2006
Bitrate - 192-256 kbps

Sorry dear people, my exam week is upcoming so I have had even less time to post than is usual lately, and this will probably be the only entry in the coming week. Don't forget about me in the meantime!

This is a duo from Sweden that weave very warm, lucid dreamworlds together out of electronic sounds, moving back and forth between ambient and psytrance a bit indecisively. Archipelago is clearly more on the trance side of the spectrum, but easingly so and never rushing things, earning the label morning trance if you ask me. There are more ambient tracks on here as well such as the beautiful Tierra Azul and Late Winter Storms which isn't as cold as it sounds, really, while Sweet September is the most memorable trance track my inexperienced ears have ever heard. They're all very engaging atmospheres with a lot of natural grace and melody that make it more than just a pleasant background noise. It was too big to share so I had to snip it in half, make sure you take both!

1. Tierra azul
2. Sweet september
3. Reservoir
4. Landmark
5. Seven days to daylight
6. Morning breeze
7. Sudden comfort
8. Baltic resonance
9. Late winter storms
   

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Part 2: Load it down (62.11 MB)

Oi Polloi! - Ar Ceòl, Ar Cànan, Ar-a-mach

Genre(s) - Punk/oi!
Origin - Various parts of the British and non-British Isles
Year of release - 2006
Bitrate - 256/320 kbps
Size - 56.97 MB

The first album in punk history produced entirely in Scottish Gaelic (yes, also SS Politician, which btw has a great little folk number at the end) was released only three years ago by the "green anarchoi!" band Oi Polloi! I consider myself a green socialist rather than an anarchist, but it is good to hear sounds that do make the connection between ecological disaster and capitalism. Not only has the blind hunt for profit been largely responsible for the impending climate change, it is holding back effective measures right now. So I hope to see a large anticapitalist block at the Copenhagen summit in december. But on to the music. Well, it's solid punk with slight oi! influences - not quite enough for my taste though - and what more do you need? Best tracks are the opener, the aforementioned SS Politician, and Union Jack.

The blog entry title is right and the RAR and folder title is wrong. My mistake.

1. Ar ceol 's ar canan
2. Brosnachadh catha
3. Ramalair ruisgte
4. Ceud mile failte
5. La na sabaidh
6. Saibjidh sneddon
7. Scrudadh 2323
8. Bas dhan t'siostam
9. Union jack tha'll 's cac!
10. Fear a' batha
11. Cait a bheil an armach leir sgrios
12. 911
13. Madaidhean allaidh
14. SS Politician

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Monster Magnet - Live at Bizarre Festival 1998

Genre(s) - Stoner rock
Origin - United States of Amerijuana
Year of release - Unreleased bootleg
Bitrate - 192 kbps
Size - 88.37 MB

Monster Magnet are a rock band. You can say that again. They're a drugged up hard rock band with balls as big as their riffs and that's saying something. They exemplify the big fuck-you finger to all and everything that rock music is supposed to be. When I saw them live at Graspop this year they were better than they sound on here, much more droning and jamming and playing monstrous riffs for minutes on end. Man, I loved that shit, it had my mind spinning. This is great as well though, with all the fan favourites it gets the adrenalin flowing like a mountain stream. Rampaging psychedelic goodness guaranteed. Or to speak in the lyrics to Atomic Clock: so won't you put my dick in plastic? They make it sound like an awfully good idea.

1. Intro
2. Atomic clock
3. Snake dance
4. Powertrip
5. Nod scene
6. Dopes to infinity
7. Crop circle
8. Zodiac lung
9. Bummer
10. Negasonic teenage warhead
11. Space lord
12. Kick out the jams

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The Deirdres - Two Demos

Genre(s) - Twee pop
Origin - United Kingdom

The Deirdres are a bunch of hand-knitted puppets from Britain that play endearing, loosely-played noisy twee pop of a sort that jumps at you from unexpected corners. They don't stick to the plans and are all the more refreshing for it. Dinosaurs That Can Swim has a cool diy-cover courtesy of that wonderful little label WeePOP! who always have great ideas like this. The other demo, Poor Harmonies and Communal Clapping (which is exactly what it is!), seems untraceable on the webs but features the great Electro Magic and Sir Michael of Aspel, which rock my world with their deadly hooks and exquisitely poor harmonies. Yes!!

Dinosaurs That Can Swim (2007, 22.39 MB) - Load it down

1. Claire, are we safe to be on our own?
2. Hopeless is the venue
3. Fun to pretend

Poor Harmonies and Communal Clapping (200?, 16.40 MB) - Load it down

1. Electro magic
2. Fun to pretend
3. Shoop shoop
4. Sir Michael of Aspel
   

Fluisterwoud - Langs Galg en Rad

Genre(s) - Black metal
Origin - The Netherlands
Year of release - 2003
Bitrate - 192 kbps
Size - 49.13 MB

Some pretty standard black metal from the province of Gelderland, hardly mindblowing but worth the try if you like stuff that sounds like it was recorded in 1993 but the master tape got lost in someone's basement and was only found ten years later. People trying to write grim lyrics in Dutch usually turn out sounding extremely lame; so too these blokes. Plaeghdraegher? Den Duusteren Wouden?! Kom op gasten, je ziet toch zelf ook wel hoe belachelijk dat eruit ziet. Anyway, tracks like Tergernis and Hoer van de Zeven Hemelen are very well listenable and this is safe territory for those who think black metal reached its apex with A Blaze in the Northern Sky and should never have developed further. Fluisterwoud, in any case, have not.

1. Een sinister schouwspel
2. Tergernis
3. Den duusteren wouden
4. Hoer van de zeven hemelen
5. Plaeghdraegher
6. Woudangst
7. Knovelaer
8. Aardmannen
9. Langs galg en rad

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Bronski Beat - The Age of Consent

Genre(s) - Synthpop
Origin - United Kingdom
Year of release - 1984
Bitrate - 128 kbps
Size - 55.12 MB

Okay, this may make a few people feel really sickly, and hopefully only because of the music, but to hell with it. Every store has this one in the discount bin, just today I picked up a second-hand copy of The Age of Consent on vinyl for only fifty cents, and that is for a reason. This record is so distinctively eighties it probably became unlistenable to most of its owners the moment the clock struck twelve to introduce the first of January, 1990. It's disco-ish, falsetto-sung synthesiser pop that makes the Scissor Sisters sound like Fred Phelps guest-singing for Anal Cunt. This stuff is really ultra-gay in every way. And that's the most important point about Bronski Beat. More than a musical project, singer Jimmy Somerville intended this as a social project for gay emancipation, listing a gay legal advice number and pointing out in many countries it was still illegal to be in a homosexual relationship. Most lyrics are about gay issues like discrimination and homophobic violence but also the more everyday and positive aspects, and I was happy to notice many implicit anti-capitalist elements as well. Great music for keeping up spirits while learning boring and difficult texts.

I realise the mp3 files read "Bronsky" with a y but the tags are correct.

1. Why?
2. Ain't necessarily so
3. Screaming
4. No more war
5. Love and money
6. Smalltown boy
7. Heatwave
8. Junk
9. Need a man blues
10. I feel love / Johnny remember
11. Smalltown boy (full 12" version)
12. Why? (full 12" version)
    

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Robert Downey, Jr. - The Futurist

Genre(s) - Jazzy chamber pop?
Origin - New York City, later California, USA
Year of release - 2004
Bitrate - 128-320 kbps
Size - 54.36 MB

Jim Barris, er, Robert Downey Junior is one of the most fascinating creatures to stalk the Hollywood wastelands and I've been a bit obsessed with the good man since I saw A Scanner Darkly (which you should definitely read AND see if you like surrealist dialogue, drug culture, dystopian sci-fi, unhappy endings and/or mindfucky plots!). So when I read he had an album out I had to hear it. And it's... well, very different than what I'm used to: open, jazzy piano arrangements that lack any regular shape or structure. Not everything can really stir my enthusiasm, but it has some great moments. I really like the triple tandem Kimberly Glide-The Futurist-Little Clownz. And Robert's voice is great and evocative, with an impressive span and a nice raw edge. It's elegant, but I guess it has to suit you.

1. Man like me
2. Broken
3. Kimberly glide
4. The futurist
5. Little clownz
6. 5 - 30
7. Your move
8. Details
9. Hannah
10. Smile

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Graupel - Auf alten Wegen

Genre(s) - Black metal
Origin - Nordrhein-Westphalen, Germany
Year of release - 2005
Bitrate - 256-320 kbps
Size - 64.85 MB

Among the bands to spring into the gap that Nagelfar left behind after disintegration were Graupel, a three-piece of mostly (ex-)members of the aformentioned unit that was around since a long time before they released their first demo. You can expect some really extreme stuff on here; an unscaleable wall of raw guitar noise melting together with the drums that are, of course, rumbling along at a merciless pace. Still, the noise keeps just enough distance from the listener that he or she can gradually learn to discern the riffs and details. There is one song that more than the others deserves your attention, and that's the long Requies Filii. It is the most varied song and the melodies come to the fore a little bit more boldly. Indeed it has a much greater emotional pay-off than the other tracks, and that is no coincidence as the song was written about and dedicated to singer Zingultus' son, who passed away at a very young age. It's a very striking and remarkably honest detail on an album you would not expect such a thing, and I can bring up a lot of respect and sympathy for this gesture. Not that more people should suffer the loss of a child, but it kind of makes me wish black metal lyrics were not generally so impersonal.

1. Heimkehr
2. Saat zieht Zeit
3. Die Notglocke
4. Der alte Weg
5. Requies Filii
6. Soll und sein
7. Von der Gunst de Schelte
8. Glück der Söhne
9. Ein Sterbelied auf Metall
10. Blutend Weiß

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The Pastels - Up for a bit with the Pastels

Genre(s) - Twee pop
Origin - United Kingdom
Year of release - 1987
Bitrate - 256 kbps
Size - 58.54 MB

From the new Twee I rolled into the old and man, a lot has happened since the previous pop generation of the eighties and earliest nineties. That's not (at all!) to say it all got better from here, just... different - even though more and more new bands hark back to the old sound. The average old twee record was generally more British, more noisy, more emotionally ambiguous and more radically at odds with the world around it. So too the Pastels; they were among the very first. The music's pleasant and woozy, and it gets better every time you hear it. So if it's late and you still find yourself up for a bit, have some the Pastels!

1. Ride
2. Up for a bit
3. Crawl babies
4. Address book
5. I'm alright with you
6. Hitchin' a (ride)
7. Get 'round town
8. Automatically yours
9. Baby honey
10. If I could tell you

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