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King Crimson - Larks' Tongues in Aspic

King Crimson is a classic 70s progressive rock band with a unique jazzy sound that makes their music very fun and interesting. If you have heard of King Crimson at all, you probably at least know of their first album, In the Court of the Crimson King , and its popular song, "21st Century Schizoid Man". Although that album is undeniably great, I actually prefer this album, Larks' Tongues in Aspic . The first song on the album, "Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part I", begins with a peaceful soundscape made by the sound of wooden wind chimes. Eventually, this transitions into the sound of frantic fiddles. The tension slowly builds as the fiddles get louder and some guitar and improvisation on what sounds like a found object drum kit is added in. Suddenly, a loud, sludgy guitar riff blasts through, completely taking you off guard. Like a lot of king Crimson songs, this one is full of interesting exp...

Молчат Дома - Этажи

You may be wondering, 'Is the band Молчат Дома, who created the album, Этажи, a foreign band?' and 'Are they going to be singing some non-english language, perhaps Russian?' The answer to both of these questions is yes. I can't remember how I found this album originally, but one day it came up in my YouTube recommended, I instantly recognized the cover, and decided to give it a listen. It was really good. It reminded of me listening to Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures for the first time. Note: In this review, I italicize Russian words written in the Roman alphabet, put "quotation marks" around English translations, and do nothing to Russian words written in the Cyrillic alphabet. Молчат Дома or Molchat Doma (roughly translates to "The Houses are Silent") is a 'cold wave' band. This is a genre of music that I don't know too much about, but from what I understand the genre is close to goth, except more detached and minimalistic. Si...

The Jesus Lizard - Goat

Since I just reviewed Big Black (see my review of Big Black - Atomizer here ), I thought it would be appropriate to review another highly influential noise rock band, The Jesus Lizard. The Jesus Lizard is strongly influenced by Big Black, especially because Steve Albini, the ex frontman of Big Black, is their recording engineer. I think "recording engineer" is a title Albini made up, but it's basically the same thing as a producer. According to him, the difference is recording engineers solve problems in capturing sound, while letting the artist have complete control; on the other hand producers will often take control and ruin records. The Jesus Lizard's music often features a mix of low rolling guitars and bass, harsh shrieking guitars, slow drums, and weird shouted muffled vocals. It's kind of hard to tell, but the cover of Goat is a naked woman with some image projected on her. To be honest, I'm ...

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