Category Archive Music I Like

  • Home   /  
  • Archive by category "Music I Like"
    • ( Page13 ) ( Page13 )
Kaleikr Heart of Lead album cover
ByGD
, , , , , , , , , , ,

Music I Liked – Kaleikr, Ossuarium, Tiny Ruins, 1349, Okkultist, Julia Jacklin

Music to kick off March with includes Kaleikr, Ossuarium, Tiny Ruins, 1349, Okkultist, and Julia Jacklin. I don’t have a clever introduction this week, but I do have good music.

Kaleikr

Kaleikr‘s Heart of Lead was bound to be my jam. It’s Icelandic, it’s black metal, it’s a given. I actually listened to the track “Neurodelirium” before the album was released and started to draft this post. Then a couple weeks later I rediscovered Kaleikr on another blog and added Heart of Lead to my list to blog about again.

Ossuarium

Ossuarium is a great name, but this Portland band’s album Living Tomb didn’t grab me the first time I heard it. It kept popping up on so many blogs, though, and each time I saw it I gave it another listen. Eventually I succumbed to its power. Proof that repeating your argument makes it stronger, I guess. Or maybe I was just in a mood the first time I heard it.

Tiny Ruins

The album Olympic Girls by Tiny Ruins is all plinky guitars and breathy folk melodies. Folks who make playlists will want to throw some of these tracks on a playlist with Teitur Magnasson. Anyway, good luck listening to this without rushing out to buy summer music festival tickets and cracking a lager in defiance of freezing temperatures outside.

1349

So I’m headed to Norway in April, which means everything associated with that country is suddenly twice as interesting as it would have been before I bought plane tickets. On top of that, this track, Dødskamp, is part of a partnership with the Munch museum where 1349 and other bands write songs based on lesser known paintings in the collection. The Munch museum is the second most important thing in Oslo for me (after the Viking Ship Museum, natch) so this song sounds like inevitability to me. Now I just have to track down the rest of the songs from the project.

Okkultist

Remember the part where things associated with countries I’ve traveled are auto-special? Okkultist is from Portugal. I’ve never been to Portugal proper, but after visiting the Azores I have fantasies of renting an apartment and spending months there like an old-school writer. Add to that the satisfying chug of Reinventing Evil, and you’ve got some music I like.

Julia Jacklin

Something about Julia Jacklin’s album Crushing reminds me of Frazey Ford, who was one of my Pickathon favorites last year. Jacklin is not quite so … I hate to use the word ballsy, so let’s just say there is less of a soul influence. But the music is every bit as real and just as engaging.


ByGD
, , , , , , , ,

Music I Liked – Mo’ynoq, Teitur Magnasson, Pulchra Morte, Beak>, Panopticon


Mo'ynoq album cover

This week I liked listening to Mo’ynoq, Teitur Magnasson, Pulchra Morte, Beak>, and Panopticon.

Mo’ynoq

It’s kind of annoying how common apostrophes are in the names of magical races in fantasy novels, and they are just as irritating when you’re trying to pronounce or spell metal bands. But I’ll forgive Mo’ynoq because they are so very good. If you read any music blogs at all, you will already know this, because I think they all wrote something about how good Dreaming in a Dead Language is. They were right. Usually I have to be in a mood for black metal. But I could listen to Mo’ynoq all day. Just don’t ask me how to say their name.

Teitur Magnasson

Teitur Magnasson was on the KEXP lineup at Airwaves last year, but I missed the set (streaming, I mean – I haven’t been to Airwaves in a long time). So I wasn’t familiar with him. But then I stumbled on the video for “Kollgátan” off his album Orna. The nostalgic old school home video vibe really hit the spot, so I had a listen of the rest of the album. The whole thing just has such a peaceful summer melancholy feeling. Almost like Chicano Batman without the annoyingly repetitive lyrics.

Pulchra Morte

Pulchra Morte released Divina Autem Et Aniles this month, but it feels timeless. It’s all my favorite food. The vocals are just growly enough to scratch the death metal itch without being incomprehensible. Midpaced riffs are chunky and meaty, and the solos are noodly. This is stick-to-your-ribs, Hormel chili test music.

Beak>

I rarely write up a single song. I’m an album kind of girl. But this is not about the album, or even really about the song (although both are quite listenable). This is just about the video. I saw this video of the song “Bream Down” by Sleeping Beauty).

Panopticon

I never disliked critical darlings Panopticon, but they never quite grabbed me the way they seemed to capture everyone else before. The they released the two-track The Crescendo Dusk and they finally got their hooks in me.

So how about you? Are you hooked on any of this music?

ByGD
, , , , , , , , , ,

Music I Liked – EF, Chapel of Disease, Otoboke, Steve Gunn, MONO, Anemone

This week I’m bookending an eclectic bunch of music with some dreamy pop from EF and Anemone. But if that’s not your bag, I’ve also got Chapel of Disease, Otoboke Beaver, Steve Gunn and MONO.

EF

Bandcamp Daily did a post on Scandinavian bands carrying the emo torch. I don’t know why I even bothered to read it, except that lately I’ve noticed people slinging the word “emo” around in contexts that don’t match up with my memory of the early 20th century. So I read it, and listened to a few tracks, and EF totally hooked me. Ceremonies sounds like a cross between Sigur Ros and Phosphorescent and you can’t go wrong with that. Too bad they haven’t posted new music since 2013.

Chapel of Disease

The name Chapel of Disease sounds like death metal. The name Mark Knopfler (at least to me) means The Princess Bride theme song. A title like “…And As We Have Seen The Storm, We Have Embraced The Eye” sounds like post-rock. I didn’t expect these things to unite in one project, but here they are, and they are … death metal. And I like it.


Otoboke Beaver

As regular readers know, I don’t often listen to punk. But when I do it’s Japanese teenagers who name their band after a love hotel and make feminist videos in which they take down gendered life-goal expectations and stereotypical Japanese behavior by destroying wedding dresses with food. I’m looking forward to the new album from Otoboke Beaver in April.

Steve Gunn

I’m always a sucker for guitar-centric music, regardless of genre. The Unseen Inbetween from Steve Gunn sounds like 60s folk at first blush. It reminded of Father John Misty at his debut best. And after listening for a little while, it made me want to go be creative.

MONO

Just about every music blog I follow assured me that I cared about the new MONO album, No Where, Now Here. Every music app on my phone sent me an alert when the album was released. I’d never listened to the Japanese post-rock band before, but with so much prompting I had to check them out. Every now and then the bloggy buzz and the app algorithms are right.

Anemone

New release Beat My Distance sounds like the opening montage in the 1980s the way the movies want you to remember them, instead of the awful decade that we actually lived through.

Two pop albums, some death metal, two very different bands from Japan and folk music to inspire your own muse. That was my week. How about you? Did you hear anything you liked?

ByGD
, , , , , , , ,

Music I Liked – Enblood, Bloodbark, Hammock, Mournful Congregation, Angelo De Augustine


Here is a collection of music I liked. I would love for these posts to start having some kind of theme, but music discovery is not so systematic. What do these bands have in common? Besides “blood” in two of their names, they are all bands I discovered in the last few weeks. Have a listen to Enblood, Bloodbark, Hammock, Mournful Congregation, and Angelo De Augustine.

Enblood

Before I spent a week in the Azores, I could not have named a single Portuguese band. But once I’ve traveled to a place, I start to notice it everywhere. Then when I saw Moonspell in concert, I found out that Portugal puts out some pretty good bands. Enblood is Portuguese technical death metal. Cast to Exile proves those three adjectives belong together.

Bloodbark

I don’t know anything about Bloodbark besides their atmospheric black metal Bandcamp tag. But the name sounds like a kenning – maybe for skin or for scabs – and Bonebranches sounds like a kenning for arms, so I’m already happy. The sound is indeed atmospheric black metal, and I liked it.

Hammock

If Bloodbark had me at kenning, instrumental Hammock had a bit to overcome. But Universalis has atmosphere in spades, with that echo-y, wide open spaces swept by cold wind sound that so many Icelandic artists are known for. They are actually from Nashville, but I won’t hold that against them any more than the name. It’s beautiful music, elegantly structured.


Mournful Congregation

It would be a great segue to say Mournful Congregation‘s Incubus of Karma is as ugly as Hammock is beautiful. But this Pennsylvania doom act has its own stately elegance and a warmth you might need after 40 minutes of Hammock. These guys are on the 20 Buck Spin label, which I just noticed seems to be a good place to find music I like.

{As an aside, I never got the difference between an incubus and a succubus, but they’re coming up a lot. Over the holidays I watched the Dresden TV show, and there was an incubus episode. Then I started watching the anime Phantom in the Twilight, (which transcends the otome genre BTW) and there was a succubus episode. So now I can keep them straight. Unfortunately, my daughter has recently had trouble remembering the word for succulent, with some comic results.}

Angelo De Augustine

I loved the hell out of Dýrð Í Dauðaþögn in both Icelandic and in English. But the followup album, when it finally came, was kind of disappointing. Despite the death metal name, Tomb by Angelo De Augustine reminds me of Asgeir Trausti with its breathy near-falsetto vocals and nostalgic guitars. This kind of music always runs the risk of being forgettable, but it sure goes down easy. Perfect for slow Sunday mornings.

So what about you? Did you hear anything you liked?

ByGD
, , , , , , ,

Music I Liked – Svartidaudi, Scott Hirsch, Mr. Twin Sister, Marc Mac


This isn’t actually a list of music I listened to last week. I’ve been keeping track of things I liked, but even as briefly as I summarize things here, I haven’t had time to write it all up. Plus, I really hate the new WordPress editor and find myself avoiding blogging lately. So most of this is music I liked in December. But I liked Svartidaudi, Scott Hirsch, Mr. Twin Sister, and Marc Mac when I heard them.

Svartidaudi

Svartidaudi was one of the first black metal bands that I listened to. I’ve always been more of a death metal girl, so there usually has to be something special about a black metal band to make me care. When I came onboard for Svartidaudi’s Flesh Cathedral, just the fact that they were from Iceland was enough for me. That’s still enough to make me take notice, but I’m a little pickier now that there’s a wealth of Icelandic black metal to choose from. Revelations of the Red Sword still makes the cut.

Scott Hirsch

Scott Hirsch is most famous for the band Hiss Golden Messenger. They are a KEXP favorite, but I’ve never really paid much attention to them. Hirsch’s solo album Lost Time Behind the Moon was album of the day on the Bandcamp Daily about two months ago. Despite it being midwinter when I first heard it, this album had all the good folky summertime feels of a sunlit day on Doe Bay.

Mr. Twin Sister

Alas, so much time has passed that I don’t remember where I found Mr. Twin Sister. But their album Salt is like a cross between Vok and Zero 7 and I am so there for that.


Marc Mac

Well here’s an album that hits all my nerd buttons. You could call it hip hop. Or you could call it an audio documentary. Anyway, on All Power to the People Marc Mac teaches history by laying archival audio interviews about the civil rights movement (specifically the Black Panthers) on top of beats. April 4-8 is Black Lives Matter at School week. Do yourself a favor. Listen to this album and get educated. It’s much more fun than sitting in a classroom, and might be just as effective.

Publications

Follow Blog via Email

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 430 other subscribers

Categories

Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Appointee by Webriti