Quicker update this time thanks to no deep dives into big discographies!
Field Music (sent by HOF)Really interesting band this, if not as consistently engaging as I might have hoped, especially after the success of Sweet Billy Pilgrim who have some similarities. I like the sound and style these guys have, a sort of experimental indie with some infusions of a more classic prog sound here and there. The experimentation and general variety of ideas is fun too. It worked really well on your EP for two reasons - you picked some good songs, and it was in a small dose mixed in with something else. In a full release though, I realise that there’s not a great deal that hooks me in melodically. The big exception is Disappointed which I absolutely love, and a few other songs across both Commontime and Field Music (Measure), which were the albums I’ve given a try, are also very nice. But on Measure especially, it’s just such a long album and never really grounds itself in something more accessible or catchy in the way I’d like it to.
Fish (sent by Stadler)Having never really got into any era of Marillion, I doubt I'd have bothered to check out any of Fish's stuff had you not included the title track from Sunsets on Empire (which I liked a lot both in itself and as part of the emotional arc of your EP). I've been listening to that album and it's good. There are some songs that, more than anything else Marillion-related I've heard, immerse me emotionally. These are mainly concentrated at the bookends though. The title track and the opener are both excellent in different ways, while Goldfish and Clowns is also very good and the closer works as an engaging coda. Everything in between is less interesting, unfortunately. There's some experimentation in sound at least, like the grungy industrial rock of What Colour is God, but it doesn't quite pay off, while other songs are too middle of the road for me.
Hardline (sent by jingle)Well now, this is one of the nice surprises of the roulette. Not that I didn’t like the songs from their debut that you included in your EP, as you know I enjoyed them a lot, but with the style and sound being very vanilla I didn’t necessarily set high expectations for a whole album. And yeah stylistically there’s absolutely nothing new or unique about this, but it’s a damn good album anyway. Great energy and charisma, and lots of strong hooks. I’ve tried a couple of their subsequent albums (II and Danger Zone) and they’re not nearly as good. In the 10 years between the first two albums it seems they had a change of line-up and a slight shift in sound with a little more 90s alternative rock in there. There are some good songs definitely (mainly on Great Danger) but even those aren’t that exciting, and the rest are a little bland.
Harmonix Music Systems (sent by Buddy)Managed to find this video game soundtrack on Youtube - doesn’t seem to be the highest quality upload but fine to get a sense of the music and sound design. There’s some very cool stuff on here but it’s a bit of a mixed bag. Really digging tracks like Perfect Brain, Break For Me and Dalatecht - great sounds, catchy hooks and some fun groove. Energize is another fun one, straightforward and using some pretty cliched sounds but very enjoyable. I also like that there’s lots of variety - I guess because it’s a soundtrack for a music-based video game? - but that’s also where it falls down a little because quite a few of the tracks just don’t really do anything for me at all. Anyway I’ll see if I can find a way to get downloads of the tracks I like as I’d like to be able to return to those ones.
Horizon Ignited (sent by TAC)Good grief the In Flames influence is very up front here.
The band has a lot of potential that I’m not sure they’re fully realising yet. Each time I listen to the album it starts well. The performances are tight, the sound is clear and punchy, and as In Flames copies go they do a solid job, especially in the verses - you could have told me half these verses were actually by IF and I’d have believed you. But ultimately these songs have neither the melodic richness of earlier IF or the catchy hooks of the good bits of their more recent output. I like the idea of the clean vocals on this album, but his voice isn’t that interesting and neither are the melodies. If they can refine their sound and songwriting a bit, they could end up being a really strong melodeath band.
Topic: ariich's DARK TO LIGHT roulette (v8) - Post-roulette updates (ongoing) (Read 91326 times)