Any of you heroes want to speak up?!

Now here's something new I've completely fallen in love with. Foxy Shazam.

It's not something I went out of my way to find. I heard one song off a friend's computer and thought "hey, this is pretty good." My natural cynicism, however, left me to believe that only one song was good. I went on my merry way obtaining music I wanted to collect. Then came the listen-through. Listen through are always a way for me to decide a love for an album. It happened with Glassjaw - a band I barely liked but after a listen-through I loved them ever so much.

Now it has done the same to Foxy Shazam, so much so that I need more. I've listened to the album plenty of times over the period of 3 months, but I can't get enough of it. Their music is so powerful yet hypnotic. It pulls you in, makes you listen and then leaves you begging for more. The piano work is refreshing to say the least, considering the tsunami of guitar work put into music nowadays. The vocals are very unique, a cocktail of influence and originality with a dash of soul. And the clapping... something small but I love it. It's as if a crowd is part of the music, bringing in a larger feel to the music. Its not just the musicians, its you too. 

Overall I am thoroughly impressed with Foxy Shazam, and it's going to take a lot from other bands to overshadow them. And just for some trivia... Foxy Shazam means "cool shoes"...

I know...

Blending in some Local flavour...

So after wandering around trying to sate my insatiable lust for new music I decided it was time to hit the local pubs and listen to what out little country likes to call "lekker". So off I go, with some mates who pulled me unwillingly out of my safe hole, to a bar that often hosts a few of our countries many bands...

And behold, I was pleased...

The opening band, I cannot say I was to impressed with however. It seemed like they took a formulae that worked before and stuck to it. Kudos for making music, zero points for originality. A group called "Andre van der Walt" popped up, and I was truley impressed with what they did with a 3 piece group and a drum machine. They had a crazy stage performance and the music itself was crazy-enjoyable. You could hear the influence yet at the same time you could hear the original musical style they were trying to present. Its hard to give an example of what they could sound like since it is a mesh of influence but I'm sure the audience it appeals to is large. 

But the coup de grace come upon me like a ton of bricks. The Ocean Doesn't Want Me. I had heard them before, but so drunk was I and they're music caught me off guard the first time I couldnt make anything of them. Most music just requires you to listen, while there is music out there that can even make you feel... but The Ocean Doesn't Want Me did something different. It's like I became one with their music... hard to explain but it felt like a spiritual epiphany. The songs span over 15 minutes, and their gigs are usually only 2 or 3 songs, but each verse, chorus, bridge is composed so beautifully that you can't help but fall into a music-induced trance and forget about everything. Their songs are so original, so amazing, that they do not feel like 15 minutes. The music itself is composed so well, that you dont just fall flat when listening to the end, or get bored halfway through. It draws you in. And when it ends you aren't sad because it's over. I felt happy, content after the first song... it was like something I had waited for had finally come and didn't leave me disappointed. 

The Ocean Doesn't Want Me is not a band to be taken lightly, their music is obviously built with a mission. A band that can succeed even the most amazing of musicians or even the most original of songs. I have loved and followed many of South Africa's most promising of bands, Narrow, Marlow and even 16 Stitch. But The Ocean Doesn't Want Me brings back the forgotten doctrine of music. Being unrestrained. Modern day composers with music in their hearts.

Slay the Dragon!

So I've been a slave to Guitar Hero for a while partly due to it being an awesome and fun game, mostly cos while I get to act like at idiot holding a plastic toy I get to do it to awesome music. Now there was like 2 songs on Guitar Hero 3 that I wasnt familiar with, and they were both french so I think I'm allowed a little forgiveness, but one band in particular threw me off balance. I had know them for a while but never liked them... it is, of course, Dragon Force

Now I don't know what it was that made me dislike Dragon Force initially, but it had something to do with their theme of their music and more often seemed to silly to really pay any attention too. I also found that the constant wail of solo's was more of a 'show off' than a play off. But then... then I played their song on GH3, and sadly (cos I dont know why a game would do so) my opinion of them changed.

I began immediatly by getting their albums and listening furiously... now and then a song took me awhile to appreciate but I came to realise: I had been mistaken. The guitar work is heavenly, so classic yet bringing in a style of their own. Bass was insane, as I tried to emulate playing it... it was just too fast for my untrained arms to handle. Drums... oh the drums, where to begin. That drummer must have legs of steel. Im still sceptical of their themes and lyrics, but overall it is a great band to head bang to in the car with a few friends. I can see ourselves riding steeds and preparing journeys of heroic magnitude, bathed in camaraderie and ready to take on any epic challenge.

But thanks to my new found love of Dragonforce I have dug out my older metal and begun listening to guitar ripped 7-minute solos and soul crunching drumwork. Punk-Rock tried to kill the metal... but they failed, as they were smite to the ground

I'll stick to these guys for a while...

Gluecifer is a band I found about during my obsessive listening to of Turbo Negro. Another band that has been around for a while, 1997 to be precise, and I have only heard of them recently. I'm beginning to realise that I am stuck in some music tunnel and that my beautiful country has put me here.

Now Gluecifer isnt the most original music I've heard, and there's a lot of other bands I would choose to listen to over them. But it doesnt mean that its bad. In fact they are great to listen while stuck in traffic, or when playing a game, or even while you clean the house. Basically, its a good generic rock sound but it just feels to me as if they might've taken (or found) a good recipe for their music and repeat. But only within albums, which in their own ways are very unique. Chevelle, on the other hand, seem to have found a way to replicate the same style of music into over 20 songs. But this is not a Chevelle critique...

As far as music goes, Gluecifer is great to listen to and maybe even set to ambience while you light up with some friends and open a few beers. But either I've been headbanging to too much loudness and my ears are more scrambled than I think they are, or Gluecifer just doesnt offer a full out mini-mosh-pit at home session with a friend or two, like the early System of a Down albums.

Peaches come from a can...

I cannot believe it. I've waited so long for a sequel to Presidents of the United States of America, one of the best kept secrets of the music world, that when I stumbled acroos Presidents of the United States of America II album I was a bit worried... So many of my beloved bands have failed me recently that I was reluctant to have to spend R200 on a new CD. (Luckily, I didn't have to since another Presidents fan was nearby and she bought it).

I took the CD to the listening corner and ask to hear it (10 minutes maximum per customer). I couldn't believe it. After waiting so long I was really surprised to hear that they sounded the same yet managed to develope some new material. The songs are just as up beat as the first album, just as entertaining and just as nonsensical. I was ecstatic. No disappointment, no half-assed experimental songs, no open-to-inerpretation concepts. Just pure, unadalturated Presidents of the United States of America. They throw in their random joke lyrics, singing about some or other humanised animal and kept to some or other odd yet interesting crunchy groove. Lob in some interesting guitar work, an odd assortment of keyboard and the occasional reference to some or other band style and you have a recipe for fun.

Great to listen to when getting drunk... just like the first album. Presidents are back, and its like they never left.

Soldier and a Poet

I've been arguing with someone with much more charisma than myself about music. Where I can't stand a female vocalist, save a few, he seems to think that female vocalists are much better than male. I can barely count on one hand how many female vocalists and musicians inspire me, Vanessa Mae and the chicks from Kittie being a few, let alone actually getting me to go out and buy a CD or two of theirs.

Said man dumps names like Spears, Simpson, Twain and all such 'artists'. I like to believe I listen to everything equally at the start, and if I find its just a play on whats popular (like skateboarding *cough*Avril*cough*) or trying to be a pop star because... well, you're rich (*cough*Paris*cough*) then I don't even bother because they are obviously trying to catch the eye of the blind we-love-music-as-long-as-it-remains-new masses. I'll admit there is some good poetry out there but thanks to it being few and far between I can't think of any right now. You can't compare "Hey hey, you you, I don't like your girlfriend" to "I'm a soldier and a poet, But I'm a dancer at best ".

A point I'd like to make on the side, towards those new-music-only people (because I can't grasp the concept of music becoming old - overplayed yes, not old). Look at it this way. Metallica's first albums are still popular, still selling and probably still the most downloaded songs on the net. Any pop artist CD (and I use pop artist as loosely as I can), from a year old, can be found in bargain bins nationwide. Point here is that while the pop culture throws music aside as if it's just some used toilet paper, the 'underground' hogs, collects and tries its best to recreate what everyone knows. Hell, AC/DC's Thunderstruck pops up as an all time pop favourite but barely 2 years before the same people all-of-a-sudden loving it would have had to change their pants after hearing it cos of it's EVIL and METAL nature.

ANYWAY, my argument with previous guy leads to the fact that he doesn't listen to the music, but rather the prose of the artists. (Because we all know that Rave and Remixes just don't count as music, like vegetarians don't count as people). Then surely, from what I can muster, these artists aren't Muso's, as MTV has so vigorously named everyone, but rather Peots (unless there is something Im missing). Why is the Pop culture, who is so ready to throw away it's own music after a few months, so obsessed with taking the music title away from those who actually play instruments, create new sounds and redirect music into a whole new panorama? Has it realised that it's screwing up recently and now needs actual music to satifsy the people. Or have the people realised that good music comes from the soul and not some quick-beat, 1 hit wonder pop machine but from the soul and heart of an artist? I don't believe either. From what I see, like any social pop trend, I think it's just one way the market saw that people would pay money for things they don't really need to pay for. And the people will fork it over because, even after the whole 'Im different and have my own viewpoint' trend, they still like to blindly follow. But in their defence I would just like to say nice choice in current music. It only took you 30 years, but you're on the right track!

They're trying to trick me...

Every year I look back at what I've done, what I've learned and, more importantly, what I've listened too. Since I have managed to stale myself in my own music cess pool I've decide, this year, to rely on random clickage of websites and listening to bands. My usual method of music choice starts off with finding a new band/musician/DJ, listening to about 3 songs (which I think is a good starter) and then deciding wether or not I like them enough to give them a thorough listen to.
I then follow up by listening to an album and if I enjoy them then it continues onward to further purchasing of albums, special discs and live DVDs.

Myspace, sad as it may be, is a rather easy site to do the initial three-song-listen-too-technique as they have band profiles all over the place. But this is where I get tricked. They've managed to put the best songs on the profile, which is understandable because you want people to know your best work up front. But that doesnt give bands the excuse to showcase the "good stuff" and leave me in the lurch after I've spent hours downlo... er, spent wads of cash buying CDs. It brings me back to the whole anger issue of people spending insane amounts of money on a CD just for one song. Its like bands nowadays are encouraging it (not all, mind you, but the general boo-hoo slit my wrists bands).

What happened to bands being bands. Has glam rock poisoned the minds of so many artists that its all just a gimmick. Mozart would bitch-slap all our current musicians who wear a facade of music and go about with gimmiky stage-performances and cookie-cutter ideas. However, if I think about it, Mozart was probably a sell out in his own way too. He had to make money too, so obviously had to succumb to 'what was in'. But it doesnt stop it from being good... The same cant be said for current music, nor their way of convinving people with one song that their music is amazing.