Monsieur Job - Chilliando Hangueando (2018)

Written by Jason Hillenburg, posted by blog admin

Toby Holguin and his compatriots in Monsieur Job are steadily upping their musical profile with each new single from their album Bass Passi. The rousing success of the debut single “Chow Chow Eyyy Pow Pow” preceded subsequent hits of later singles “Pica Pica” and “Nina Shake Your Body” and led the unit into the final round of Grammy nomination voting. Holguin’s songwriting vision is the foundational power for Monsieur Job, but his musical partners fellow Colombians Charlie Illera and Leo Jaramillo join with European native Stan Kolev to form a kinetic musical attack emphasizing a variety of influences to make their music work. It works tremendously and sounds like a natural synthesis of seemingly disparate musical flavors.

The track runs a little over three minutes in length and begins with terse keyboards and a restrained vocal. The song’s lyrical content isn’t in English, but Espanola/Spanish, but open-minded music listeners will find this isn’t any obstacle to enjoying the track despite any potential language barrier. There aren’t many of the same sonic flourishes we’ve heard from previous Monsieur Job tunes, but this simply proves that the band is more than adept at presenting a number of musical faces for their growing audience. The arrangement is intensely physical and focuses on a relatively spartan musical accompaniment nicely balanced against stylish, intensely rhythmic vocals. The song features the talents of guest Cholo Valderrama in a move that helps push an already fine number further over the top.

It certainly more than fits the bill as a winning pop and dance number, but Monsieur Job are consistently producing music bearing the marks of genuine substance. The rhythmic values of this single are impossible to deny, but there’s also solid melodicism driving the song for audiences and the impeccable construction, likewise, helps make it a winner. The smooth, understated sensuality of the number is another bonus for listeners and further accentuates their talents. It is never brazen, rather suggestive, and cozies up to listeners from the first without ever overwhelming them.

Bands of every stripe come together in all sorts of ways. Monsieur Job has united under a band of creating something familiar, yet distinctive and new for lovers of Latin fueled dance and pop. This new single is more than successful at doing so; it, indeed, raises the bar ever higher for a four piece who are proving to be more than a flash in the pan but, instead, are gradually refreshing and renovating what it means to be an artist in this particular genre. Their stunning cross section of talents and superior production talents frame the song in the best possible way for listeners and there’s little question, after hearing this number, their continued climb in the music world will continue unabated. Colombia has provided our world with a wealth of musical entertainment over its long history and Monsieur Job stand as the new vanguard of Colombian artists ready to further highlight the nation’s substantial contributions to our entertainment lives. It’s music with a positive and upbeat bent that will engage you from the first.

Cyborg Asylum - Never Finished, Only Abandoned (2017)

OFFICIAL: https://www.cyborgasylum.com/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/CyborgAsylum/

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/cyborgasylum

Written by David Shouse, posted by blog admin

Never Finished, Only Abandoned is the first release from Cyborg Asylum, a twosome combining American and English influences into an unique powerhouse quite unlike any other act working today in the alternative rock/industrial genre. Rather than just focusing on slambanging guitar and percussion theatrics, Cyborg Asylum inventively utilizes melody and atmospherics to further strengthen their muscular arrangements. There’s an enormous amount of imagination powering the album’s twelve songs and the duo never relaxes their musical standards – hence, there isn’t a single song on the release you can regard as filler. Cyborg Asylum’s sonic landscape is varied enough that hardcore music fans will find virtually endless riches in these performances while casual fans will find the tracks to be accessible and intensely physical. Never Finished, Only Abandoned paraphrases the renowned quote from Leonardo da Vinci that a work of “… art is never finished, only abandoned” and even a cursory listen through this album will convince anyone that Cyborg Asylum has certainly crafted an enduring work of musical art.

The thought and consideration that goes into realizing this release reveals itself in multiple ways. Despite Tumminia’s vocal and lyrical presence in the duo, a substantial portion of the release is devoted to instrumental tracks, usually brief in duration when compared to the tracks where Tumminia contributes more, and they demonstrate the deliberate yet organic approach that defines even the vocally driven numbers. “Blitz” makes excellent use of sound effects well in keeping with its title and theme; it makes for a powerful opener. “Synergy” is a much more stripped down, sinewy endeavor that features two key elements for the first time – John Tumminia’s vocals and Phil Jones’ guitar work. The former, obviously, exerts the largest influence on the track’s development, although it achieves different effects than one might expect thanks to the presence of post production manipulations. Jones’ guitar isn’t a shirking violet, however – the edgy distortion and upper register wails he incorporates into the arrangement immeasurably enhance the track. “War Machine” is another of the album’s instrumental tracks and the hints of imminent threat couched in its industrial textures are impossible to ignore. Its brief running time only serves to underscore its impact.

“Weightless” brings one of the album’s best arrangements with, beyond dispute, Tumminia’s finest lyric. The near poetic attributes of his writing create a striking contrast with the dark hued music and his delivery is up to the task of helping the material get over even stronger with listeners. The rattling percussive snap driving “Fragments as Illusion” along has its effects doubled by a haunting Tumminia vocal and the song takes a handful of surprising turns that will grip listeners. “Pale Green Dot” brings piano into the instrumental mix and it makes this instrumental melodically glitter in a way that few tracks on Never Finished, Only Abandoned are capable of. There’s certainly a tangible darkness that increasingly creeps in along the edges of the performance. It serves as a natural introduction of sorts, perhaps unintentionally, to the album’s last track “Paradigm Shift”. This shows the duo intent on ending their debut with enough appreciable sonic and musical force that listeners will feel satisfied, albeit a little dazed. Never Finished, Only Abandoned is definitely an exhaustive experience, but rewarding regardless, and it gives this tandem an exceptional strong debut to build on.

Josh Birdsong - Where the Light Bends (2017)

OFFICIAL: http://joshbirdsong.com/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/joshbirdsongguitar/

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/JoshBirdsong

INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/joshbirdsongmusic/

Written by Daniel Boyer, posted by blog admin

Where the Light Bends is the second release from Nashville based singer, songwriter, and guitarist Josh Birdsong. His debut Simple Geometry threw down the gauntlet by serving notice to the Nashville scene and the music world at large that a major new performer and writer is poised to make a deep impact. The promise of that initial release is fully realized with Where the Light Bends’ six songs and it has an impressive scope despite being an EP release. It isn’t surprising when you stop to consider the wave of accolades Birdsong has enjoyed since first emerging – numerous competitions, plum placement of his material on high profile television networks, and graduation from the prestigious Interlochen Arts Academy with a singer/songwriter degree. Where the Light Bends should accelerate his upward trajectory and cement him as one of the more formidable talents to emerge in recent memory.

His artistry is apparent from the first song onward. “Complex Context” is definitely the most aggressive track on the release and, while it shares some of the ambient textures you hear fleshed out in greater detail on later songs, the authoritative drumming heard throughout much of the track and uptempo pace set it apart from later songs. Birdsong delivers an equally forceful vocal and his guitar parts are certainly worth listeners’ attention. His six string talents are simply impossible to ignore. Another of the strongest songs on Where the Light Bends is the second cut “The Sound Beneath the Static” and the well rounded creativity defining both the arrangement and lyric makes this one of Birdsong’s most fully realized moments on both this release and his debut. The chorus is particularly memorable and the one-two combination of this with the opener gets Where the Light Bends off to an impressive start. The ambient influences on Birdsong’s songwriting gain strength with the songs “Cloud 8” and the EP’s longest song “Too Much to Hold”, but neither track is so devoted to its soundscape design that it neglects to engage listeners. The former song, especially, features subtle guitar lines that get under the listener’s skin while Birdsong’s singing on “Too Much to Hold” raises already excellent lyrics to a much higher level.

The EP moves away from the atmospheric ambient tone of those songs and back to music more in touch with the potential of his guitar playing with the songs “Arctic Desert” and the title song. There’s a slightly unsettled, dissonant edginess coming from “Arctic Desert” Birdsong’s audience will undoubtedly admire and concluding the EP with its title track illustrates how thoroughly conceived this release is for Birdsong and balances the guitar textures with equally memorable keyboard playing. Where the Light Bends is a more than adequate follow up to Simple Geometry and embodies for current fans and newcomers alike Birdsong’s considerable talents. These six songs pack far more of a cumulative effect than many full length albums and it never resorts to heavy handed methods to achieve its desired results.

YYY - A Tribute to the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds (2017)

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/therealyyy/

Written by Pamela Bellmore, posted by blog admin

This is an exhilarating release. Austin Carson, adopting the name YYY for his musical projects, is a Minneapolis based musician who can’t be accused of playing it safe. His tribute to the seminal Beach Boys masterpiece Pet Sounds, unsurprisingly titled A Tribute to The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds, doesn’t aspire to merely recreating the album. Thankfully. Instead, YYY has recruited the cream of the local musical crop to help him flesh out nothing less than a full on re-invention of this pop classic that endeavors to underline all of the aspects that make it such a canonical work while still putting his personal stamp on the collection with imagination and verve. It results in one of the year’s most impressive releases, original material or not. His interpretative powers are so developed that it isn’t a stretch to say this album, in its own way, is every bit as original as a release filled with his own compositions. He has claimed Brian Wilson’s tunes as his own and the addendums and revisions he subjects them to means this isn’t your father’s copy of Pet Sounds – for sure.

The opening track “Wouldn’t It Be Nice?” makes that last point clear. We are in familiar territory, to a certain extent – this wouldn’t be anything resembling a proper tribute to the album if it somehow forgot that vocal excellence is the lodestar of all things in Beach Boys music and the earnest, deeply felt qualities behind each of the album’s vocals more than respects the source material. He never neglects the melodic strengths behind these songs either, but he places them in a new context. The largely electronic arrangement has all the warmth that the song requires and more than adequately summons the needed atmospherics. When you go through this album, there is a small sense of YYY expending most of his creative energy on the album’s foundational songs – the aforementioned opener, “Sloop John B”, “God Only Knows”, and the closer “Good Vibrations”./ This is to be expected for a number of reasons, but it’s also a smart move – these are the pivot points upon which both the hardcore devotee and casual fan alike base their bulk of their knowledge regarding this album and he’d be a fool to not play those moments up.

Make no mistake, however, that his attentions do not extend to the comparatively little known secondary songs on Pet Sounds. He particularly excels bringing female voices into Wilson’s traditionally male dominated performances and Lydia Liza’s contributions to “Hang Onto Your Ego” and Devata Daun’s singing on “I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times” give these tracks a distinct character the originals do not have. Bringing in such a wide cast of guest stars from the Minneapolis scene to help him realize this tribute album could have made it a diffuse affair with a slightly schizophrenic character, but YYY shows the good instincts to utilize those performers in ways that accentuate their strengths and those of the respective song. It makes this tribute to Pet Sounds one of the most unique listening experiences in my recent memory and marks its creative mastermind, Austin Carson, as a talent to watch for years to come.