Frownland

Yes, as I put it in the parentheses.

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Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.

Pet_Sounds

OK, wasn't sure if you actually invented it or just made your own. I'll give the album a shot. I enjoyed Knuckle in the Mud.

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Everybody's dying just to get the disease

Frownland

It's basically the most bastardized cigar box guitar you've ever seen. Used a floorboard for the neck and some random box, and it has two atriums with no tuning pegs. For that recording we took a gramophone horn and atuck it in one if the many holes drilled into the body.

You can probably guess we were on the other side of sobriety.

Good luck listening, this records our most abrasive. I like it a lot because we really took our sound into our own and made some if the most apocalyptic **** you've never heard.

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Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.

Rexx Shredd

I like it. Its like an acid jazz version of "Illusion Of Safety", who I listened to back in the late 80s/early 90s

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OK :)

URBAN SHOKKER -- Old School P-Funk Style FUNK -- out NOW on Carbon 12 Records

Trollheart

Time to get off my arse and give some more of your music a listen. I've a few still backed up, but I was asked specifically yesterday to look at this, and so I will. Xurtio is a member who doesn't seem to post that often (although he could be posting in threads or subforum I don't visit) so unless you're a prog head you may not know him, but he's been here for a while. He has a band called Luop Garou --- I think he mentioned once what it meant but I've forgotten --- and on their Soundcloud page they describe themselves thus:

“An amalgam of genre bending tonality and psychedelic fusion”.

Should I be worried? Who knows, but I'm going in anyway. They have a lot of music on their page, but I'm told the first four have been released as a mini-album, so I'll check those out and see how we go. Unfortunately I don't know if there's a title so I'll just assume it's self-titled; if I'm wrong Xurtio can correct me.

Luop Garou --- Luop Garou --- 2015

“Pull” is the first track, and after some odd little sounds it settles into a sort of slow blues groove, the singer reminding me of a cross between Cave and Reed, with a little Cohen thrown in. There are female vocals there too, which sort of lighten the tone. The music is a kind of spiralling, almost waltzy melody, slow and dreamy, with a really nice sort of vocalise part in the middle --- it may be synth, theremin, god knows what, even guitar effects: I'm no musician, but it's good. Impressed so far. It's a short little track, shy of three minutes and ends with a sort of creaky sound that reminds me of Floyd's “Your possible pasts”. Next up is a more guitar oriented tune, pulling (sorry) in those same effects as “Fed a spider” keeps the tempo slow and laidback, definitely more of the Cave influences here I feel.

Nice kind of bouncy, echoey drumwork with what I guess is a guitar pedal effect which sounds a little like slide guitar. Could be synth of course. Slow, descending end and we're into the third track, which they have labelled as “psychedelic punk”, making me flinch a little, but the charmingly-titled “Pile of guts” is not that far removed from the other two tracks, though it is a lot faster and rockier. Guitar a lot more to the fore here and not distorted (if it was on the previous song), but I must sound a note of caution here: the singer's voice suited the last two tracks but here it's just too laconic and I think someone with a bit more fire might be needed. I don't know if Luop Garou have any other singers, but the lady who was providing the backing vox to the first track might be a possibility?

Very decent guitar solo which puts me more in mind of a progressive rock tune than anything to do with punk really, and a sweet little bassline near the end, taking us into “Cats n' dogs”, the final track. This opens with feedback guitar and organ, very Waits in feel, that carnival idea he uses so well, sort of spooky in its way. The vocal here is initially more moaned than sung, and I hear someone doing a passable impression of a cat, which is cool, though why they couldn't have employed a proper cat I don't know: doing an animal out of a gig, honestly! The vocal is now going properly and again this song suits the vocalist, with its dark atmosphere and laconic feel. I hear tinges of Bowie here also.Nice guitar solo, not overdone or overblown, but very competent and fits in well with the rest of the music.

TRACKLISTING

1. Pull
2. Fed a spider
3. Pile of guts
4. Cats n' dogs

Hard to categorise this band, but overall I feel a sense of blues a la Cave, maybe the odd flash of Velvets as well. And certainly some nods to Waits. All in all, very enjoyable and I wouldn't be averse to listening to more, though as I say there is that one song that just seems not to sit very well with the singer. Just a thought, but maybe someone else might try singing that one? Other than that, impressed and a very good job overall.

You can catch the album, and the rest of Luop Garou's music, here
https://soundcloud.com/luop-garou

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Xurtio

Thanks Trollheart! Our original vocalist struggled with Pile for a long time. We have a new singer that fits Pile of Guts a lot better. Looking forward to having him lay down a track over our instruments.

There's no title to this demo, it's essentially a precursor to the full album (which isn't named yet but has working title "Cats n' Dogs" after the song.

Oh, also that was not female vocals, that was me! (no offense taken, I like how the vocals turned out there and I had a little influence from Billie Holiday).

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Trollheart

Some people are so pushy! “Review this, or I'll turn you into a toad,” he said. Or possibly the threat was more physical and to do with visits to the dentist. Anyway, the upshot was that I have been threatened and as always, I respond to threats of violence with my customary cowardice and fold like an umbrella. So here we go.

Underworld --- The Peaks of Thok --- 2015 (Bandcamp release)

This appears to be the name under which Mondo Bungle releases his music, and that in itself is getting high praise around these here parts, making it all the more important to review it here before Ki goes and steals the idea I stole from Pet Sounds... well, we could stay here for hours and argue over 'oo stole what from 'oo, but the main thing is, I had the idea first, even if Pet Sounds wrote it down and posted it first. Additional: shut up, Batty.

At any rate, we open on “Dream quest 5” (what happened to Dream Quests 1-4? Ask Mondo) which is a long enough track, eleven minutes and change, and opens with a dark, atmospheric sound of wind perhaps, low and growling with little really happening until after the second minute, but you can kind of sense something building. Some sort of echoey effects then, with what sounds like a howl and a sort of falling siren which puts me in mind somewhat of whale song, and we're now five minutes in. I guess this is what's called minimalist ambient? No real tune, no melody just effects. I keep turning it up because I can hear nothing for minutes at a time, then suddenly something screams or roars through. Bit unsettling.

Okay, in the sixth minute there is absolutely nothing. Silence. I know, because I turned up the volume and all I got was that high-pitched static-y screech you get when there's no music or sound to be transmitted. This goes on (as it were) to the seventh minute, before some sort of high-pitched effect comes in, then what may actually be a synth in the eighth, rising slowly like a banshee over a lake, then descending and falling away and though there's more than a minute left I feel it's going to end in more or less silence now. And it does. The second track is the title, another eleven-minute composition --- actually twelve --- and I don't mean to be nasty but I hope this one has more music in it as it's really hard to review ambient sounds. Well I hear a low synth but it's basically holding the same chord sort of like I remember Solar Fields annoying me by doing. Mind you, I grew to like that. There does seem to be slightly more of a melody here, but again it's very sparse and everything is really drawn out very long indeed. Sort of puts me in mind at times of Peter Gabriel's Ovo.

It's now into the eighth minute and I still can't really find anything to latch on to, anything to write about. It's sort of like the equivalent of floating weightless and helpless in space, wondering if your feet will ever touch the ground again. The next three tracks are all part of the one, labelled “Swarm of ghosts”, and all quite short, less than three minutes each. Even added together, that doesn't come close to the running times for the two previous tracks. It's more ambient, kind of formless sound, and I see now that Mondo has “drone” as prominent tags on this, so I guess that's what it is. It's hard to tell you what it's like though, as it's basically just rising and falling effects and sounds, most of them very low, all very slow, and really minimalist. The first part is over before I know it and the second seems to have some sort of sonar effect bouncing through it, then there's something like a scream, but as I say it's really hard to pick out any individual sounds, and I am trying.

Sort of a mechanical sound to part three, low booming thunder noises, like a storm moving slowly away, what sounds like rain falling on metal barrels in a warehouse, and then it could be water in pipes maybe, very hollow sound with what appears to be dripping water again. The closer is a full fourteen minutes long, which does not inspire me, given what I've heard so far. I'm sure there's a great amount of thought and effort gone into this, and I certainly could not do it, but I just can't see the music in it, and without music I'm left with very little to write about. “Along the peaks of Thok” is, I guess, Mondo's signature piece, and there's some dark, growling effect (assume it's a synth, maybe not) in the second minute, then it goes all quiet again for about another five minutes before a sound like a great sigh issues forth, followed by a scraping, echoey something, and it gets the loudest and most substantial it's been in the ninth minute, with a dark, rolling wave and wind sounds. It's coming to the end now and I have to say I'm glad: I seriously do not get this at all.

TRACKLISTING

1. Dream quest 5
2. Underworld
3. Swarm of ghosts part 1
4. Swarm of ghosts part 2
5. Swarm of ghosts part 3
6. Along the peaks of Thok

I don't wish to do Mondo a disservice here. I'm sure those who are into drone/ambient/darkwhatever-the-fuck-this-is will be able to appreciate far better than I the delicate nuances, the programming and the motifs and themes he is exploring here. But to me it just feels like I've emerged from a vacuum and can finally breathe again. It's probably a classic of the genre, and there's certainly a lot of work been put into it, but it just is not anywhere near my wheelhouse.

You can hear it all here https://thepeaksofthok.bandcamp.com/album/underworld

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Mondo Bungle

Dream Quests 1-4 are on the first album.
I just wanted to see your input on one of my albums as you're a great reviewer, and I thought I'd give you this instead of something from my main project (you'd hate it).

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Powerstars

Grand idea, TH. When my band has better demos, I'll send them your way,

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Trollheart

Aw shucks, thanks! Sorry I couldn't give it too much love, but I'm sure a whole lot of people will really like it.
Do, by all means.
Also, anyone else who wants their work reviewed (yours are in the pipeline, Plankton, don't worry) just drop me a line.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018