Trollheart Listens to Every Album on Wiki's List for 2017

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 11:10 AM

Album title: Just Bring It
Artist: Band-Maid
Genre: Hard Rock, Heavy Metal
Nationality: Japanese
Release date: January 11
Position in Discography: Fourth
Familiar with this artist?No
Familiar with the genre or subgenre? Very
Check out more from this artist? Possibly
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Probably
Ever since the emergence of Babymetal it seems Japanese girls have embraced the idea of Heavy Metal, perhaps as much as K-pop in Korea, and bands like Band-Maid have been doing good business on the back of that reawakened interest. As for this, well it's competent, maybe taking themselves a little too seriously – not the fun K-pop seems to be – but I wouldn't say it's anything special and I'd be in no hurry to hear more.

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 02:58 PM

Album title: Mystery of Venus
Artist: Hello Venus
Genre: K-pop
Nationality: Korean
Release date: January 11
Position in Discography: Fifth
Familiar with this artist? No
Familiar with the genre or subgenre? Getting there
Check out more from this artist? Meh
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Meh

Back to K-pop we go. This is another new group to me, Hello Venus, and this is their fifth release, another EP, with only four tracks. Good fun I guess, but the fun is beginning to wear a little thin and of course peering below the makeup and the fluff there's really little there. Still, it's pleasant music, inoffensive but not something I'd seek out if I was in the mood for serious music. As fluff, it's ok I guess. Couldn't really tell that much of a difference between this and the various other K-pop albums I've listened to up to now. That will probably becoming a recurring theme as we go on.

djchameleon · 09-15-2017, 04:38 PM

I'm enjoying this thread more than I thought I would. Keep up the good work. Your previews are saving me time so I can just pick and choose some of the albums that I missed checking out.

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 04:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by djchameleon

I'm enjoying this thread more than I thought I would. Keep up the good work. Your previews are saving me time so I can just pick and choose some of the albums that I missed checking out.

Glad to help, and nice to have you along for the ride!

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 05:36 PM

Album title: Ambitions
Artist: One OK Rock
Genre: J-Rock (huh?)
Nationality: Japanese
Release date: January 11
Position in Discography: Eighth
Familiar with this artist? No
Familiar with the genre or subgenre? No
Check out more from this artist? No
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Maybe

Ah, those crazy Japanese! From Flower Travellin' Band and Dir En Grey to One OK Rock, they sure know how to pick strange names for their bands! Interesting to find that not only do these guys sing in English, it's perfect English too; had I not know they were Asian I would have pegged this as a US release. Catchy opening anyway. No complaints yet. Pretty decent in all fairness. Kind of a Script/Imagine Dragons feel to it. That would normally be a negative for me, and these guys probably don't sound like that at all, but it's all that comes to mind. And I like it. So far. “Hard to Love” is a surprisingly un-cringey ballad, hmm but then “Bedroom Warfare” takes the tone seriously down: I mean, they're using autotune here, the lyric is pretty terrible, and although the tune is catchy it's not particularly good. Almost like a different band has come onto the record. Sigh. Is this where it really begins to dip, or is it a blip on an otherwise half-decent album? Meh, “American Girls” is pretty much as bad, a real throwaway. OK “I Was King” pulls it back a little more on course, but it'll take a lot to erase the memory of those last two songs and convince me there are no more like them waiting to ambush me. Oh. There are. No, I think I'd chalk it off as a bog-level American rock-copy album which occasionally hits gold but most of the time it's kind of iron pyrite, if even that. I can't even use the obvious pun of saying it's One OK Album, cos it really doesn't even quite deserve that much praise.

FaSho · 09-15-2017, 07:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by djchameleon

I'm enjoying this thread more than I thought I would. Keep up the good work. Your previews are saving me time so I can just pick and choose some of the albums that I missed checking out.

literally what album so far were you worried you missed

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 05:42 PM

OK then, this is where, as they say, the **** gets real. January 12 has no less than SIXTEEEN ****ing albums released on the same day, so here's where my progress is gonna slow down a little. Everything from country, folk and jazz to neo-psychedelia, pop and Christian rock. Yes, this is where I begin to wonder if this was a good idea after all. And just to underline the point, the next album up is the debut from a Brazilian drag queen! Well, I asked for it, didn't I?

GD · 09-15-2017, 05:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trollheart

OK then, this is where, as they say, the **** gets real. January 12 has no less than SIXTEEEN ****ing albums released on the same day, so here's where my progress is gonna slow down a little.

That's January 13 and it's 28 albums

Trollheart · 09-15-2017, 07:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gigantic Debaser

That's January 13 and it's 28 albums

Oh yeah. Thanks for that. Now where was I? Oh yeah...

**** it: I've heard some half-decent k-pop, a Bowie EP I wasn't aware of and I've been introduced to the Dropkick Murphys. So far, it's been worth it.

Ask me tomorrow, though...

grindy · 09-15-2017, 09:36 PM

Way to abandon Love Or Hate for this dumb ****.
Yeah, I'm late to the party.

09-15-2017, 11:10 AM	#1 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,996	Album title: Just Bring It Artist: Band-Maid Genre: Hard Rock, Heavy Metal Nationality: Japanese Release date: January 11 Position in Discography: Fourth Familiar with this artist?No Familiar with the genre or subgenre? Very Check out more from this artist? Possibly Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Probably Ever since the emergence of Babymetal it seems Japanese girls have embraced the idea of Heavy Metal, perhaps as much as K-pop in Korea, and bands like Band-Maid have been doing good business on the back of that reawakened interest. As for this, well it's competent, maybe taking themselves a little too seriously – not the fun K-pop seems to be – but I wouldn't say it's anything special and I'd be in no hurry to hear more. __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

09-15-2017, 02:58 PM	#2 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,996	Album title: Mystery of Venus Artist: Hello Venus Genre: K-pop Nationality: Korean Release date: January 11 Position in Discography: Fifth Familiar with this artist? No Familiar with the genre or subgenre? Getting there Check out more from this artist? Meh Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Meh Back to K-pop we go. This is another new group to me, Hello Venus, and this is their fifth release, another EP, with only four tracks. Good fun I guess, but the fun is beginning to wear a little thin and of course peering below the makeup and the fluff there's really little there. Still, it's pleasant music, inoffensive but not something I'd seek out if I was in the mood for serious music. As fluff, it's ok I guess. Couldn't really tell that much of a difference between this and the various other K-pop albums I've listened to up to now. That will probably becoming a recurring theme as we go on. __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

09-15-2017, 05:36 PM	#5 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,996	Album title: Ambitions Artist: One OK Rock Genre: J-Rock (huh?) Nationality: Japanese Release date: January 11 Position in Discography: Eighth Familiar with this artist? No Familiar with the genre or subgenre? No Check out more from this artist? No Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Maybe Ah, those crazy Japanese! From Flower Travellin' Band and Dir En Grey to One OK Rock, they sure know how to pick strange names for their bands! Interesting to find that not only do these guys sing in English, it's perfect English too; had I not know they were Asian I would have pegged this as a US release. Catchy opening anyway. No complaints yet. Pretty decent in all fairness. Kind of a Script/Imagine Dragons feel to it. That would normally be a negative for me, and these guys probably don't sound like that at all, but it's all that comes to mind. And I like it. So far. “Hard to Love” is a surprisingly un-cringey ballad, hmm but then “Bedroom Warfare” takes the tone seriously down: I mean, they're using autotune here, the lyric is pretty terrible, and although the tune is catchy it's not particularly good. Almost like a different band has come onto the record. Sigh. Is this where it really begins to dip, or is it a blip on an otherwise half-decent album? Meh, “American Girls” is pretty much as bad, a real throwaway. OK “I Was King” pulls it back a little more on course, but it'll take a lot to erase the memory of those last two songs and convince me there are no more like them waiting to ambush me. Oh. There are. No, I think I'd chalk it off as a bog-level American rock-copy album which occasionally hits gold but most of the time it's kind of iron pyrite, if even that. I can't even use the obvious pun of saying it's One OK Album, cos it really doesn't even quite deserve that much praise. __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

09-15-2017, 05:42 PM	#7 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,996	OK then, this is where, as they say, the ** gets real. January 12 has no less than SIXTEEEN *ing albums released on the same day, so here's where my progress is gonna slow down a little. Everything from country, folk and jazz to neo-psychedelia, pop and Christian rock. Yes, this is where I begin to wonder if this was a good idea after all. And just to underline the point, the next album up is the debut from a Brazilian drag queen! Well, I asked for it, didn't I? __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018*

09-15-2017, 09:36 PM	#10 (permalink)
grindy . Join Date: Oct 2014 Location: . Posts: 7,201	Way to abandon Love Or Hate for this dumb **. Yeah, I'm late to the party. __________________ A smell of petroleum prevails throughout.**