The Chorus Music Club Society • Page 197

Too much civility in here /s

 

You are too used to the metal thread: “I like A”, “NO, you are wrong!!! B is better and that’s a fact!!!” Haha!

 

sounds like we need a friendly local curmudgeon in this thread like we have in that one lol

 

Haha!

 

Fuck a metallica and fuck a music with guitars

 

Not here for the Metallica hate.

@JediMasterKevo182 @iCarly Rae Jepsen
Got behind, but I'll have reviews for your recs in another day or two.

 

lol I like Mertallicuh

 

okay @suicidesaints gave me Beggars by Thrice
I know some people might be surprised that I had never heard a Thrice album, like most people in the scene I'm familiar with them but I just haven't heard an album by them, just a heads up for everyone for future sessions
this sounded different than what I was imagining but I'm not quite sure what I thought it would be
I like Dustin's voice

standout songs- The Weight, Doublespeak,In Exile, Wood And Wire, The Great Exchange

 

I think @JRGComedy is on something. Got any left?!

 

Lol I've got the common cold brain. Been sick all weekend and I get so weird

 

I've only heard Major/Minor

 

Ahhh you are on the “syrup”

 

purple drank

 

it's weird that you were recommended their worst album

 

What?!?!! Beggars is their worst?

I love the entire discography, so maybe I'm not the person to ask, but I thought Beggars and Vheissu were pretty much universally agreed on as their best.

 

That's not serious right? Please tell me this ain't serious.

 

my work here is done

 

To create the metal thread drama? Lol

 

how'd I do?

 

I’m glad you got it out of your system

 

Its time to get some write ups out into the open now, tonight. Three partners, 5 albums total. I always enjoy getting these write ups up, so lets do this.

First up comes one from @broken22

Matt Skiba And The Sekrets- Kuts

Viva la Skiba! This is a saying I have been saying ever since front man Matt Skiba joined Mark Hoppus in Blink-182 and I came to appreciate how much power Skiba's vocal prowess both in the foreground and the background contains. I was a fan of Alkaline Trio, Matthew Skiba's other project prior and main band prior to joining Blink, beforehand and I liked his voice from that but this solidified it. But we are not here to talk about either of those two bands; we are here to talk about Matt's solo project and their 2015 release prior to his joining Blink-182. My only knowledge of this solo band came from two sources; a trade broken and I did late last year where I checked out one of their earlier albums, and the video of his melt down on stage during one of their first shows(He has since cleaned up and I commend him for this, his live ability is amazing now. This is actually a topic he addresses in the opening song. But I digress.) so I was unsure of what to expect going into this album.

This album shows a much more laid back and mellow version of Skiba. Unlike his work in Alkaline which is dark and sometimes heavy punk, or his work in Blink-182 which is up beat and sunny pop punk, this album seems to find a happy medium between the two sounds for Matt. These songs are more on the softer side of pop punk, but they sound very much like Matt Skiba's side of Alkaline, mixed with some cool 80s synth rock and some keyboard rock that I will flat out say works amazingly with Matt Skiba's vocals when he sings in a somber tone. Songs like 'I Just Killed To Say I Love You' are very mellow, but with Skiba's vocals and his strength of writing empathetic and relatable lyrics, these softer sides of the man are an enjoyable listen. 'Lonely and Kold' is a solid opener, its super catchy to be stuck in your head and about as 'heavy' as the album gets musically; as well as having one of the catchiest choruses. Lyrically a lot of these songs are heavy and strong. This strength never lets up, as I was enamored with 'She Wolf' which starts with a bad ass intro riff and some of my favorite vocal performances of Matt on this album. With the opening lyrics of "Never forget the way you looked at me that night, Never forget the way you smile. You looked at me as if I was your prey; And you were a wolf out in the wild" the lyrical tone is set about a bitter relationship that kills emotionally. 'Krazy' is a bit more on the lax side, but its a great 1-2-3 stretch to get you into this album that will keep you invested; there is not a bad song on this album in my opinion. Each song has its own unique sound, and they don't blend together. Songs like 'Way Bakk When' and 'Hemophiliak' are stellar examples of the man's ability to do something different and how good his voice sounds on a song. This album seems Matt Skiba being much more raw with his emotions in these lyrics; each of these songs are lyrically able to pull at your heart strings. I also have to note that Skiba does both main and backing vocals on these songs, and I have to say as I have always liked his ability to carry both sides of vocals; he nails it on these songs. This is evident as soon as you hear the opening track.

If you are a fan of Matt's work in either Alkaline Trio or Blink-182; whether it be his ability to play a guitar or of his vocals and lyrics; you will like this album. Or if you like the idea of a more poppy The Cure. Matt shines on this album, and I will be returning to this often. It has Matt's strengths that I have enjoyed on both of his other projects, and allows him 100% control to do what he wanted to do on this album. I did not know Matt was able to be this mellow; and he nails it. I would recommend this album to not only fans of his other work, but fans of pop punk/ punk in general. This is a great album. Stand out tracks: 'Lonely And Kold', 'She Wolf', 'I Just Killed To Say I Love You', 'Way Bakk When', 'Hemophiliak', 'Vienna'.

9/10

 

As promised, the list of albums from the Deathwish grab bag:

108: 18.61
Acid Tiger: Acid Tiger
Birds in Row: Personal War
Blacklisted: When People Grow, People Go
The Carrier: Blind to What is Right
Ceremony: Violence Violence
Cold World: Dedicated to Babies Who Came First
Coliseum: Coliseum
Coliseum: Anxiety's Kiss
Cult Leader: Lightless Walk
Cult Leader: Nothing For Us Here
Death Index: Death Index
Doomriders: Come Alive
Doomrider: Grand Blood
Frameworks: Smother
Harm Wulf: Hijirah
Loma Prieta: Self Portrait
Modern Life Is War: My Love, My Way
Oathbreaker: Eros/Anteros
Planes Mistaken For Stars: Prey
Planes Mistaken For Stars: Mercy
Pulling Teeth: Paranoid Illusions, Paranoid Delusions
Punch: They Don't Have to Believe
Rise and Fall: Our Circle is Vicious
Rot in Hell: As Pearls Before Swine
Some Girls: All My Friends Are Going Death
Starkweather: This Sheltering Night
Touche Amore: Is Survived By
Trap Them: Seizures in Barren Paradise
Wovenhand: Refractory Obdurate

I'm pretty excited to dive into this!

 

Great review! This is a very good record and shows a very different side of him.

 

Next come a couple of recommendations from our very own @skogsraet

Djavan- A Voz, O Violao

The whole point of the CMCS has always been to branch out our music tastes and help people hear new things; in or outside of their regular music tastes. When I was given this 1976 album, I had no idea what I was getting into. This was as outside of my wheelhouse as it was going to get, even more so than when I was paired with @Kiana . This album is a portugese album and is almost a folk rock style. Being completely in Portuguese, I will not be able to exactly comment on the lyrics; though I can come out flat and say that the guy can sing. Even without knowing what he was singing about, the guy's voice is superb for this style of music and works extremely well on these songs. This is Djavan's first LP, and as his first work its a good place to start if you are wanting to hear some good Brazilian music.

These songs work more as compositions than of 'songs', especially when you don't know what the lyrics are. The singing is almost an afterthought, I would imagine even if you spoke Spanish, as the focus is really on the music of the songs. Extremely melodic, these are well crafted pieces of art. As soon as you hear the opening track 'Flor de Lis', you kind of just melt into listening to the melody and how they mix with his voice. The album is mostly in acoustic guitar, though there are times that some other instruments make their way into the mix. Again, his voice whether you know what the lyrics are or not, mix well with the instruments that he has selected to use in these pieces. There are extremely well thought out grooves on this, and they are diverse and well played. Brazilian music has a tendency to be beautiful to the ear, and this is no exception. In fact, this may be one of the better exposures to this genre that I have heard. The up beat rhythm of the songs are a huge stand out of the songs, and there are moments where his voice sounds very passionate and sad yet mixing well with the more up beat sound. The songs work well and flow together, especially the little run of track seven 'Maria Das Mercedes' through ten 'Fato Consumado'. At 35 minutes its a quick listen, but it flows so incredibly well that you don't even keep track of the time when listening. These songs work especially well listened to alone on a cold rainy night, that was one of the ways I listened to the album and it sat well with me in that scenario.

If you like Brazilian music, folk rock, or just want to push your limits of listening beyond American music, this is a fantastic way to start it off. I probably won't return to this all that much, just because its such a different sound than what I normally go with; but it has merits and is definitely worth the respect of listening to at least once if you want to branch out to different cultures of music. Its a very beautiful yet interesting experience listening to this album. Stand Out Tracks: 'Flor De Lis', 'Para-Raio', 'Maria Das Mercedes', 'Magia'.
6.5/10

Brockhampton- Saturation III

This actually is NOT that far out of my wheelhouse...to an extent. Unknown to a LOT of people of Chorus, before I was obsessed with Blink-182 and pop punk/rock music, I was obsessed with hip hop for literally YEARS until after my sophomore year of high school. That being said, Its been a while since I revisited the genre outside of a handful of releases and even longer since I liked something from that genre of music. Knowing what I know about @skogsraet when we were paired, I was expecting something from this spectrum of the music wheel, and I was not disappointed. This was a rambunctious, bizarre listen; and its exactly what I needed to listen to a hip hop album again. What I got was the collision of a boy band and a hip hop group in this bizarre makeshift group.

One thing I will say about this album, it has some very dang good beats to it. One of the major things I used to like about hip hop in high school was the beats; they were a great backdrop to my days of driving around with friends, going to clubs with friends or dancing with dates. The lyrics were usually an after thought; and this album delivers some very good beats to it. This is more of a pop hip hop act than the tradition hip hop that you would think of, and when you hear songs like 'ZIPPER' with these beats that will be stuck in your head for days, its not hard to see the appeal that these guys carry. If you focus too much on what you are listening to, you are in for a culture shock. Think Kanye meets One Direction, and that's kind of what these guys would be. They kind of fall into the boy band spectrum of hip hop. The best practice is to not focus and just flow with it. You'll experience some good flows and some great beats and rhythms. When you do listen to the lyrics, not all of them bad. Some of them are a bit clunky, some are downright goofy, but there are some good ones in there like 'JOHNNY'. There are times like on the song 'BLEACH' where they embrace their boy band label that was handed to them a bit more, and its not as bad as you would think as with say One Direction or something. Very unorthodox in places, but that is kind of what makes these guys work. There is a lot of lyrics about self belief and motivation in these songs, and with these guys being a DIY act(Something I really respect) that makes sense. There are also a lot of lyrics about growing out of what you are told you are, something else that collaborates with the prior theme I mentioned. At 46 minutes, this is the longer of the two recommendations that she gave me, but it was not at all a hard listen. There is a charm to these songs, and like I said I liked a lot of the beats that they put down in the songs. Sometimes goofy, sometimes a bit eye rolling, but overall there wasn't anything really bad to it.

If you like poppy music, or hip hop, this album would work well inside of your wheel house. It has moments of great rhythm and beats, some good bars and working well between the members of the group. The other two albums they released before this (in the same year) are a bit under developed compared to this one from what I have been told, as this seems to be their culmination. It was the end to a trilogy from what I gather, and not that bad of a listening experience on its own. This was not what I expected going in, but I ended up liking it a bit more than I thought I would. Again, there were times that this album gets goofy, but from what I can tell that's what these guys were going for. They apparently are trying to be different, to be bizarre; and that works very well for them. Its been a while since I listened to this style of music very much, but this was enjoyable. Stand out tracks: 'ZIPPER', 'BLEACH', 'JOHNNY', 'ALASKA', 'HOTTIE'. 6.5/10

 

Great write-ups. Just a note though, that first album is in Portuguese. We don’t speak Spanish in Brazil haha. Also found it funny that you described Brockhampton as a mix of Kanye and 1D. That’s so spot on given they met on a Kanye fan forum and they name check 1D a lot in their music. It was fun reading these!

I expect to have the reviews for your recs done and posted by tomorrow night!