Just got back from the NYE celebration at the Golden Triangle in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. Three separate venues: Pavillion (open-air clubbing), Sungei Wang (some Chinese artists singing on stage), and Changkat BB (lots & lots of Heinekens). So now I found out that 2011 reeks of alcohol, sweat, and bloodied forehead struck by metal projectiles thrown by rowdy revelers, thanks in part to street-side vendors selling foam-spraying cans.
And true to the whole spirit of NYE celebration, the reality actually looked a lot like this. Happy New Year everyone!
*This entry would probably be the last for the year before we'll start posting again next week. And since we're already done with counting down 30 best albums of the last decade, it's best perhaps for us to look at some of the highs that have made the year 2010 in music that is worth taking note.
Best New Artist - Janelle Monáe Yes, she might have started her professional music career back in 2006, but it was only this year that she had started to enter our radar (and presumably everyone else's as well). And this time it's not some self-depreciating trashbag female singer audible only with the help of the Auto-Tune, singing about something that is at best deliriously incomprehensible (yes, it's Ke$ha if it's not already obvious). Janelle Monáe has that soulful voice and a unique delivery style which are very rarely can be found nowadays.
Best Album - Diamond Eyes by Deftones I'm still scratching my head over some of the lines Chino Moreno sang in this album, but as far as I could work it out, for the entire album they were actually talking about sex. That should probably explain why there are lots of reference on 'blood' and 'shooting stars from the barrel of your eyes'. But lovemaking matters aside, Diamond Eyes are brilliant. After two frankly pedestrian albums, they have finally hit the right note and produced, what we dare to say, Deftones' finest album of their entire career (so far).
*Sorry for the shitty video, but copyright matters prevented us from embedding the official video clip for the song.
Best Song - Fuck You by Cee Lo Green This is sheer catharsis at its' funky best. Should add that the year 2010 also was when we started to pay attention to the mainstream music as well, instead of just focusing on the indie scene. Cee Lo Green's came to us as a bit of a surprise because very rarely we've heard songs about being snubbed by a partner that is fun and not angry or sad. So fun indeed that the "fuck you" part is almost a delight to sing along with.
Best Old Song Given a Breath of Fresh Air - Monoloque's Tiada Kata Secantik Bahasa (P. Ramlee) When the newspaper The Star ran an article covering about an effort among Malaysia's indie musicians to do what is basically a cover of Tan Sri P. Ramlee's songs, at first I couldn't care less of what the final product would've been. But reading at how all the artists involved in the project talking about the depth of emotion that permeates through all of P. Ramlee's works, and how they wanted to capture that exact 'feel' in their version of the song, that got me curious. Fair to say after listening to seven or eight of the songs, the only 'feel' that I can get from it was disappointment. None of what they claimed to be 'the troubling croon of a wounded soul' was evident in their cover, save for one - Monoloque's Tiada Kata Secantik Bahasa. Even if you don't speak the language, you could have a pretty accurate guess of what this song is actually about.
Best Song by a Local Artist - Gadis Semasa by Yuna The guitar-straddling girl from Kedah has finally ditched her gloomy, somber past and embraced the fun and the hip with this one, a song that is both playful and groovy, something that is not very synonymous with Yuna. It's a real breath of fresh air, not only for Yuna, but for the Malaysian music scene in general as well.
Best Song To Sing Along When Frustrated - Law's Lover's Tiff This underground band is so elusive in nature that frankly speaking, we had no idea who the Hell they are, where they came from, and how on Earth they got their materials to be played on national radio when even within the indie circle, they are almost anonymous. We can't even find a good gig in which they are playing. Which should explain the lack of a picture for this one. Real frustration we got here...
Best... Ok We'll Admit It We Just Fucking Love This Band - Law And they have another song which they did a duet with Liyana Fizi (the bite-the-back-of-my-hand beautiful songstress but with an uninteresting voice) called "Fantastic Adventure", which is a real fun to sing along to. Damn it - who are these people?!
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
1. Arcade Fire - Funeral (2004)
This choice of making Funeral as the best album ever released throughout last decade should not come as a big surprise to many music publications who had their ears on the burgeoning Indie scene because by the time their third record dropped somewhere this year, they were already the most important act to ever grace the genre this side of the century. And all that praises going in their direction is totally understandable when what they have basically achieved with their debut is legendary greatness, of epic proportion. I'm using all this 'huge' words because this 2004 release is a 'huge' record in its own. Let's delve further on that point...
We have made it clear in the previous entry that when it comes to music, we look at the whole experience of listening to it, rather than just a remark of what was apparent on the surface, to deem the album as a masterpiece. And that is how Mastodon made it to number two because it made us feel awesome, ahead of Beck who had just written the most sincere album ever known to mankind. But alas, making us feeling like a total badass still meek in comparison as to how Arcade Fire's debut sounds like. We'll give you the basics first: it's a very delicate album that doesn't shout in your face and stamp its authority all over your heart, but rather very gently tugs at it and squeezes it until the tears comes out.
If that description sounds more troubling than comforting, more painful than insightful, then it could not get any truer about this album that it so much deserves the coveted first place. 2004 was the first time ever throughout my listening to music years in which I cried while listening to it. There is this painful, harrowing scream that echoes throughout the album which could only come from a long-tormented soul whose existence is only confirmed by the occasional act of solitude howling at the full moon, it is entirely impossible for anyone to not notice it. There has never been any other album that we've listened to that has such an overbearingly powerful emotion, delivered in its full glory, unfiltered by adulthood or level-headed sensibilities, it prompts you to coil in a fetal position while trembling and sobbing uncontrollably.
Think about the exact moment when someone you loved passed away; think of how empty your soul felt on that day, of how you felt that the world around you has crumbled and withered away and there is no more hope left in life and living - that is about as close as how you would experience, emotionally, when listening to this album. Not because incidentally the album was titled funeral, but because when they were in the midst of making this record, four of the band members lost a member of their family. We were thinking along the line of "so that's where they got the inspiration to make this album sounded like they were really hurt". Watch the video I've embedded below and try to get the whole feel of the song - it should reduce you to tears. It did that to me.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
2. Mastodon - Leviathan (2004)
Pure unbridled badassery finally has a name, and it is called Mastodon. Over here at the Genuine Mind Zine when it comes to music, we review our music based on how it makes us feel when we listen to it, whether it excites us, or suffocates us, or comfort us, or give us a good kick in the back, or make us shed our tears, or give us orgasm (joking really). Some people can be really anal about the technicalities in the working of an album, like the absolutely rubbish Pitchfork, which we think defeats the whole point of listening to music in the first place. Because when you listen to music, it's always about the feel of the song, the flurry of emotion that carries with it that crashes onto your heart in wave after wave until you're completely drenched and engulfed with it. Listening to a song is an experience and should always be treated likewise - a good song moves you, but a great song makes you lose sense of yourself and transport you to another dimension.
As we inch closer to the pinnacle, sort of, of this list, thus likewise the experience that one person will go through as they listen to the featured album should increase dramatically; and when a startlingly honest album has made it only behind you in the third place, how do you top it off? The answer is of course simply by being Mastodon. It's like a one-pass-for-all entry pass that guarantees your induction into the honorary wall of awesomeness when you have a band that is called Mastodon, even without anyone actually listened to any of your song in the first place - it just doesn't matter. It's like going for a track day race where everyone has brought along their M3s and AMG C-classes while you drove into the garage pit in a Lamborghini, and straight away declared the winner even when the race haven't started yet. Because you're in a Lambo, it's awesome, so that's that.
With this entry, yet again I was in quite a crisis. You see, Mastodon started back in 1999 but only released their debut in 2002 with Remission. It was apocalyptically good an album. The impact of the record can be likened to like being hit on the face with a lorry that is on fire while pulling along a fully-loaded steel container containing bricks. If it doesn't kill you already by their sheer power of awesomeness, then your soul is ripe to be raped by its dark and suffocating atmosphere that even light fears to tread. This is the real black: they are specially tailored for that moment when the black clouds are rolling and thundering down the hill and into the darkly valley where the soulless roam and saints are burned on sticks; Cradle of Filth in comparison is pink and their music is to lullaby babies to sleep. Then two years later, out came the pseudo-creature from Melville's literary world and the tale of its' fantasy adventure, Leviathan.
It is a monolithic creature from the Jurassic age, unearthed from the thawing ice in the Antarctica, breathed back to life by the power of distorted guitar, killer riffs and a holy scream. It is a bone-crushingly spectacular album unrivaled even by Blackie Lawless' hair. The band then proceeded to release two more albums, all within the space of last decade, proving once and for all that there is no such thing as awesome overkill. If there is a gauge to measure quantity of awesome, you can go from as low as Bon Jovi, to as high as a million, and Mastodon would be sitting one notch higher than the highest point. So by now it's probably clear of the crisis that I'm having: if this list can make do with more than one album per band/artist, all of their four records would have made it into the top ten. Perhaps I could be shitty again and do what I've did with number 4 but, if you think that should happen, think again...
The basis to all of Mastodon's four albums is that they're all heavy stuff. All of their materials are jam-packed with complex structure and odd time signatures, buried within body slam-inducing riffs and a melody sense that is inspired by the sound of human bodies being crushed together with a stone grinder. But the slight difference that marks the change from one album to the next is in the intensity of the materials served. While the debut, and to a certain extent their third album Blood Mountain was an absolute killer, it reeks of too much paranoia that it can at times become a little suffocating, and after a while, a bit stretching. While "Sleeping Giant" may be Mastodon's finest track among many other (which come to think of it, all of their songs actually), it still does not salvage the album from plunging head first into the unforgiving abyss of darkness. This is the difference that makes their sophomore effort the outstanding one, because it is the 'feel good' record of the four.
Let's skip pass all the superlatives that I would shower on this band at any given time and chance and just focus on the 2002 release because they are just simply marvelous across all four albums. But there are times when even Mastodon can outdo and out-gun themselves. As how many other people have said before: too many of a good thing is not at all a good thing. And Leviathan was a considerable exercise of not playing themselves to the full potential. They know what they are capable of producing and are actually fully capable of doing so; but in this album, they didn't. Whether it's intentional or not, the result is rather profound because it made the album felt rather classy. And thus by not indulging in awesome overkill, or ahem being the real Mastodon, they have successfully made what we reckon is essentially the 'real Mastodon' album.
Our feature on 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009) will resume real soon enough. My only excuse for this though is that it's tough being a writer and you have non-chronic Anomic Aphasia. But in the meantime, here's something interesting I found in the Internet, thanks to the magic of Failbook and Google.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
Before we reveal number 2 and 1, let's recap all the albums that made it from number 30 to 3, starting with...
30. Green Day - American IdiotBecause they managed to reinvent themselves (sort of) and outlived other punk rock bands who have ceased to exist.
29. Coldplay - Viva La Vida or Death and All His FriendsBecause now they sound pretty convincing, and not that cheesy, at least.
28. The Walkmen - Bows and ArrowsBecause it's a highly entertaining album, better than White Stripes and the Strokes.
27. Sonic Youth - Murray StreetBecause it proves that SY gets better through age.
26. Dimmu Borgir - Death Cult ArmageddonBecause even pussies can put out a highly entertaining album.
25. Sigur Rós - Takk...Because technically Ágætis Byrjun was released in 1999. Because now you'll know what Spring sounds like: breath-taking.
24. System of a Down - ToxicityBecause it was released at the correct time, towards the correct crowd, politically speaking.
23. My Vitriol - FinelinesBecause despite it has already been a decade since, it still sounds as fresh and exciting as when it was new.
22. Tool - LateralusBecause it is the single biggest mindfuck rock music ever gave birth to, and will continue to astound everyone.
21. The Coral - The CoralBecause 'colorful' music has never sounded this fun.
20. Badly Drawn Boy - The Hour of BewilderbeastBecause this album is way too far ahead of its time and will soon be the most important album humanity has ever clasped its ears on.
19. Queens of the Stone Age - Songs for the DeafBecause they are the epitome of hairy-chested, testosterone-charged man bands, and this album is the manliest of them all - it comes with its own pair of testes.
18. Vetiver - VetiverBecause now finally there is an album from the Queer Folk movement that actually makes sense, and is a good listen.
17. Mew - And the Glass Handed KitesBecause they are the most criminally under-appreciated band around.
16. Radiohead - In RainbowsBecause Kid A is over-hyped. Because it showcases the future preferred format for music - digital. Because this album surprisingly is very romantic.
15. ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead - Source Tags & CodesBecause it simply kicks ass.
14. Muse - Origin of SymmetryBecause before they became shitty post Absolution, they were THAT awesome.
13. Death Cab for Cutie - TransatlanticismBecause it's a very heart-warming album without being cheesy.
12. Silverchair - Young ModernBecause they are a true genius, an innovator, a visionary, and this album is their finest effort so far.
11. Deftones - White PonyBecause it's a true thinking man rock album and it should be made compulsory for everyone to listen to them.
10. Norah Jones - Come Away With MeBecause it's the most wonderful record ever made, and just look at her. Just look at her...
9. Tim DeLaughter and the Polyphonic Spree - Thumbsucker OSTBecause beautiful music, when made beautifully, is just... beautiful.
8. The Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire WorksBecause this album shows a real depth in technical prowess and ingenious songwriting for such a chaotic band.
7. Mogwai - The Hawk is HowlingBecause Mogwai has finally come round full circle and unleashed their true, full potential.
6. The Mars Volta - Frances the MuteBecause it is the most convoluted and perplexing album from the undisputed king of the convoluted and the perplexing.
5. PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the SeaBecause you can hear New York in it.
4. The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots / EmbryonicBecause no other album around that touches on such weird emotion, but it is true to all of us.
3. Beck - Sea ChangeBecause it is the most genuine and honest and realistic album ever made.
First of all, to those who are visiting this poky blog by clicking on that link over at Metal Bastard, welcome! And to give credit where it's due, our version of the 30 Best Albums of Last Decade list was inspired by David's own.
Now, to recall the post that we did on Tool, we were pretty much blown away by the sheer amount of mental-ness that goes into the whole theory, discussed by over-analytical listeners, regarding the album. Go on, click that link and the host of more links we provided in that post, we'll wait; but please don't blame us if your brain exploded as a direct consequence of exposure to it. Long story made short, we were pretty convinced that that was the most batshit insane stuff that we'll ever come across in rock music. Well, not until we come across this article over at Cracked.
And in particular, the one concerning Aphex Twin. Watch the video embedded below if you don't mind having your soul scarred for life. Please be patient and watch the video from start to finish without skipping forward for the proper full experience of having your soul raped to oblivion. The only conclusion that we can think of for that is: "holy fucking shit, Aphex Twin is twisted!"
A useful info about the video: This video shows a spectrogram analysis of a song from the Aphex Twin album "Windowlicker". The song is commonly simply referred to as [Equation] but its actual title can be seen in the beginning of the video. (As provided by HappyQuark, the poster of this video)
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
3. Beck - Sea Change (2002)
With all seriousness, failing in a romantic relationship is about as common as catching the flu. You need to be an absolute loser, or a social outcast, or a mental patient to not go through a rough patch in a relationship. The way I see it, the only difference is on how people cope with the loss, whether you can take it on the chin and move on, or it will kill you. Well, sort of. Most people (reasonable people) I assume fell in the 'a whole week/month gloom & doom moping' patch before the sun starts to shine as brightly as ever again; and in that so-called healing process, there will always be something, a catalyst, to help them go through it as painless as possible. Some will look for it in the company of close friends, some find better comfort being on their own, and some will find it in things like a good book, or (boxes of) chocolates. I've had my fair share of the rough and tough, and this album at number 3 was the magic potion.
In the year 2002 where the whole world had went literally crazy, something profound happened that prompted everyone to sit up and take notice: Beck Hansen, the wacky-headed musician whose music has never sounded any more serious than Patrick Starfish & Spongebob Squarepants going jellyfishing, released a straight-faced sober serious record. Before Sea Change was released, it is hard for anyone to take Beck seriously, whatnot with his balmy sense of humor and his cryptic lyrics. Just pick any record from the 90's, any album by Beck and I guarantee you that your brain will have been rearranged by the time you finish listening to it, and you will forgot what's your name. Sorry to exaggerate that part a bit but my point is, Beck is the torch-bearer of eccentricity. Yes, read that statement again carefully and Japan only comes in second place.
To really understand the impact of this record (and one Hell of an impact this album did made), you just need to go back to 1999 where he released his eighth album entitled Midnite Vultures. Simply put, it is an orgiastic electro pop record that mashes together the fun, the hip and the ludicrous. It sounds like a party at some swanky club, and it is, but everyone on the dance floor is looking like Steve Urkel. But then, after the terrorists struck down the WTC and everyone went mad, Beck broke-up with his long-term girlfriend and he went sober. And the result was the 2002 album.
The album kicked off with a crisp, Autumnal acoustic guitar strum and Beck singing "Put your hands on the wheel, let the golden age begin" in "The Golden Age". It has that distinct sound of perfect clear-headed sureness and sobriety, but tinged with the coarse voice of a weary man who had gone through many nights of senseless boozing, and the lyrics feels like it was scribbled on some coffee-stained paper written in a fit of a mix of anger and sadness. It sounded both calm and turbulent. It sounded down-trodden but not hopeless at the same time. It sounded exactly like a soul embroiled in an internal dilemma - something that you would normally go through after a break-up. There is no other album that sounds as realistic as this because it perfectly captures and encapsulates that exact emotional turmoil that one goes through after a break-up.
Before you go on and think that this album might look like a very bleak album, Beck then dishes out "Guess I'm Doing Fine". This time he sounded resplendent and perfectly at ease with the quagmire (if it can so be called) that he is currently in. At first it may seem a little defeatist, with Beck claiming "All the jewels in heaven, they don't look the same to me"; but then he made his intent clear: "It's only lies that I'm living, it's only tears that I'm crying, it's only you that I'm losing... Guess I'm doing fine". He clearly pointed out that the bygones had been let to be bygones, that right now I'm okay, everything is okay, and life must go on, and so do I. That line has got to be one of the most sincere, open-hearted admission of a broken-hearted man, ready to move on with life. I am sold - you would have to have a heart of gold to not be moved by this record. It is genuinely astonishing.
P/S: I've included as well a video to Beck's equally amazing cover of "Everybody's Got To Learn Sometime", which was not available in the album but was for the also amazing film entitled "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind".
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
4. The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002) / Embryonic (2009) Fucking brilliant
Blame me for being fickle minded or just being plain shitty, but the Flaming Lips in the Aughts had released not one, but two equally amazing album that I just can't put the two apart. It's like having to choose between two of your own child on which one you love more - it's impossible. So, in breaking with the tradition of how a 'best of' list is usually made where only one album occupies one space, here's why Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and Embryonic are both the number 4 best album of an entire decade.
If you happen to read any good Isaac Asimov novel, you'll probably get the overall gist of his stories - the future is one Hell of a bleak place for humanity. It is such a cold, desolate, grim, harsh, and hopeless place that the way we see it, we're doomed to go through it rather than blessed. In fact, such theme does not only permeate through literature because there is also a very good presentation of the idea in movie-dome through the equally heart-wrenching Artificial Intelligence, the movie in which Haley Joel Osment played a humanoid robot that is almost realistic in being human except for a lack of emotion. It is a deep, thought-provoking heavy drama that raises the question of "is a robot, a humanoid robot, capable of feeling love?"
Speaking on the same train of thought, the particular ethics-based question was also made as the central theme on Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. Is a robot capable of simple human emotion? And when it does, where will it put all of us as human? Because when once the border has been crossed, and the line blurred, will there anymore be any difference between human and robot? Between human and non-human? Will it matter anymore for us as human, to be human? Usually when faced with philosophical question of such nature, the answer will almost definitely be lost in definition and scientific, empirical researches. But in Yoshimi, the answer to all the questions is very simple: we're all doomed.
It is this kind of philosophical level depth of emotion that is ingrained in the Flaming Lips' music that really sets them apart from the rest, that makes them such a unique specimen, that makes them what they are, and they are the finest lot. They are known to be a wildly entertaining and stunningly creative and bafflingly weird band all the way since their inception in the 80's. But none of that erratic creativity is best matched than with their effort in the two albums featured here. While one is a cautionary tale on a bleak future concerned with robots capable of emotion, the other percolates through such wide ranging field of emotional depth never seen in any good Christopher Nolan's movie, it hurts your spleen. Some of the thoughts presented in their songs may be a little baffling at first but then at the end of it you just have to shed a little tears, moved by such a hopelessly sentimental album. But then again, clichéd as this may sound by now, when it comes to an album (or two albums) with true emotional depth, no other comes as close as these two very exceptional records.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
5. PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea (2000)
I always have this minor problem every time someone come up to me and ask: "where do you come from?". Not that it is a tricky question, but it is. I was born in the town of Kuantan in Pahang, in the East Coast of the peninsula; then we moved to Subang Jaya where I spent my entire childhood, my primary and secondary school years and up until I was in the university, there, which is so far the biggest part of my entire existence; then my parents moved again to the relatively secluded Sungai Buaya whereas for me I was stationed first at Petaling Jaya, and then Gombak; and finally now working, I'm in Bangi. So when someone popped that question, I wasn't quite sure whether the "come from" part refers to where I was born, or where I grew up, or where I had my school, or where I'm currently staying. But irregardless of that confusion I instantaneously knew that there is only one definite answer to that: Subang. It is the place -it is the only place - where I left my heart at.
The reason why I am reminiscing my Subang years for this entry is simply because of this album at number 5: PJ Harvey's Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea. The reason why I am reminiscing my Subang years for this album is simply for two reasons: one, I used to listen to this album religiously every time I'm on the Metrobus riding back and forth between Subang and KL, between my house and my usual stop at the Central Market, and it was the perfect soundtrack for me at the time; and two, because this album was written as an exclamation of Polly Jean's love towards New York during her brief stay there. Call it anthropomorphic or whatever else that you like, but I think I understand when someone is deeply in love with a particular city or town - irregardless of the huge difference between the Big Apple and the UEP-developed township.
PJ Harvey has always been a difficult case, either musically or personally. When she first broke through with the debut Dry in 1992, it was a sparse, raw and unforgiving record reeking of the Riot Grrrl spirit of Bikini Kill with its punk-ish kick-you-in-the-face attitude. I'm a little terrified to label her as feminist because the term has been so widely used, it kind of lost its real meaning and purpose; and besides, her materials has mostly been of personal taste rather than a revolution-for-a-purpose type, and the other reason is one which I will reveal a few lines down. When the second record was released the following year, her 'harsh' sound was given an even grittier touch thanks largely to Steve Albini on stewardship, which resulted in Harvey sounding a lot 'troubled' than what she was really on about. By the time her third album was released in 1995, a trend has emerged, and in which Harvey herself has admitted vocally - with each releases she refuses to repeat herself.
I'm not quite sure whether this is intentional or not, but when it comes to female artists, people always tend to look at the emotional depth angle of their materials, usually through their lyrics and the behaviorism or the mannerism of their delivery of the songs. There must always be a message encrypted in their songs - always. PJ Harvey though, as how I suspected, is not as much on the encrypted message or the emotional aspect of her lyrics but more on her musical leanings at every releases. This is in a way to say that Harvey's output has always been about musical style rather than message in the lyrics, furnished by the music. If that is still a little confusing, then try to listen to her music while ignoring her lyrics. For a brief moment, think of her lyrics as unimportant, and just focus instead towards the music, and you will start to realize what PJ Harvey is really about. She is like the singing version of Explosions in the Sky - it is always about the music, about the songs, about the style, about the genre.
The reason why I chose Stories as not only her best work as of last decade, but also for her entire career, is because it is a very stylish album, musically. And since this album is an exclamation of her love towards New York, it feels romantic. For all her other releases past and post Stories, the music has always felt personal, and alienating. and troubled, and gritty. But in this 2000 release though, it sounded unrestrained and free - it feels huge, like an occasion of some sort. And that occasion is no other than a celebration of love, like screaming on top of a top building, revealing your most intimate feeling towards the whole world, unashamed. It is the sort of occasion that makes you feel relived because you have just let out a huge burden, and it feels empowering and reviving. No wonder people say that love is a great thing - it makes you feel alive. It makes you realize that you're alive. And all the above-mentioned emotion you can experience it in this album. You might have not been to New York yet so you don't know how great that city is, until you've listened to this album and feel the groove of life in that city that is contained within this album. I kid you not, I could feel New York in me when I listen to this album, and I've never been there.
If I were PJ Harvey then this album would have definitely been about Subang - but it might have been rubbish compared to this.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
6. The Mars Volta - Frances the Mute (2005)
First of all, let's get the basics out of the way so that we can delve further into what this album is doing here at the giddy heights of number 6 just so to carefully avoid chronic brain damage among you the readers - The Mars Volta are mentalists. They are not your typical run-of-the-mill rock band that your mom, or spouse, or neighbor, will approve. Everything that they do, every single one of it must be exaggerated by a million times, stuff it in a bag and put it on a roller coaster ride (and must I add that the roller coaster ride is the one that goes around the entire galaxy), then take it off and shred it to pieces, then they begin again; and they do all that not because they wanted to or because they can, but because they are The Mars Volta. In other words, they are absolutely ridiculous.
Item number 1 done, now comes item number 2: to reiterate the point that I've made in the previous paragraph, everything that The Mars Volta do has to be humongous. This particular characteristics comes from Bixler-Zavala and Rodriguez-Lopez's love of throwing the conventional songwriting method into the industrial-sized skip (this is important) and let lunacy takes center stage. They are the kind of people you'd imagine will go to the recording studio on a Tuesday morning wearing nothing but thongs and rubber flip flops and sporting a white horn-rimmed glasses. And to further enhance their already unconventional songwriting method, every little detail of their songs has to be exaggerated. Let's say we have a ten minutes composition, and let's say there are a total of 1354 chords that can be played on the guitar, The Mars Volta will give you all 1354 chords within 3 minutes, and that's only one-third of the entire length of the song, mind you. As a result, the final product has always been a dizzying collection of guitar licks flying at you at every angle in a constant barrage. In other words, they are absolutely ridiculous.
Item number 3: the lyrics. Another fact that we should establish about The Mars Volta is that they are absolute mental when it comes to lyrics craftsmanship. Consider figure 3.1: (My nails peel back / When the taxidermist ruined / Goose stepped the freckling impatience / All the brittle tombs) (from "Cygnus... Vismund Cygnus") Certain musicians will try to put a story behind their songs and usually that is achieved through the lyrics; some wanted to provoke a brainstorm through words and terms that challenges the listener's knowledge or long-held beliefs; some just want to make clear of their own feelings or emotions about something; and some just wanted to have fun with their English or wanted to flex their vocabulary muscle. The Mars Volta though is on an entirely different plane of thought: they just don't give a shit about what they were singing. Most of the time, their lyrics are so mind-boggling, it makes solving the Da Vinci's code seems as easy as sitting down on a chair. Consider figure 3.2: (There was a frail syrup dripping off / His lap danced lapel, punctuated by her / Decrepit prowl she washed down the hatching / Gizzard soft as a mane of needles / His orifice icicles hemorrhaged) (from "Miranda, That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore part b) Pour Another Icepick") Made any sense out of the above quoted lyrics yet? Thought so. It's like reading the poetry of Luis Bunuel whose head has just turned into a cow's. In other words, they are absolutely ridiculous.
So with all that facts established real nice, it is now only a matter of choosing which album that they have produced over the years which best covers all the above-mentioned characteristics: Frances the Mute. It is an album of absolute excess - most of the time it stretches one's patience to the limit, refusing to come round in full circle and make any sense of itself, or try to explain the logic behind anything. In fact, there is not even a single logic behind this album. It is just a 76 minutes record worth of exercise in awesomeness. Listen to the album for the first 3-4 times and you will be frustrated at how convoluted and warped and indulgent this album is. There are too many moments scattered all over the album where they spend on it doing absolutely nothing. There is no movement, no action, nothing. And the really frustrating thing is that those moments are not a pause, something which this album does not have, at all. So, it's a very long, draggy, pointless album that focuses on a topic that does not make any sense at all. But then this album is brilliant because very rarely you get to hear an album that is excessively indulgent in being awesome. It's a hate-love relationship with this album - you hated it because it is everything that would drive a sane person up the wall with its smug nature. But then you will love it because no other album can give you such strong emotion towards it. In other words, they are absolutely fantastic.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
7. Mogwai - The Hawk is Howling (2008)
Perhaps putting a picture of a majestic-looking eagle on the album cover has paid off handsomely for Mogwai for this is the first time ever that this Scottish band sounded properly huge and purposefully dramatic in a record. When they first started out in 1995, followed by the release of their critically-acclaimed debut Young Team in 1997, the basic template for their song structure has pretty much remain unchanged ever since - lots of interweaving guitar interplay between two or three guitars, occasional outburst of distorted noise and tortured screaming feedback, (mostly) languid pace with a long drawn-out introduction part, and when they felt like it, some singing part thrown in as well for good measure. They are by all account a guitar band; meaning the focus of their songs is on the guitar. It's where they create the mesmerizing atmospherics and mood for their song.
Despite of the heaps of praises given by the media on their debut, I somehow have always felt that the album still greatly lacks in something that ultimately does not warrant its current status as a monumental record. For one, there is this repetition of leaving a vast expanse of nothingness in between all of the songs as if they're all being sucked out into vacuum. As a result, the whole record felt weak and somehow disjointed because there is nothing in between to relate all of the songs together to make it as one single and coherent package. And by repeating the same song structure of quiet-loud-louder over and over again is ultimately an exercise in futility because it doesn't serve any purpose in creating the supposed atmosphere of a cosmic post rock pomp and circumstance.
The band's second and third effort, disappointingly, is no better either with Come On Die Young being a thoroughly insipid and uninspiring fare, very rarely exciting the listener into what was supposed to be a showcase of a band with a stellar soundscape. 2001's Rock Action, though a still-born, whatnot with the band still clearly in the process of finding a solid ground, did warmed up the listener over the things to come with a more focused songwriting. It was to be in 2006 though where Mogwai finally found their true muse and is set to flex their muscle and show that when they are capable of being spectacular, then they are really earth-shattering spectacular. They are still the same calculative, slow-building, guitar-focused band that fans used to know back in 1997 but once they broke out the whip (in "Glasgow Mega-Snake"), then all Hell breaks lose: they have finally learned how to kick someone in the bottom.
Then two years later, the self-realization hits home for good and the result is The Hawk is Howling. It is almost indicative and suggestive of the cover art - this is the album where this band of little-known space explorer is finally ready to spread their wings and soar high, as majestic as the handsome eagle fronting the record. They are no longer found circling the same drain, not able to branch out for their own good. They are no longer that guitar-centered, guitar-driven band obsessed with structures while abandoning the much more important and much more rewarding aspect of atmosphere. You can hear it almost every time in every track that the band is about to explode in a wall of white noise, thanking their hordes of rabid listeners who have been listening to them very patiently all this while, waiting when would be the moment when they are finally ready to break out of the choking habit of recycling structure. While again, the whole pace to the album is still painfully slow when the previous album was a lot quicker, you can't fault them for being themselves. They might be snobs for all that I care - but very rarely that a snob can create mesmerizing pieces of rock music and be interesting.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
8. The Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works (2007)
Since we're still on the topic of 'things from the previous decade', I feel compelled to also include something that was really big in the early half of the Aughts - professional wrestling. I don't have a detailed note on when did it all started (well, here in Malaysia obviously) but when I picked it up and became a huge fan of the game, WWF (now WWE) was already a household name. Every testosterone-charged, adrenaline junkie boys I knew back in school could name at least a few dozen professional wrestlers and their signature moves, with Stone Cold Steve Austin being the 'king' of them all; some even to the extent of copying the said moves on their friends. Of course they're all done in the good name of fun. While the more adventurous type, this writer included, ventured away from the popular brand and found WCW, where the alcohol-drenched middle finger flashing enthusiast shorty meet his match with the family-viewing friendly Canadian giant Bret Hart. If none of these is making any sense to you then I'll gladly move on to number 8.
The Dillinger Escape Plan, to those who are unfamiliar with this territory, a fair bit of warning though: if you don't like your music very loud, and very trashy, then D.E.P. is as much a band that you will never fancy in your lifetime as any other noisy-trashy bands. However, unlike almost every other noisy-trashy bands (shitty term I know, but to the clueless, this helps a lot) that your thirteen years old 'troubled' brother might be listening at the moment, this New Jersey mathcore band kicks more asses than all of the rest combined are ever capable of. To put this in a much easier perspective, D.E.P. put all hardcore-based bands to shame; beat them up to pulp, then let them flee away while trembling helplessly, peeing in their pants, crying like a baby for their mommy. Or in a much much more easier perspective, they are totally the badass. This distinction is very important because or else they won't make it as high as number 8, or in fact in this list alone.
The term mathcore in itself is already badass enough because as the name goes, it combines the hair-ruffling effect of math rock and the violent head-nodding effect of hardcore. Which is to say, this unholy marriage is actually a lot more complex than anyone could properly figure out because one music type is for you to listen while sitting down, while the other music type is when you're standing up, and smashing yourself to the nearest amp with your ears bleeding and two of your front teeth scattered on the floor. It is the marriage of two extreme opposing polars between the calm one and the highly volatile one, like between Mentos and Coca Cola - you know it will end in tears. But not for the Plan... oh God, that sounds terrible. I'm sorry. But not for the Dillinger-fucking-Escape-fucking-Plan. Yeah...
After the release of their second album, Miss Machine in 2004, their fans were divided. Some didn't like the more experimental approach in their composition where they prefer the band to just stick to the pretty straightforward scream fest of Calculating Infinity, while the braver souls with open minds embraced this whole new (well, not whole new actually, but just new) sound and, as I would imagine, giddy in their bed every night before they go to sleep, excited at the prospect of an even 'braver' sound in their third album. But then again, this is what other music critics say about D.E.P.'s sophomore, and I actually didn't really agree on that, mainly because I still don't see a lot of difference between their debut and the follow-up. Although the second album is found to be a bit more melodious, but the approach is pretty much still the same - mindless screaming.
D.E.P.'s third album however, Ire Works, expands a lot further, musically, than the last album, and is now at last sounds like a proper experimentation. But they were still very clever and careful about it, preferring to kick things off with the pretty simple in-your-face "Fix Your Face" and followed by another two minute relentless attack of "Lurch". It was by the third track however where the electronic experimentation starts to flourish; but still only in a faint distant right after the second verse. And the other remarkable thing that happened in "Black Bubblegum" is that suddenly you realize that Pucciato actually has a nice melody to his voice. Then right after they have registered the new sound in the listener's head, they go full blast on "Sick on Sunday", leaving the whole music arrangement into a messy electronic glitch disarray, before Pucciato again surprising listeners by gently singing his lines emphatically, crying out "Don't you ever go...".
What is truly remarkable about this album is that despite of all the talk about the band going the way of Radiohead after the release of Miss Machine, it didn't scare them off, prompting them to return to the relatively safe ground of familiarity. They instead pressed forward and released an album equivalent of pushing the envelope, breaking into a new territory by merging their already new territory of mathcore with the drill'n'bass sound of Aphex Twin. If there is one album that should already deserves a legendary status, Ire Works is it because of one very simple reason - this album now proves that you can listen to a hardcore band without people around you calling you a brainless maniac.
Plus, I have to agree on this with David on this one: the closer track, "Mouth of Ghosts" is absolutely epic. The track has a real nice build-up before it bursts into a distorted guitar frenzy all the way to the end. Possibly the best closer track ever in a record.
LISTED: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009)
*As the year 2010 is about to draw its curtain close, it is the time of the year (of any year) for many music sites and blogs to come up with a top list of albums of the year. Yes indeed the year 2010 has seen many interesting releases worthy of at least a top 20 list. But here at The Genuine Mind Zine we decided to do things a bit different and take a look at some of the best (of the best) releases throughout the last decade. This may not be the most comprehensive list around, lack of hip hop records for one, but all the albums listed here are indeed the most precious of last decade's precious gems.
9. Tim DeLaughter & the Polyphonic Spree - Thumbsucker OST (2005)
The really nice thing about being a writer (irregardless of the medium) is that you get to be frank honest with yourself, or about yourself, and still enjoy the anonymity that would spare you of the embarrassment, or fury, of others. That of course is only applicable if your readership consists of people who don't know you, or if you write using a pen name or by taking on an entirely different persona, or if nobody reads your writing. But still, sometimes even if the reader recognizes the article with the writer, the impact of the embarrassment, or fury, is soften by about as much because of the lag in time between you making the statement and the ensuing reaction by the latter.
But then again, of course, if you're not posting things on your Facebook wall, which by the look of things the reaction time is pretty swift.
Sounds like I'm about to make a frank confession and perhaps I will, somewhere, but let's focus on this album of last decade that has made it to number 9. First of all, let's be honest, soundtracks are usually an abomination, made by recording companies to either help push ticket sales up by promoting it with a song by a popular band through compiling songs that has hardly any connection at all with the movie, or make profit by using the branding from the movie through compiling songs that has hardly any connection at all with the movie. In other words, soundtracks are naturally rubbish. But Mike Mills, who wrote and directed the movie, has made it a point that he wanted the accompanying soundtrack to complement, or complete, people's experience of watching the movie, a statement made based on the sleeve note I read, written by Mills himself.
Originally, the songwriting and performing duty for the soundtrack was entrusted on the hand (or should I say, shoulder) of Elliot Smith. But after recording two covers ("Thirteen" and "Trouble") and one own composition ("Let's Get Lost"), the singer-songwriter surprised everyone by shifting off this mortal coil, leaving behind a legacy of a wounded soul troubadour. This event then left Mills in deep grief; not just for the fact that both of them were close friends, but because the songs that Smith had recorded and sang spoke greatly of the heart and soul, the very core, the essence of the movie. In fact, it is in a way true to say that the movie was actually about Elliot Smith - or about being Elliot Smith; about being fragile and delicate.
The movie revolves around a 17 year old character named Justin who is facing problems with himself and his family pertaining to his habit of sucking his thumb, which is the central issue to the whole movie. The act of sucking one's thumb has always been associated with a psychological issue, mostly about the insecurities that a person felt within him/herself. And the theme of self-insecurity has always been central in many (if not all) of Smith's songs. Thus, when you have a movie that focuses on such issue, Smith is obviously the natural choice to be the spokesperson because by the way of how delicate the subject matter of his songs were, one would think and expect that he has such an in-depth grasp and understanding of it.
His brittle but amiable voice resonates perfectly with Justin, a startling yet captivating projection of what being fragile means. The way he daintily pluck the guitar string and, almost out of breath, exhales the words was amazing in helping listener to visualize what it feels like to be insecure. Thus, his lost had initially greatly affected the project because there could never be another Elliot Smith to be the voice and the music of Thumbsucker; there could never be another voice so brittle and innocent it perfectly symbolizes what self-insecurity is. Well, not before Mills met DeLaughter...
Tim DeLaughter is the band leader of the poppish-cum-spiritual choral group The Polyphonic Spree. They were well-known for their brand of summery pop choral sing-alongs and their matching white robe overall, which made them look like a cult group, or the choir section of the Scientology. At first look, it may seem like an odd fit, whatnot with Smith's material being on the darker side of the day whereas DeLaughter and co. sings on something that sounds like a party at the garden of Eden. However, upon close and careful listen, one can sense the overlying message of fragility in the Spree's overjoyed delivery. It's like seeing someone smiling and laughing after being declared the loser in the final round of a contest - it is the smile and the laughter of contentment and acceptance of defeat. There is a hint of bittersweet admission in their singing - they sounded happy not because of ending up the champion, but happy of being almost there.
When you see someone broke down into tears, and that tears is of a specific 'lonely sorrow' type, what people would usually do is to gently coax the person to calm down and come into sense. The tone of the voice and the delivery of it would be of a calming one. If you can already imagine that voice, you have come close to understanding the real voice of The Polyphonic Spree, and why they are the perfect candidate to continue what Smith has been doing for all this years - being the voice of the delicate, of the fragile, of the self-insecure, of the down-trodden, of the rejected. That voice perfectly lent and expressed the emotion that is contained within the movie, and that had made this soundtrack one of the finest ever produced. In a completely different list (perhaps something like 30 Best Soundtrack Ever Conceived), this album would have been number 1.
