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.
*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.
Labels: 30 Best Albums of the Last Decade (2000 - 2009), dillinger escape plan
posted by Hafeez at 12:33 AM
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