deadmau5 - For Lack of a Better Name - Album Review - 2009

[by NeilWest]

To show my appreciation of Deadmau5 to all of you, I thought I'd give a review of the album, track by track. Deadmau5 is the mastermind who produced such hits as I Rememberand Ghosts N Stuff. So, I thought I'd review my favourite album of his: For Lack of A Better Name.

For Lack of A Better Name is Deadmau5's second studio album, with Random Album Titlebeing the first and 4x4=12 being his third. It explores more atmospheric and ambient sounds, from the haunting, but beautiful melody of Strobe and the realistic crash of sounds in FML. One thing is certain, it's one of the best.

It contains such hits as Ghosts N Stuff, Deadmau5's successful collaboration with Rob Swire (the lead vocalist of Pendulum) and Strobe, Deadmau5's best song (in my opinion) to date. Then there is also Hi Friend!, a song with the vocals of the vibrant MC Flipside and Moar Ghosts N Stuff an extended mix of the critically acclaimed original.

FML
Deadmau5

This song begins the album with a hectic drum beat, with a slowly progressing electronic beat interlacing. And soon, we get to the club beat that is so prominent to Deadmau5's album, which is catchy and - most of all, has a great vibe to it. When people say that a great song kickstarts an album, Deadmau5 shows the proof like he did before.

9/10
Great start to the album, showing a club beat vibe that's prominent throughout the album.

Moar Ghosts N Stuff
Deadmau5

And extended mix of the hit Ghosts N Stuff, and features no vocals and an interesting sample at the beginning. Which really adds to the atmosphere in this song, as a funeral (from the organ at the start) gone happy. Many of you classic heads will recognize that the melody is based off the instantly recognizable 'Funeral March' by Chopin.

9/10
A great extended mix of Ghosts N Stuff, and makes great use of a famous piece of classical music.

Ghosts N Stuff
Deadmau5 ft. Rob Swire

This is what made this album famous. A heavy, catchy beat (based on Chopin's Funeral March as said in the Moar Ghosts N Stuff review) playing alongside the vocals of Rob Swire. He adds extra depth, as if the song were his own. The only problem is, that Rob Swire touches on the over-used theme of going to the club and having a good time.

7/10
The original, vocals version, but the lyrics touch on a subject which has been used too much.

Hi Friend!
Deadmau5 ft. MC Flipside

Where to begin? This has everything that progressive house, a controlled electronic drum beat keeping the pace, a slowly progressing tune - what else? Well, this has MC Flipside's catchy lyrics to boot as well! However, then tune only catches it pitch, making it quite repetitive for 5 minutes.

8/10
A catchy tune and catchy lyrics, but too repetitive, even with the increasing pitch.

Bot
Deadmau5

Bot is part of the three songs which interlock perfectly, as if they were one. This begins with a simple tune, which could be easily recognized as one from the For Lack of a Better Name album. It also has bot repeated occasionally, just add that extra atmosphere and ambiance that makes the songs from this album so great.

10/10
Perfect in every way, and changes into Word Problems perfectly as well.

Word Problems
Deadmau5

Word Problems begins off sounding like Bot for a minute, but instead of bot being repeated occasionally, it's 'word problems'. But soon, the song changes into something new, but still keeping the ambiance and atmosphere that Bot had. And once the song ends, it becomes the last of the three middle songs: Soma.

8/10
As long as you can put up with it sounding like Bot for the first section, this song really does have potential.

Soma
Deadmau5

This song is beautiful in every way, as unlike Word Problems, it doesn't take a while to switch melodies. What it does offer, is a beautiful and clearly atmospheric tune that makes you feel like you're in paradise. The ambiance of this song is similar to Bot and Word Problems, but adds to the beauty of this song.

9/10
A beautiful song that isn't a shame in the For Lack of a Better Name album.

Lack of a Better Name
Deadmau5

Like Soma, thia song has a heaven-like ambiance, but unlike keeping it, it goes to the bouncing club beat that was reminiscent in the first few tracks of this album. And does so well, incorporating some sounds from the beginning, but mainly focussing on the song itself. The name is the album's, but this is the album in a nutshell.

8/10
Nothing new, but uses highlights of the album's mix of songs.

The 16th Hour
Deadmau5

This is true progressive house in the album, but however, is very repetitive. The same sort of beat for nearly 10 minutes? Not even Cthulu Sleeps (from 4x4=12) could do that well. Becuase of it's extreme repetitive sounds, it doesn't do well in this excellent album by Deadmau5.

5/10
A good beat... stretched to 10 minutes.

Strobe

Here we are, the end of this album, and Deadmau5 knows how to end an album. And he proves it by giving us the masterpiece of the album: Strobe. It starts with a hauntingly beautiful piano melody which slowly transforms into a thriving club beat, but still keeping the magic melody. This, this is Deadmau5 at it's best.

10/10
The best song out of the album, either you love this or you hate the whole album.

View the BBC's review of the album here


Hope you enjoyed my review of the album, and support Deadmau5 (if you like his work)!

Depeche Mode - A Broken Frame - Album Review - 1982

[by All4one]

Late 1981 was a tough time for Depeche Mode. All seemed to be going well, and everything seemed just fine. Their debut album "Speak & Spell" had just been released that year, and they were still going strong of the success of that, especially in their hometown, where it reached #10 on the UK Album Charts. Then, seemingly out of the blue, their primary songwriter Vincent Clarke decided to depart and form a new band, Yazoo, who released their debut album "Upstairs at Eric's" in 1982. As for Depeche Mode, they were left in the dust without their guiding voice.

Why did Vincent leave, though? No one really knows for sure. Some say that Vincent's more freewheeling, care-free pop styling mingled negatively with the rest of the band wanting to go in a moodier, edgier direction.

No matter how things went down, the bottom line is Depeche Mode were at a very unsure place in their history. Would they be able to go on without their primary songwriter? Would they even be able to have as much success? All these worries were conquered when their first post-Vincent single, "See You", reached #6 on the UK Charts, higher than any previous single of theirs. 

With this in mind, the band became more confident to work on their follow-up, "A Broken Frame". Keyboardist Martin Gore, having written all 10 tracks on the album, at this point seemed to had filled the songwriting shoes once worn by Vincent Clarke. 

And with this album, Depeche Mode became the band that Vincent never would have let them been - a moody, thought-provoking band that, unlike most of the other synthpop bands of 1982, was interested in writing about something more than simple love affairs and just having a good time. This album touches upon heartbreak, the inner beauty of the world, and mental re-evaluation. 

The more upbeat moments on the record are mostly the singles. While "Leave in Silence" does have the contemplative, atmospheric tone of the rest of the record, "See You" and "The Meaning of Love" take a similar aesthetic in a somewhat jauntier guise.

It all sounds like a great album in the making, so why is it such a forgotten relic in the Depeche Mode discography? Martin Gore once dismissed the record as "our worst album". Those are pretty harsh words, but are they deserved?

Well, for all of its great triumphs, the album is far from flawless. The album's distant, misty tone does provide a nice atmosphere, but it can also be as much of a turn-off as it is a benefit. This was also Martin's first time writing a full-length album all by himself, so it's understandable that not every track would be an absolute masterpiece. Sometimes his songs seem to come a bit short of what is promised, and even the singles aren't as memorable or catchy as future ones would be.

But when the album works, it can completely enthrall you into its brooding ambiance, for example when the chilly, breath-taking finale "The Sun & The Rainfall" comes raining down upon the listener. And as the song fades to black, closing the curtain on the album, the song doesn't simply fade away - it flutters away into the distance gracefully, with a glistening shimmer of hope on the horizon.

Overall the album is far from perfect, and there are some moments where the album doesn't quite gel together. But as mentioned before, there are still excellent, beautiful moments on this album that will be rewarding to even those not acquainted with the band. Depeche Mode would later go on to accomplish even greater things, but "A Broken Frame" proved that they were headed in the right direction, even in the absence of their former frontman.

RATING - 6/10

The Beatles - A Hard Day's Night - Album Review - [1964]

[by All4one]

For the very first album review for Music Geek Central, a blog dedicated to taking a look at music of varying genres, what better review to write than one from the Beatles, easily one of the most influential and innovative bands of the 60's - and perhaps of all time. And the album we've chosen to review is an album that could arguably be considered their artistic breakthrough - "A Hard Day's Night". Sure, some nay-sayers may say that the Beatles' greatest triumphs didn't come along until Rubber Soul, but all the wonderful aspects of the Lennon-McCartney sound were already present on this 13-song, nearly flawless piece of masterful popcraft. 

Now, the Beatles were known for releasing records at an alarmingly rapid rate; their third album, "A Hard Day's Night", was released only nine months after their previous outing, "With the Beatles". But inside those mere nine months, the entire world had changed for the band.

The Beatles' name had started to become more familiar to those outside of their hometown, especially when their 1963 Christmas single, "I Want to Hold Your Hand", became a number-one blockbuster hit in America at the beginning of 1964. The band, who had sworn they wouldn't tour in America until they had their first number-one there, finally flew down to New York on February 7, 1964, to be greeted by seemingly thousands of young fans. To even further cement their popularity in the U.S., two days later, the Beatles performed on the prestigious Ed Sullivan Show to a whopping 73 million viewers, at the time the most viewers to ever tune in to a U.S. television program.

These four lads from Liverpool were on the top of the music world, when American director Dick Lester decided to capitalize on their success by bringing them into the movie world as well, with the 1964 film "A Hard Day's Night". The movie was a black-and-white "mockumentary" that exaggerated a day in the life of the Fab Four (a nickname that the Beatles had earned by the press), complete with slapstick, wry and witty dialogue from the band, and of course, excellent music numbers from the Beatles themselves. Not only did the sophisticated and arty comedy of the film gain the Fab more respect from the press, but it also seemed to encapsulate the confidence and energy of the youth at the time.

The album that accompanied the film was just as energetic and brilliant, with Side 1 of the album featuring songs from the film, and Side 2 with songs that were recorded for the film, but didn't make the final cut (but are still as good, anyway). 

The Beatles' confidence and musical vision seemed to be growing by the minute, and "A Hard Day's Night" is no exception. The album kick-starts with the sudden, startling 12-string attack of the title track - the song is an exciting craze of a song that perfectly captures Beatlemania at its fullest, and it also tells you that the Lennon-McCartney duo is back and writing better than ever. 

That's right, the two are the authors of the entire album - no covers of any kind, just a full-on blast of Lennon-McCartney; and considering that the album never seems to come across any filler, the whole thing seems like an artistic triumph.

The record flows beautifully, the unabashed title track rolls right along into the heartfelt yet ever-so upbeat "I Should Have Known Better", followed by an Everly Brothers-inspired ballad titled "If I Fell", and so on. 

Though Lennon-McCartney were the primary control of the album, that doesn't mean the others get some room of their own. George Harrison gets to sing on the gorgeous rocker "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You", and his blaring 12-string proved to be an influential sound in the development of the impending folk-rock movement. 

Meanwhile, Ringo, though he doesn't get to sing or write anywhere on the record, he is credible for coming up with the title for "A Hard Day's Night". The story goes that the Beatles had just returned from a long, hard day of performing. As Ringo put it, "I came up still thinking it was day, I suppose, and I said, 'It's been a hard day...', and I looked around and saw it was dark, so I said, '...night!'" 

John elaborated, "It was an off-the-cuff remark. You know, one of those malapropisms. A Ringo-ism, where he said it not to be funny, just said it. So Dick Lester said, 'We're going to use that title.'"

In short, "A Hard Day's Night" captured the Beatles at the peak of their popularity, and was quite possibly the point where the band started to show signs of a blossoming artistic vision. But, it would soon turn out that the constant touring, performing, photo shoots, and press conferences might have some kind of toll on the Fab Four.

RATING - 10/10

WELCOME, MUSIC FANS!

(written by All4one)

Hello, reader, and welcome to Music Geek Central! This is a blog where I shall be posting reviews of music (i.e., albums, songs, artists, box sets), and perhaps other music-related posts. In the future, I also plan to get more writers in the project. 

What kind of music will we be covering, though? The answer to that is everything, really. We will be trying to touch upon every genre of music we possibly can (from rock, electronic, jazz, even classical) - and we will also be taking a look at both new music releases and throwback reviews of older albums. It should be a 50/50 division between both.

So, if you happen to be a music geek like us, then this blog might just be the place for you. For right now, by myself, I'll probably be adding articles on here as soon as I can, but once I get more journalists involved, this will most likely be raised to perhaps 2 or 3 articles a day. :D

Welcome to Music Geek Central! We hope you're here to stay!