New Releases - 3 May

New Releases - 3 May

28 April, 2010
by: Music Team

What we found out this week: obscure US hardcore bands are officially better than most UK rap groups.

Guns N Rosa Parks – Antifreeze EP
Give Praise Records

I can’t really figure these guys out. On the one hand they have all the hallmarks of one of those meat-heat anarcho-hardcore bands, but then you read that they quote Akron and taxidermy in their influences, and enjoy a reputation in the States for being pompous jerks.

Apparently this EP cost $500 to make, and despite having ten tracks on it, it's probably shorter than that Lady GaGa track that seems to be in everywhere right now. It’s fast, fun, sloppy and as angry as hell. $500 well spent? You bet your ass. 4.897232/5
DH

Sophie Ellis-Bextor – Bittersweet
Polydor

I'm not entirely sure why – I think the only song I know is that 'Murder on the Daaaarrrnce Floor' one – but I have a bit of a soft spot for old Sophie Eliis-Bextor. Perhaps it's just that she always seems like a friendly, jovial sort. You can't imagine her throwing some weirdo diva strop because there's one too many Fabergé eggs in her dressing room.

'Bittersweet' is trademark shimmering disco pop, with S E-B's distinctive crystal chandelier vocals dangled over the top. I love it. 4/5
TJ

65 Days of Static – Crash Tactics
Hassle

Underneath the YouTube video is a rather coarse comment, as they usually are, reading "I've made a mess in my trousers." I assume he means after listening to the song, and it's not just a random display of unnecessary honesty.

Listening to 'Crash Tactics', although I manage to maintain control of my bowels and/or sex glands, I understand where he's coming from. Clearly paying homage to the Prodigy, it's a belter of a tune, full of energy and guts. 4/5
RS

Foals – This Orient
Transgressive

Foals singer Yannis Philippakis once stated that his follow-up album to 'Antidotes' would sound like "the dream of an eagle dying". Well it's actually a bit more pleasant than that. ‘This Orient’ encapsulates the stripped back, mellower tone of the album although it's probably one of the livelier songs.

It has all the trappings of a classic Foals tune, with insistent drums and bass guitar building up to a soaring, anthemic chorus, but there are more interesting tracks on the album than this, which show them abandoning their pop hooks for something a bit deeper. 3/5
EM

Watain – Reaping Death
Season of Mist

Watain has everything you can dream of from a Swedish black metal band: over-the-top gore imagery, some Nazi provocations in the past, a first demo called "Go Fuck Your Jewish God", a last album modestly pitched as "the rebirth of black metal", and here we are.

Their music ? All you'll get to hear is a relentless salvo of hardcore uber-dark metal complete with straight-outta-hell guttural vocals, torrential drumming and bombastic movements, which is what black metal is about, ain't it ? 2/5
TC

Pendulum – Watercolour
Warners

OK, so maybe some of their old stuff like say, 'Tarantula' or 'Granite' can be called drum 'n' bass but I'm not really feeling it with this new one. It's pretty boring and mediocre at best, but hey the emos will still love it.

And they could have at least made a decent video to go with it, and not just used the background for Windows Media Player. Better luck next time floosers. 1.8/5
SRC

Sky2010 featuring Mike Raynor and the Condors – On Our Way
 
I'm all for patriotism through sport support, especially as the World Cup approaches, but really. The original belonged to boozed-up football fans and so does this 'Mystery Mix'. There are alternative methods in creating nostalgia and atmosphere. "We're gonna win the cup, we gonna shake em up. We're gonna get our kicks, like we did in '66"? I've read insurance adverts more inspiring.
 
Keep it in the football stadium; this is polluting the airwaves. 1.5/5
SC

Taio Cruz ft Ke$ha – Dirty Picture
Island Records

‘Dirty Picture’s’ featuring artist, as will now be obvious, spells her name with a dollar sign – this made me realise the track may not be aimed directly at me because a) the country I live in operates in pound sterling and b) well, it speaks for itself really.
 
On listening, it’s worst than I pre-empted. The vocalists repeat a lyric I imagine took all of about five seconds to write whilst euro-dance hammers away. Utter tosh – needless to say it'll be blaring out of many a car window come summer. 1/5
RM

Blame Ft Ruff Sqwad – On My Own
EMI

Ruff Sqwad? Hmmmm. In trick-taking card games, to 'ruff' means to play a trump card to a trick (other than when trumps were led). Usually players must have no cards left in the suit led in order to ruff. Since the other players are constrained to follow suit, even low trumps can win a trick. Normally, ruffing will win a trick. But it's possible that a subsequent player will overruff (play a higher trump).

This is not always a bad thing. Whereas this single by Blame and Ruff Sqwad IS. 1/5
TO

DJ SS – We Came To Entertain
Formation Records
 
Identikit, tear out DnB. He claims he “Came To Entertain” but DJ SS didn’t entertain me. Instead he made me take my headphones off in irritable disgust and decide not to listen to it ever again.

7 minutes and 4 seconds of predictable, unchanging dullness, which goes a little something like this:

“We came to entertain
This music dulls my brain
This sound is so insane
We’ll make you scream our name.”
 
Repeat with a backtrack of bland Pendulum-esque breaks and a bassline which whines like an insistent dog. Avoid. 1/5
LC

Oh dear. If you want more punishment, why not watch this MIA video, which manages to take ginger bashing to a level somewhere between Schindler's List and the Battle for Haditha. Fun times.

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Music Team