Natalie Jones - Now You Know review

Year : 2013
Genre : Soft Rock, Pop Crossover
Origin : United States
Official site : > - here - <

Natalie Jones' debut spin "Now You Know" is highlighted by a lush, adeptly channeled, emotional voice-presence skillfully orchestrated through 13 radio friendly pop/soft rock crossover declarations. The flow is melodically dynamic and pretty much masterfully - pun willfully absorbed - revealed when scrutinized from then angles of all the genre specific considerations of definition and obligatory instant pop power. The sound is punchy, yet never arrogant or intimidating, while the songcraft willfully submits to all the major - AND minor, too - culturally ingrained pop-affections without losing a face and the ethos of creative dignity in the process.

The disk weighs in at 59 minutes of melodic pop/soft rock stimuli, and never once falls into the false luxury of losing focus on the main actual attraction, which is to showcase Jones' considerable singing talent, exhibited on top of all the various sonic/harmonic domains of the most popular western scales and musical keys. Fear not! Or, fear only if you are a pop diva who frequents this site - this either is very bad or very good taste, madame - her natural timber elevates her above 99 of 100 recent pop divas, and the remaining one (logically) is her.

Granted, the chord progressions are polite and not at all experimentive in their intents and render no challenge to the boundaries of radio friendly music, nevertheless their inherent timeless charms are explored (AND exploited) thoroughly, toppled by the favorite vocal ornamentics of the profiling artist. The mere consideration of the unchained female singing voice is not the ONLY consideration though, not this time - Natalie Jones sounds to have a natural talent at spotting melodies that are truly worth giving attention to on top of the given bonfire tonalities. Read on to know more about this.

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Brian Larney - The Starting Line review

Year : 2013
Genre : Country, Soft Rock crossover
Origin : United States
Official site : - here -

With his debut LP, Brian Larney might indeed literally be at The Starting Line, yet this definitely is a start you want to render all your musical attention to. Larney has a ripe and competent command on the trademark melodic moods and harmonic structures you are most comfortable holding unto upon a country-centered listening session, combined though with a soulfully channeled steadiness exhibited in the most important aspect of it all : the plain good old songcrafting ability.

The album is extremely easy and pleasant to decode, as its sole purpose - obviously enough - is to entertain on a laid back, yet uncompromisingly exigent genre-specific comfort zone. Occupying this full-optimum position with a pretty much perfect understanding of the bread and butter mechanics of country music, Larney never ceases to imbue a tint of family friendly roadmusic-heft into the respective builds with the utilization of soberly tamed and eloquently presented soft rock affections. Rare is the time when the miserable music critic has no other action left to him than to nod a head in unconditional approval, yet such is the case right now, as the record contains crystal clear musical thought, realized through elements that I personally would not bother looking for flaws in with a poker face worth calling one attached. Read on to know more.

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Post Trauma - Sleepless review

Year : 2012
Genre : Country Blues Rock Crossover
Label : Independent
Origin : United States
Official site : > - here - <

Post Trauma is a country/blues rock crossover audio attraction from the United States, pioneered and lead by project mastermind Billy Ulrich. 2012, November marks the release date of the first massive portion of the double sided (and highly double barreled compatible) monster LP "Sleepless/Dreamless", weighing in with 25 tracks of bourbon-soaked soulseeking. This review is based on said first segment of the soon-complete project, which is doubtless to be regarded as a full scale installation on its own merits already - the complete installment is scheduled to entertain your receivers and receptors in May, 2013. Read on to know more about this ambitious project.

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Short Sharp Shock - Problems to the Answer review

Year : 2011
Genre : Thrash Metal / Punk Crossover
Label : Earache
Origin : UK
Rating : 9.0 / 10

Buy it now

UK based silence massacrists of Short Sharp Shock shoot 25 sonic shrapnels towards your direction, divided along 40 minutes of freshly presented thrash metal / punk mixture that is quite unlikely to miss you surely and totally, granted you did not forget to put a pair of ears on this morning.

The high track count may seem to be quite surprising for the playing time of the release, and the reason behind this is nothing else than a dormant, elegantly served justification of the band's name : the tracks indeed are short and sharp, and pack eloquently presented, well articulated musical furiosity without exception. Read on to find out more about this LP, that which has a perfect understanding of what it wants to accomplish and how it wants to come through as, managing to pull off its own timeless aspirations without you even noticing it, due to the constant lack of opportunity to process what just happened before you already find yourself in the emotional register the LP wants to command you into.



Short Sharp Shock's musical furiosity is much more different than that you would experience listening to recent death metal affairs, for example, as SSS fronter Foxy addresses his numerous frustrations in a manner that is very easy to relate to : he does not scream per se, he instead declares his disillusioned notions and thoughts in an extremely natural way, pretty much speaking on the top of his lungs as opposed to screaming. This style, while effectively negates the need, hell, even the dormant desire to deliver melodic lines throughout the vocal palette of the output, firmly establishes a mood that hits you in the face as utterly appropriate and well suited for this form of music. Short Sharp Shock wisely recognizes that there is no need for musical pitches in the vocal contribution when the emotion behind them already smashed them to shreds, anyway.

There is maybe one track on the entire LP on which Foxy sings effective pitches : "Foreign Body Plot", but you truly do not even need more. His performance is quite entertaining to listen to while he is producing a consecutive breakdown on each and every track to follow, and this entertainment value is persevered as result of Foxy's ability of keeping the last bit of sanity intact and non-tinkered with. That last bit of sanity always comes in handy for music, after all.

Integrity and well established balance are focal traits of this output. While the sound of this production is equally violent and raw, it also is very decently and carefully engineered, giving you a thrash metal / punk experience that is very easy to grasp unto and appreciate the moods it is taking you to. The instruments are clearly audible and reign in top form, diligently refraining from abusing each other, from placing you in a crowded mess of audible stimuli.

The primal portion of the output explore the good old fashioned neurotic rage and related dissatisfaction you probably want to - at least theoretically - immerse yourself in while cultivating and observing this genre, yet the Short Sharp Shock dudes exhibit a rather good taste in balance, throwing in a decent, playful and quite easily approachable instrumental with the title "Future Primitive" at the relative middle of the album. In Short, Sharp and Shocking form : you will be Shocked, how good it is. Go get it.

Rating : 9 / 10

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