video review: 'theories of flight' by fates warning

Well, this took me WAY too long to get out - and I also apparently bungled the publishing process, so I don't think anyone has seen much of it. Gah, one click could have made it all work...

In any case, I've got Michael Kiwanuka and Uncommon Nasa/Short Fuze coming up soon, so stay tuned!

album review: 'theories of flight' by fates warning

It's widely understood that there were four bands who really 'broke' progressive metal towards more mainstream acceptance - well, as mainstream as prog metal gets. I've talked about Dream Theater twice and they probably stand out as my favourites, although I can definitely say that early Queensryche gets up there too. And then there's Tool... look, I'll save that discussion for if they ever actually release another album, I'm not sure I want to deal with the dumpster fire that conversation will be.

Then there's the last group, the one that gets mentioned in the same sentence and came up around the same time but never seems to get the same attention or critical acclaim. That group is Fates Warning, a group that for the past few weeks I've been exploring in detail to try and understand why exactly they never get the same attention. And I think there are a number of reasons: they never really had a huge crossover into the mainstream, they weren't active throughout a significant chunk of the 2000s, and they also weren't really as good. I'm not saying the group was bad, but the group definitely suffered through some pretty rough production throughout the 80s that would only start to turn around in earnest by the turn of the decade with Perfect Symmetry and Parallels. And yet from there... it's hard to tell what it is, beyond the unfair comparisons to stronger peers. They wrote good music, but I'm not sure I could point to that standout classic record the same way I could with Operation: Mindcrime or Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory. I don't think they were helped by trying to stick with production trends of the time rather than carve out their own route - it definitely dates both Disconnected and FWX as albums, even if I do think Disconnected is probably underrated. In any case, when the band went on hiatus and then came back in 2013 with Darkness In A Different Light, I actually quite liked that record - the band sounded fresh and invigorated, and the writing and production felt as fresh as anyone could have expected. So you can bet when I heard that Theories Of Flight was even better, hailed as one of Fates Warning's best albums, I was excited to dig in, so despite being a week or two late with this review, how did the album turn out?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 30, 2016 (VIDEO)

Well, this was an interesting episode to make. Took a little longer than I expected, but overall a better week, I think, especially before Britney and Katy make their big returns.

Next up, I think it's finally time I talk about Fates Warning, so stay tuned!

special comment: #kimexposedtaylor & pop culture authenticity (VIDEO)

I'm actually a little amazed I got this out on time, but I'm definitely happy I did - fair amount to deconstruct her, and it did lead to a nifty little punchline at the end about our role in enabling this sort of drama. A little less dramatic now, thanks to the legality of it all being stripped out the picture, but eh, it happens.

Next up, Billboard BREAKDOWN, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 30, 2016

I have mixed feelings about the Hot 100 this week. On the one hand, our new entries look pretty promising for the first time in a while, and I have to hope that a few of these tracks will actually stick around for a bit... but on the other hand, I also have to take a look at our gains and realize that even they start to gain traction, they've got a ways to go to overtake the tidal wave of garbage that's ascending up the charts when the summer lull blocks out most competition. Joy.

video review: 'the maze' by a:j

Well, this was an interesting record to untangle. Pretty interesting, to be sure.

Next up, Billboard BREAKDOWN, and then I've really got a ton of records to tackle - stay tuned!

special comment: #kimexposedtaylor and pop culture authenticity

I started to feel physically ill when I started drafting this Special Comment. It's the same sinking feeling that happens whenever I have to even mention the Kardashians in anything I create, acknowledge how so many people find their utterly brainless TMZ-baiting trash so damn captivating. Even though anyone with a functioning brain stem can tell you that none of it is remotely close to real or has produced anything beyond cheap gossip and ruining the lives of people who should rightly know better at this point. Oh, don't get me wrong, I get the attraction to it - people like vapid drama, especially when it seemingly comes at the expense of the rich and famous - but even without seeing a single episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians and contributing to the downward slide of humanity towards Idiocracy, at this point it should be blatantly obvious to everyone that they're more shrewd than that and are making millions off of the public not knowing any better - or caring, which is arguably even worse.

album review: 'the maze' by a:j

Let's flash back to the end of 2013. I'm a mostly fresh-faced music critic coming up on my hundredth or so album review on YouTube, trying to ensure I've covered everything I need before the end of the year. And then, almost by accident, I find a record that's been languishing in my inbox for a few months, a hip-hop release by Cousin Ayjay, a relative unknown who still managed to capture my attention for some impressively layered production and an ambitious narrative framework exploring the listless day in the life of a perpetual stoner. Now if that's seems like an oxymoron, it's because this record falls into a weird spot for me: plenty of detail in creating the characters and world around him, but as a rapper Cousin Ayjay could feel a little sloppy. The production was lush and off-kilter, but it rarely developed any sort of momentum to drive the story. In other words, it did have many of the hallmarks of an indie hip-hop passion project: lush and expansive with little to no pop appeal, but also self-indulgent and overlong, not quite coming together as strongly as it could.

And yet say what you will about A:J - he dropped the 'Cousin' from his name a few years back - he's the sort of artist I like seeing in indie hip-hop, and thus when he approached me with his newest album, I was definitely intrigued to see where he was going next. So steeling myself for another complicated listen, I dove into The Maze - what did I find?

video review: 'nothing's real' by shura

Wow, this record caught me off-guard by how much I dug it. So tight, so distinctly memorable... great record, bound to be underrated, definitely check this out!

Next up... think I might get that indie record out the door along with Fates Warning, and after that... not sure, really, so stay tuned!

album review: 'nothing's real' by shura

I don't know what the hell is happening with synthpop this year.

See, in 2015 it seemed like every other week I was covering another band drawing from various points in the 80s to update their sound, for better or worse. 2016, though... I don't know if I just haven't covered as much of it, but that quick spurt of tight, synth-driven and accessible music seems to have faded almost as quickly as it arrived, either splitting towards the more immediately danceable electronic scene or towards different eras of retro sound. And that's a bit dispiriting in my books - as much as the 80s has felt like a well-trod ground when it comes to musical nostalgia, I still feel there's more that could be done to balance old and new in the modern age if given the chance.

As such, I was definitely curious to cover Shura, a British producer and singer-songwriter who built some groundswell on YouTube with a string of singles and got signed to Polydor for her first record,  starting her first ever headlining tour this year with Tegan & Sara. To me, a lot of that is a good sign, because even if this record's rollout has seen nearly every song on it become a 'single' - which you would kind of expect, given her YouTube roots - it seemed like there was some serious attention given to her as a songwriter who aimed for a more confessional and detailed side of writing you don't often see in synthpop. So I figured what the hell and I checked out her debut album Nothing's Real - how did that go?

video review: 'wildflower' by the avalanches

Been waiting to get to this one. I really do wish I loved it more, but it is definitely solid.

Next up... hmm, I think Shura, Fates Warning, and then maybe that indie record... stay tuned!

album review: 'wildflower' by the avalanches

So let's talk a little about sampling.

Now if you've been listening to hip-hop - or really mainstream music at all throughout the past twenty years - you're well aware of this practice, taking a piece of music or sound and using it to build a different song, often warping or flipping it into something brand new in the process. But let's take this a step further, because normally when a hip-hop producer samples something, he adds to it with backbeats and a rapper to flow over it - the sample is not the only part of the composition.

Enter plunderphonics, a fantastic word that describes a narrow subgenre of music where the compositions are entirely composed to samples merged and twisted together so that the fragments barely resemble the original piece and come together for a brand new whole. And what's all the more surprising is that there is often so many samples in these compositions that many are often uncleared, which can lead to a legal nightmare and is the big reason why we don't really see many plunderphonic records, or when we do the samples are often innocuous, from out-of-print videos or music from decades past, long forgotten by everyone else. This takes us to The Avalanches, an Australian electronic group who released a plunderphonic record in 2000 called Since I Left You that would become critically acclaimed for its fusion of samples into a cinematic, world-crossing retro-disco experience. Now going back to relisten to this record... yes, for sure it's a very good record that demands a lot of attention, but I wouldn't say I quite loved it - I appreciated the emotive scope and real earnest power, but it does have its moments that drag and you'd like to think that The Avalanches would have a little more ambition in the final product to make more than 'string section disco', to paraphrase Robert Christgau. And yet from that point it has taken sixteen years to follow it with a new album called Wildflower, which was reportedly created to thematically recapture the euphoric feeling of summer roadtrips, mostly pushed through 60s psychedelic pop. Okay, bit of a smaller scale, but I was definitely intrigued - so did The Avalanches manage to deliver?

video review: 'blank face lp' by schoolboy q

I literally have no idea how this review is going to be received. Seriously no clue. Eh, we'll see what happens.

Next up, let's dig into this Avalanches record, and then maybe Fates Warning and an indie surprise. Stay tuned!

album review: 'blank face lp' by schoolboy q

Man, Schoolboy Q is a frustrating artist for me.

See, I covered him back in 2014 with Oxymoron and while I found that record a slight step away from the genuinely excellent Habits And Contradictions, I still liked Schoolboy Q as an artist. On the tracks where his lyrics can feel stale or formulaic he brings a lot of personality, and when he wants to he can definitely bring a smarter brand of writing to his material, with subtext and insight. He definitely has a place in the Top Dawg stable of MCs, more cutting than Jay Rock's bruising style and grittier than someone like Ab-Soul or Kendrick. In other words, when we consider West Coast gangsta rap, he's probably one of the more accessible artists coming from TDE, and between his collaborations and charting singles, there's proof of that. My problem with Schoolboy Q has always been consistency, balancing out that mainstream appeal with stronger content or production that doesn't drag back his impressive personality.

And yet in the lead-up to this release, I haven't received many requests to cover this album, and I have no idea why. Granted, there hasn't been the huge single like 'Studio' to push this record, and I've already mentioned that I wasn't wild about his collaboration with Kanye West 'That Part', but he's never had great luck with singles anyway and from all accounts this record to be his longest and more elaborate to date. And his list of guest stars was pretty impressive - forget Kanye, when you get Kurrupt, Vince Staples, E-40, Jadakiss, Anderson .Paak, Miguel, and Kendrick contributing hooks, you've got a pretty impressive lineup of quality behind you, most of which deserve to be a lot more famous than they are - which would probably be one of the best ways to describe Schoolboy Q, come to think of it. So I decided to dig into Blank Face LP - how did it turn out?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 23, 2016 (VIDEO)

Another slow week on the Hot 100. Eh, it happens - at least Logic finally debuted, and I didn't hate that new Fergie song quite as much as I thought I would, which I count as a net positive.

But enough wasting time: ScHoolboy Q is up next, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 23, 2016

...well folks, it's the summer lull. High temperatures and vacation means that the charts have fallen into a torpor, with nary a major shift in sight. In other words, we got another slow week - and no guarantee that it's going to be any better.

video review: 'dopamine' by BØRNS

Thank you all for your support, folks - pretty happy how this review turned out too!

Next up is Billboard BREAKDOWN and Schoolboy Q, so stay tuned!

album review: 'dopamine' by BØRNS

I have to admit, I'm surprised this album got the top pick. Sure, it was a narrow three-way race, but I had expected the support behind those two records. After all, Kamasi Washington's The Epic had won a ton of critical acclaim as a behemoth of modern jazz, and Love Stuff by Elle King probably got the request thanks to how many people went back to rediscover her after 'Ex's And Oh's'. This guy, on the other hand...

Okay, from what I can glean, Garrett Borns is a Michigan-based singer-songwriter that's had some success on the rock and alternative charts after getting signed to Interscope. Apparently much of his work was inspired by retro-cool Americana, like the Beach Boys and Playboy magazines from the 60s and 70s. That's got some promise, and his collaborating producers also seemed interesting, most notably Tommy English, a guy who has worked for both 5 Seconds Of Summer and Black Veil Brides... and yet buzz was suggesting BØRNS was more retro-disco and glam rock. At the very least I like glam rock, and even though Kyle Craft set the genre an incredibly high bar this year with Dolls Of Highland, that's no reason why BØRNS couldn't also match six months earlier. And besides, you all recommended I take a look at this and I have to trust you guys have an idea of what I'd otherwise like, so how did Dopamine turn out?

video review: 'fma' by grace

I'm absolutely stunned this review has been received as well as it has - took me a while to get out properly, so I'm happy with the results, but still, I expected a bit of a backlash here that hasn't happened. Huh.

Next up is my 3-year anniversary and a very special video you all voted for, so stay tuned!

album review: 'fma' by grace

Oh, I've been looking forward to this review.

See, a few months back I covered a song as a World Hit for Billboard BREAKDOWN called 'You Don't Own Me', which was a remake of a classic Lesley Gore song from the mid-60s and was actually updated well for the modern era. And ever since then, with the song crossing over into the States, I've been trying to keep an eye on Grace Sewell, known mononymously as Grace. If you recognize that last name, it might be because her brother Conrad has also had some major world success as the vocalist on Kygo's 'Firestone' or his breakout solo hit 'Start Again', thus being the first pair of siblings to hit #1 on the Australian charts with different songs. 

And I'll have to admit I was intrigued - with 'You Don't Own Me' it looked like Grace was able to tap into the smoky side of vintage soul that leans more towards Amy Winehouse than Meghan Trainor, and the fact she brought on Quincy Jones himself to update the production is all the more evidence that she might be a formidable artist in her own right. And while some of that would come from being part of a family of musicians going back to her grandparents who toured with the Bee Gees, there did seem to be formidable talent here, so I checked out her debut FMA, which stands for Forgive My Attitude - what did we get?