Favourite Full Lengths of 2014 (So Far)

Here's the last of my lists that I'll post before I leave for July. Don't think of this as a kind of half-finished "best of" list for 2014, but more like a list of albums that I loved a lot. These are all contenders that may or may not show up on my year-end list depending on whether anything else blows them out of the water this year.

Follow the links in the album titles if you want to listen. Tell me what 2014 releases you're still stoked for in the comments (or feel free to tear apart my list too).

See you in August!

20.) Machine Girl - WLFGRL
This is a pretty mind-blowing electronic album that covers a huge range of electronic music, including rave, hardcore, dance and jungle. WLFGRL is packed with energy and never lets off of its aural attack

Hiatus // Best EPs of 2014 (So Far)

See ya, suckers. I'm heading on a month-long trip and most likely won't be touching this blog at all in July. So with that being the case, I thought I'd leave you with a couple of midyear lists (I told you I love lists) to mull over / argue over / agree with / not care about.

First up, here's a quick list of the top five EPs that I've been the most impressed with this year. I'm only one person, I can't listen to everything, so give me your favourites in the comments and let me know what I missed out on.

List of full lengths to come soon.

5.) Evian Christ - Waterfall
The electronic artist Evian Christ, first signed to Tri-Angle and now a G.O.O.D. Music producer, gives us his answer to TNGHT's 2012 self-titled EDM colossus. This short EP is full of massive beats, builds and drops that are overwhelming at full volume. Very different from his spacey debut EP Kings and Them

Gogol Bordello - Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike (2005)

Gogol Bordello - Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike (2005)

Considering how much I love this album, and how many times I've played it, I'm actually surprised that it's the only Gogol Bordello album I've heard. I'm not going to pretend that I'm a huge fan of Gogol Bordello, but as far as Gypsy Punks goes, it's a super fun record and it puts me in a good mood every time I hear it. In fact, the reason why I don't have any other albums by this zany New York punk band is probably because I overplayed Gypsy Punks when I first got my hands on it years ago. It must have been all I listened to for a good month or two. If you're unfamiliar with the group, they're a band formed in Manhattan with a hodgepodge of "world music" influences (in quotes because world music is a stupid term to describe music that's not Western World), mostly Gypsy music, but also ranging from Latin rock to punk and Reggae.

Gypsy Punks is bursting with energy, thanks in part to frontman Eugene Hütz's vibrant personality and thick Ukrainian accent. Eugene's lyrics deal primarily with his immigrant experiences and with Gypsy and punk culture, but it's his voice that takes centre stage as he bellows out songs with indomitable enthusiasm. His lyrics are a mix of English, Ukrainian, Spanish and Portuguese, but often (like on Think Locally, Fuck Globally) he simply loses himself in the music and just sings along without any real words. This fountain of energy also flows from a mix of upbeat violins, accordions, guitars (both electric and acoustic), bass and a wide variety of percussion. The songs are generally uptempo and have a party atmosphere to them, with the exception of a few slower numbers near the end of the album (Illumination and Undestructible). Every culture seems to have it's own form of high-energy music, and this album expertly combines those different cultures together. 

My personal favourites on this album are Sally, I Would Never Wanna Be Young Again, 60 Revolutions, Oh No and Think Locally, Fuck Globally, because they seem to be the most enthusiastic songs on an already vibrant album. I should really stop sleeping on this band and check out what else they have to offer, but for now I'm happy listening to Gypsy Punks over and over again.

Discordance Axis - The Inalienable Dreamless (2000)

Discordance Axis - The Inalienable Dreamless (2000)

If Jouhou is the transition of Discordance Axis from a decent grindcore band to a great one, The Inalienable Dreamless is Discordance Axis perfected. All the experimentation that was present on Jouhou is fully fleshed out on DA's third and final album, to the point where they've pretty much abandoned all of the most boring conventions of grindcore, and instead use dissonant guitar chords and oddly shifting rhythms (which made Jouhou stand out) to define their entire sound. Take the song A Leaden Stride to Nowhere for example, the song is 4 minutes long (that's about four times longer than the average DA song) and it moves forward in this weird off-tempo march with sustained dissonant chords blaring over the cymbal and kick drum hits. This is something that doesn't really fit with anything the band did on Jouhou, but even so, the song is totally recognizable as DA because of the unique sound they crafted.

I think that one of the biggest changes sonically between Jouhou and Dreamless is Rob Marton's guitar chops. Yes, Dave Witte is still destroying his drum kit with complicated tempos and rolls, and Jon Chang's lyrics are still as poetic and engaging as ever (although being unintelligible, they won't affect you until you read them). But Marton really stepped up his game on Dreamless, writing some absolutely incredible dissonant riffs that follow Witte's crazy drumming patterns perfectly. The guitar slides on The End of Rebirth, and the steady build on the last half of Jigsaw make for some of the more memorable portions of the album. Most grindcore bands sacrifice any sort of beauty or melody in their riffs for straight-forward aggression, but Dreamless combines the two rivalling ideas effortlessly, specifically through Marton's incredible guitar work. That's why Dreamless is probably the only grindcore album to have ever been covered entirely with a violin, because it's a transformation that actually works.

In addition to having matured in song-writing capabilities, Dreamless boasts a much better production quality than it's predecessors, which is fantastic for a band as technically complex as DA. No longer do Chang's croaking growls sound like the muffled guttural ramblings of Jouhou. And Marton's super tight guitar riffs are no longer playing distantly in the background, instead every incredible atonal chord is being played right in your face. But the sound isn't too polished either, it still has the frenetic energy and chaos of a live show, it's just the earplugs that are gone. 

The reason why I love The Inalienable Dreamless so much really boils down to the fact that although it's a technically complex album and just as heavy as any other grindcore album, it's also packed with more feeling and passion than any other grindcore record I've heard. This is an astonishing album, and without a doubt one of the greatest of its genre. It's a must-listen for anyone interested in grind.

Dead Language - Dead Language (2011)

Dead Language - Dead Language (2011)

Dead Language was a one-off power violence project by members of Iron Lung, No Comment, Solutions, Walls and Pig Heart Transplant. This is the kind of no-nonsense power violence that bands like Iron Lung are known for. It's a style of hardcore blended with punk and discordant noise that's very loud, very fast, and very, very angry. It is unadulterated musical ruination in power violence form and it's all over within a mere 20 minutes. In it's respective genre, Dead Language is a very good album, and I'd recommend it to anyone who is a fan of power violence or is looking to get into the genre and see what it's all about. The last song in particular, Misanthropy is one of my favourite slow-moving power violence songs on the sludgier side of the genre. That being said, I'd also recommend listening to Iron Lung or No Comment just as strongly as Dead Language because as good as this album is, it doesn't explore any new sounds that the super-group lineup of band members haven't already explored with their previous PV bands.

Dead Language is a culmination of sounds that come from its various members and influences, and its also a damn good power violence album. But at the end of the day, it's also good because it sounds a lot like Iron Lung... and that's not a bad thing. It's not like Dead Language is just some uninspired band ripping off their sound. If you're in the mood for some destructive, angry and noisy anti-music, give this album a listen and you won't walk away disappointed.

Have A Nice Life - The Unnatural World (2014)

Have A Nice Life - The Unnatural World (2014)

I was first introduced to the mystifying shoegaze outfit Have A Nice Life when I heard that they were releasing a highly anticipated sophomore album this year. After getting wind of the hype that was generating over this release I had to go back and check out the band's critically acclaimed debut album Deathconsciousness, which dropped way back in 2008. I was immediately blown away by how different the band's sound was from other post-rock and shoegaze albums I've heard. Their sound seemed all at once bleak and colossal. Every sound on that album seemed echoey, oddly distorted and somewhat muffled, as if recorded in a cave. But as distorted sounds are continually layered upon distorted sounds, many of the songs on Deathconsciousness take on this massive, orchestrated feel.

So after hearing their debut, I got myself pretty worked up over the release of The Unnatural World. And when I finally did hear it, I wasn't disappointed... not in the least bit. Although it isn't nearly as epic in scope as Deathconsciousness (which is nearly an hour-and-a-half long), that echoey and massively gloomy feeling is still there. Right off the bat, it's apparent that Have A Nice Life are still writing some absolutely colossal sounding songs. Songs like the steadily marching album opener Guggenheim Wax and the monstrous Defenstration Song build into earth-shattering post rock crescendos, while the booming Music Will Untune The Sky layers the band's voices over distorted guitar chords and chimes to create an almost apocalyptic, spiritual vibe.

In the midst of all of these post rock climaxes, the album is not without it's creepy and rather depressing moments as well. The song Cropsey, named after an urban legend and bogey man used to frighten the children of New York, starts with a sample of an interview with "Johnny" a child patient of the controversial (and apparently super haunted) Pennhurst State School and Hospital. The sample is unsettling to say the least, and the song which builds off some eerie chimes, eventually becoming a reverberating orchestra of distortion and pounding drums is easily the most emotionally charged song on the album. The last song, Emptiness Will Eat the Witch is also the albums longest, and rather than build into a crescendo it sets a sprawling depressive soundscape with some droning ambient sounds, a suitable end to a rather dark sounding album.

The Unnatural World is a grim yet sonically massive album. The fact that it was released in February was incredibly appropriate to me, arguably it's the bleakest month in Calgary. But this isn't an album that I'll listen to because it's depressing. Although it has a dark side, the album isn't all doom and gloom, thanks to those huge post rock build-ups The Unnatural World is imbued with a feeling of confidence and courage amidst all the darkness.

Metronomy - The English Riviera (2011)

Metronomy - The English Riviera (2011)

If I had to summarize the sound of Metronomy's third studio album The English Riviera in two words, I would say "summer album." Or I suppose "minimal instrumentation" would work too, since this album seems to be all about getting the most feeling out of the least amount of input. Compared with Metronomy's previous releases, which could be designated comfortably as synth pop, this minimalist sound is very different for the group.

With The English Riviera, Metronomy write some super catchy and breezy sounding songs with a few simple hooks and choruses, some seriously scaled down percussion (think kick, snare, hi hat and a shaker... and that's pretty much it), a bass guitar and occasionally one or two other instruments per song. Rarely is their a wall of sound playing behind the songs because the band utilizes the empty space that exists between notes, which results in some melodies that really pop (thanks to some incredibly clear and crisp production as well). Every single instrument is completely discernible, and the harmonies they create are what make every song interesting. There are no epic choruses or sweeping pop anthems on this album, because even though this is pop music it still has the vibe of a surf rock album. The bright, minimalist instrumentation matches the simplicity of the album artwork. These songs make me feel like I'm kicking back on a beach and just listening to waves.

The singles (She Wants, The Look, The Bay, and Everything Goes My Way) all hold their own as great songs, but they don't overshadow the rest of the album either. Songs like Corrine and the title track are just as sunny and breezy sounding as the lead singles. And while not many of the lyrics were all that memorable to me, both male lead vocals and female backing vocals sound laid back enough to fit with the albums super chill and poppy vibe.

I'm actually pretty stoked to have rediscovered this album (thanks shuffle!) and as soon as this endless downpour of rain lets up and the sun comes back out I'll probably be in the mood to play this album on repeat for a while.