Reviews by deksametazon

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2023: #37 An album from the 1930s (33rd Album)

A simple little album of blues tunes, sung by the ever so influential voice of Bessie Smith, and accompanied by a jazz trumpet. The songs are all in the same "verse-jazz trumpet-verse" way, so there isn't much to say in that department. As is with most older music, this is only good as a historic document.

I always knew Thom Yorke had the power to make an enjoyable album (see). Mind you, it's nothing all that spectacular, but once he channels his inner talent to create Beatles-esque melodies, it goes from being generic background electronic music, to something on a different, much more profound level.

So you're telling me that you take 2 hours out of your days to listen to this regularly, and call it great? I dunno man.

Smak were one of the four legs of the table that held up the entire rock opus of Yugoslavia, alongside Grupa 220, Indexi, and Pop Masina (while Bijelo Dugme served as the board).

This album always has me thinking Smak was a thinking man's band, like Gentle Giant or Camel in the west. While other rock bands in Yugoslavia had some levels of technical proficiency, their style of playing never really went into depth and flair as Smak did. The guitar work of Točak is some of the best on the Yugoslavian musical scene, filled with both virtuosity and a beautiful bluesy style, and Kepa's drumming is an unparalleled style of jazz fusion drumming that always intrigued me, especially on Perle and Mračni Mol, two songs that made me fall in love with the art of drumming.

Laza Ristovski is one of the better organ players, and it's evident on the jazzish Put od Balona. It's usually forgotten in a sea of good Smak compositions, but I can't help it but applaud how the band is in sync on the jam session.

Smak did a lot of things right on this one. I guess there's a case to be made that this debut is more of a showcase of talent, rather than an attempt to create a cohesive album, but I'd disagree. Smak is very much a melancholic odyssey that I recommend to anyone.

Damn, what was in the waters of Louisville in the 90s? Whatever it is, can I get some, if it means that will help me create a timeless classic and an album that was a first, and the best, in its category.

These kids managed to make something out of nothing. Crazy time signatures with a theatrical knack for creating a suspenseful atmosphere which would unleash in a furious vocal delivery by vocalist Brian McMahan is what this album is all about.

Spiderland is, by no means, an album you can easily return to. Its quality hides in how much you can connect to the atmosphere and the moodiness of the mathematical thumping of the drum and the repetitive strumming of the guitar. It's a unique album, dark, immersive and beautiful.

Vaguely heavy with pop punk pretenses and a penchant for grungier times makes this album... forgettable?

After finishing it, I couldn't find a single thing I'd carry from it in my mind, other than the annoying squeaky and whining vocals. The instrument work is just recycled 80s and 90s noise with no innovation or catchiness to it. Not bad, it's the only thing on here that you can an epithet of good. Just stick to and avoid this one.

I'm going to say it, the biggest saving grace for this album, and I truly mean the facet that saves it from getting trashed by me here, is that it's a 28-minute-long album.

Whatever you tell me, the middle part of the album feels somewhat unfinished. They sound more like punk songs than metal, very crammed, with guitar riffs and kick drums coming at you in great succession in 2 minute intervals like they have to finish recording them in a few hours and put it out the shelves as quickly as possible, which is even funnier considering the pushback they faced from Def Jam because of Angel Of Death.

Now imagine having to hear the same punky onslaught again if the album was, say, 50 minutes long. It would be a hard pass for me, but with its measly run time, Reign in Blood is just a fun and energetic headbang fest that's over before it begins, bookend by two very impressive metal compositions. It's a very nice album if you want to break away from Metallica's thrash metal and into new waters.

I don't know why people expect this album to be some technical, Coroner/Voivod-esque album. It's primitive, filthy, and nothing more. Though sometimes the vocals do feel drowned in the noisy tone of the guitar, I liked it that way. Adds to the heaviness of the album. The guitar playing has some solos here and there, but it mostly relies on the classical form of hardcore punk playing, which these guys took great inspiration from.

If you like distorted guitars, sudden pace changes, growling vocals, short song length, and don't want to get too deep into it, this one is for you.

It starts off like a knock off Jethro Tull, but evolves into a nice concept of jazz, prog rock, and some folk in between.

The suite feeling of Marsha, All Alone and Night Time are favorites of mine. Their simple progressive nature mixed with the nocturnal and mysterious atmosphere remind me of Camel and a bit of King Crimson, bands which I enjoy quite a lot.

Overall, quite enjoyable. It does lack staying power though, as I feel like the album doesn't give strong memorable moments, but it does what it sets out to do very well, and that's to please the ears.

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2024: #16. A 1970s album from Singapore (4th album)

Not bad, but mostly uneventful. Their rendition of's My Way is good, but the rest is vocal harmonies with a tinge of Asian flavor to it. The ethereal, reverbed vocals add a mysterious aura to it. Like something you'd find in a Fallout game.

To add a quick digression, I didn't know Singapore (and that area in general) had a lush and fertile musical scene throughout the years. Might actually check out some more stuff I found from this part of the world

Three amazing songs. First is A Rock and a Hard Place, with a killer bass line, rolling drum rhythm and an infectious, dancy delivery. Second is the B-side opener, First and Last and Always which has a beautiful medieval tone to it, and the emotional closer is a cherry on top. The rest is decent, albeit forgettable, gothic rock.

I can see the appeal, but the whole thing is not for me. It has its shining moments, like the opener and Head Cut, which are more upbeat than the rest, which is not my cup of tea. Really like the tribal thumping of the drums, though.

I don't know if anyone went the psychedelic outlaw country route, but they sure didn't do it as well as Simpson did.

Space country is a sound description, I'd say. It feels like a voyage through space in a ship colored in red, white and blue. I also do love how it sounds easily accessible yet really profound once you get into it.

There's really not much to say about it, it's an improvement over his debut in terms of structure, composition and idea presentation, with introspection and poetry around every corner. It's both thought-provoking and a hoe-down album. Great stuff.

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2024: #15 An album released on your birthday (any year) (28th album)

Well, it sounds surprisingly... contemporary. The spacey, echoed guitars with a simple, proven pop rock template makes this an enjoyable album, but if you ask me to listen to it again, your request would be swiftly denied because there isn't much to it other than a collection of some simple tunes. It's clear these guys have a lot of experience under their belt, but even that experience can be a determent to the quality to some extent.

It lacks the momentum swing young bands have. When you're older, you know well what works and what doesn't, so the music usually doesn't feel free flowing. It feels a bit plastic, once you get to the nitty-gritty of it. That's the thing I have against this album. But even with that in the way, I can still say that this is an enjoyable experience.

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2025: #34. An album recorded in the 1950s (10th Album)

Genuine question, but what puts this album above other vocal jazz releases? Obviously, her piano playing is nice, but that doesn't cut it for me to consider it a heavy hitting classic, and her mezzo-soprano that people drool over sounds arrogant and not quite suited for this type of mellow sounding jazz.

You'll Never Walk Alone is decent because of Nina's natural gift of playing piano, but the rest is as good as standards can get: okay background stuff.

Weird how the algorithm decides to recommend this:

a) Just a few days after Shaka Zulu, the music that inspired Graceland, and
b) Just days after I left for college, and by extension, my record collection at home, which had this LP

Anywho, this album was my father's childhood, and he often told me the story of how he worked on local fields (omladinske radne akcije, za moje balkance) whilst listening to this cassette on the deck, so I always felt obliged to write at least SOMETHING about this one, yet it never materialized until now, partly because it came and went so many times and I just had to sit down and write something.

Obvious historical snippets aside, this is a nice pop album that's very easy on the ears. Combining something that's relatively boring like indigenous South African folk with Paul's ability to create some worthwhile and timeless melodies is a recipe for success. Probably a weird analogy, but this one feels like the process of urbanization of a once rural outback area, where the body of modernization is rampant, but the rural spirit is still among the brick and mortar.

A rather simple album with nothing extravagant going on about it, but that's the beauty of it. Just an empty, witty, depressing "one-room-apartment-that's-falling-apart" atmosphere made possible with sparse, nocturnal instrumentations which follow the late David Berman on his journey to drown himself and the listener with his sorrows, regrets, and personal failures, all rolled up on a 35-minute disc of poetry sung by a talented man whose demons and vices could never leave him.

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2025: #31 An album without guitars on it (13th Album)

Whenever something is hailed as ahead for its time, or is a trailblazer in its genre, I listen to it with a dose of caution, and a higher than usual pinch of salt. It's usually that the reputation of said album is carried by the historical connotation, rather than the quality of the music itself. Not here, though.

Simeon created an amazing, dystopian atmosphere that's both aiming for the moon, but indeed, fully rooted in the underground sounds of New York, and beyond, and Dan Taylor has this mechanical way of playing the drums that only adds to the mystery and the greatness of it.

What I find intriguing is, while mainly rooted in electronica, this album is oddly... poppy? Something about the vocals in some of these songs are a reat treat to listen to, beyond it being a good psychedelic workout.

Thank you [~SpeedKills] for the recommendation!

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2024: #43 An album with a rating higher than 4.0 on RYM. (36th album)

To get the real experience out of this, this has to be played on some high-powered speakers, and not some kind of DMV office speakers I have.

Besides that constatation, this album gets boring quickly after the first few tracks. It's overly long, with a lot of repetitiveness to it. The only redeeming factor is how much it sooths. A nice listening experience for a cold and dark night, when you want nothing extravagant, just something to pass through the ears and kill the deafening silence.

Also, you can hear where some bands took inspiration, instrumentally. Coldplay's early ventures into the more alternative side of rock have a lot of atmosphere that can be attributed to Sigur Ros, and this album.

Orpheus Listening Challenge 2024: #19 An album with a rating lower than 2.0 on RYM (46th album)

By the looks of everything on this page, you'd think you're listening to electrodes hooked onto a pile of dreck, but honestly take a moment to realistically sum up the album.

It's a pop soundtrack done for a movie. I guess people are equating it to the movie (which I haven't seen, but the scores suggest it's bad), because honestly the album as a standalone piece of artistry is not bad. It most certainly isn't good, but it's firmly a mid, background-music type of album. A tad bit annoying, because it's firmly stuck in 2012 with all the pop cliché aspect. Maybe the overindulgent nature of directing a movie AND making the music contributes to the bad scores?

I dunno. But it's far from bad, alls I'm sayin'.