Reviews by kuvien

What an amazing album! Starts off carnivalsque, drawing you into the big top, and then they raise the stakes, launching into long psychedelic phrases that take you higher, and once you’re ready for speech again, they put you on a trippy carousel and soothe you back to Earth with some hypnotic female vocals.

Telepathy is always portrayed in books and film as this means of perfect understanding and clarity, but what if it’s the opposite? How cluttered are our minds with nonsense? We might be flipping our loose lips with our forefinger while making noises. We might be moaning or clucking our tongue. We might be expressing ourselves internally and it have no meaning to anyone else not us, expressions that cannot translate into clear communication. Telepathy as communication is a fun thought, but the little green men in our brains are best left for us alone. We’d go crazy if we heard everyone else’s pixies.

In my mind’s eye, I am put on a bright, psychedelic carousel, the music moving me around in circles, and then I am led by a witch down long corridors, at the end of which I can see the light of and hear the sound coming from more carousels. After another ride, it’s on toward a heavy curtain which, when pulled up, reveals the stage where the main act is performing. But you know what, I’m kind of happy back here among the corridors and carousels.

This is a wild ride, with so much going on. Sounds like they had a lot of fun making this album. Great chemistry—you’ve got these playful, progressive elements that give way to progressive electronic space rock elements that then turn rather sensual in spots. The mythology continues!

When the nest is upended too early, and the chicks have to fly before they're ready. But they do, they thrive, and their voices deepen with confidence. Wings strengthen, and some take paths to war, others to high holy places.

Much more stripped down than a lot of their other work, this album isn't afraid to use string quartets, slow horns, and negative space to set the mood. Apparently the album title and its cover is some kind of oblique yet poorly-researched reference to the military-entertainment complex... ok. Sometimes... sometimes I wish post-rock bands would just skip the crescendos and stay down where it's quiet, nuanced, and interesting.

A kind of existential dread of the future permeates this album, and if indeed the first world is sliding into the third, then you better make sure you get yours now because in the third world, being poor is being destitute. Fight the system and scream at the black-robed judges who think they’re gods! The startling juxtaposition of the soothing, serene music with the frantic ravings of the gun-toting, conspiracy-believing American works perfectly.

I feel like this album sweeps me up into two tornadoes, the first one being dust, the second flame. The first track scours and cleanses, the other centerpiece roars and blisters. Throwing in a rusty-sounding hurdy gurdy that rises above the rich apocalyptic drone is a nice touch. And it all ends with a rummage through the detritus of the cyclone that just destroyed everything.

I wonder if the title of this album is a sarcastic nod to the ethnocentric genre label of “world music”. I sure hope so.

The women shout at you from a distance, but when you turn to look, they are right there in your face. Eerie how they aurally displace themselves so well.

The woman sounding like she’s singing ten feet away from the microphone evokes this around-the-campfire feeling to this driving, hypnotic psych music. This album really has a throwback feel to 70s heavy psych.

Beautiful and uplifting.

Sounds a bit like ДахаБраха [DakhaBrakha] in spots with a bit more of a Mother Nature feeling thrown in. The didgeridoo is an interesting addition to add into this blend of different Nordic musical and poetic traditions.

Like DakhaBrakha, they add a strong, dance-able beat to the traditional folk. The band is Finnish in nationality but hail from one of the few Swedish-speaking parts of Finland, making the music Swedish in character. They play ballads and minuets that have survived only in that small Swedish-speaking area of Finland. The female vocalist also employs a vocal technique called a kulning, which is “a high-pitched, wordless vocal technique based on traditional Scandinavian cattle-herding calls”. This album is an accessible entry point for listeners interested in Scandinavian folk.

Mega-derp.

The music is as good as the film, though I don’t get the horror from simply listening. This is a first-rate soundtrack, though, setting the scene of a pagan island hidden amid Christendom wherein the inhabitants are bold and unapologetic in their shocking beliefs, and like many pagans, they do not shy away from the exploration of sexual matters in song. Knowing that this pagan summer cannot last, I am always stunned by how carefree and playful the music is.

The aural equivalent of brainrot.

There's just so much of a feeling of wholesomeness throughout the first track. I guess it's because it's bebop, and who's not going to feel happier walking on the sunny side of the street? The question you have to ask yourself before proceeding, however, is do you want to continue that easy jaunt up the warm sidewalk, or do you mind tumbling downhill into the Eternal Triangle...and beyond? Your answer will decide whether you press BACK or let the album continue to play. The Sonnys are taking no prisoners. These guys blow.

Breezy, melodic, beautiful. Sit on your balcony in the late afternoon and enjoy this one.

A country crooner singing to the backdrop of electronic music...who thought this would be a good idea? Well, it works. This album is a jukebox playing in an abandoned honky tonk as ghosts of old men weep watching the ghosts of young girls twirl around and kick up the long-settled dust. The histrionics of the televangelist at the end are just perfect. Darkness reigns from beginning to end, like in all of Hell.