Category Archives: Mini-Review

Charlie Looker – Simple Answers

by Dæv Tremblay

The Music

The Words

Charlie Looker, of Psalm Zero and Zs renown, just unleashed a new amalgamative full-length under his own name, titled Simple Answers. The album stems from taking a deep look at oneself in a context where far-right extremism and fascism are ideologies on the rise. “Am I a fascist?” All of this process is recorded and expressed through an amazing musical journey.

The record is very “modern classical”, in essence, and takes many influences from industrial music, post-punk, and metal music. The orchestra-electronic ambivalence of Simple Answers reflects well the left-right divide of the world’s … Read more

Roz Harding – Supermood

by Dæv Tremblay

The Music

The Words

I have to say I didn’t expect to be this impressed by saxophonist Roz Harding‘s album, precisely because of the lack of a bass guitarist in the project. As a bassist myself I think it’s an important part of any band, but there are more than one bass-less band I follow and love, so this wouldn’t be the first. I’m glad to say that Supermood is part of that category. Having no bass means there is a part of the audio spectrum that is not tapped into, not that the music lacks interest.

Mike Outram’s … Read more

Pale – EP

by Dæv Tremblay

The Music

The Words

You might remember when we wrote about Pale‘s Demo, promising a bright future for the Tokyo band. Well, this future is now, as the Japanese blackgaze entity just released their debut EP through Pest Productions! I do take quite a bit of undeserved pride when seeing bands which I talked about in their early stages sprout and become ever so slightly recognized in the music community. The previous one, if I remember correctly, was Sunless and their 2016 demo, a year before they released their widely beloved debut Urraca. But enough patting … Read more

Maeth – Whaling Village

by Dæv Tremblay

The Music

The Words

Progressive stoner metal band Maeth has already wooed us with their previous album, Shrouded Mountain, which is exactly the kind of music I wanted stoner metal to be. Out of apparently nowhere, they released what is to be their last album, due to band members moving out: Whaling Village.

Adding to their already impressive sonic quality, this newcomer brings new aspects of the band’s sound to life, while keeping the things I liked the most well anchored. For example, the use of various bell cymbals, although somewhat shier than before, is still present and … Read more

Les Rugissants – D’humain et d’animal

by Dæv Tremblay

The Music

The Words

Les Rugissants is a nu jazz ensemble from Paris, France, and they recently released their latest album: D’humain et d’animal–Of Human and Animal, if you allow me the free translation. At the junction of progressive rock and big band jazz, Les Rugissants plays an emotive and intellectually compelling brand of jazz that I must make sure you not miss.

After the lyrical and rather romantic introduction of “Le visage”, we get to an interesting \(\frac{5}{4}\) motif in “Second hymne delphique à Apollon”, which gets expanded upon throughout the song, quite rewardingly so. At … Read more