Max Richter - 24 Postcards In Full Colour

Composer Max Richter was born in Germany in 1966 and grew up in the UK. He studied composition and piano at Edinburgh University, the Royal Academy of Music and in Florence with Luciano Berio.

Though he has a strong background in the canons of classical music, his influences were more modern composers and in particular, Iannis Xenakis whose musical compositions applied mathematical and physical laws and Philip Glass whose sound was a major influence on Richter. His influences also include rock bands The Beatles, Pink Floyd and The Clash, as well as electronic music groups Kraftwerk and Autechre.

This particular album holds (as you might have guessed) 24 songs. Each has an different approach and mood change. They really are like postcards. His piano parts remind me of Yann Tiersen for some reason. Quite interesting album.

Tracklist:


1 The Road Is A Grey Tape (1:01)
2 H In New England (1:50)
3 This Picture Of Us. P. (1:36)
4 Lullaby From The Westcoast Sleepers (2:02)
5 When The Northern Lights / Jasper And Louise (1:00)
6 Circles From The Rue Simon – Crubellier (1:04)
7 Cascade NW By W (1:12)
8 A Sudden Manhattan Of The Mind (2:51)
9 In Louisville At 7 (1:03)
10 Cathodes (1:01)
11 I Was Just Thinking (0:59)
12 A Song For H / Far Away (2:08)
13 Return To Prague (1:02)
14 Broken Symmetries For Y (1:00)
15 Berlin By Overnight (1:27)
16 Cradle Song For A (Interstate B3) (2:11)
17 Kierling / Doubt (0:50)
18 From 553 W Elm Street, Logan Illinois (Snow) (0:57)
19 Tokyo Riddle Song (1:00)
20 The Tartu Piano (2:05)
21 Cold Fusion For G (0:35)
22 32 Via San Nicolo (1:23)
23 Found Song For P. (2:24)
24 H Thinks A Journey (0:57)

Download.

Shintaro Kago - Koro Koro Soushi

Haven't posted a manga in a while so here's a special treat. The story is set in feudal Japan. A serious famine swept the land and one certain princess started saving people. But we are talking about Shintaro Kago so of course for people to get rice from her they need to donate their body parts. The Princess then gets very interested in anatomy and the brain so she decides to study internal organs and therefore she is now demanding organs from her people. People get agitated by this organ and body donating. Will they overthrow the princes? Will that guy finally get his penis back? Will they all end in hell? Find out yourself. :P

Personally I enjoyed this one a lot. Many, many funny and original moments and really cute imagination. Like, eye scouting!

Dark humor, making fun of religion (especially Jesus who appears here and there making deals), making fun of feudal Japan and pretty much everything else. The art is also more detailed compared to his one shots. The scenery is more detailed and overall there are more shading and little details like that. Highly recommended for everyone who is into guro (I'd recommend it to others as well but it's very gory so I'm not sure if you'll like it)!

Both volumes!

Flac week over.



I learned one thing from this adventure. I'll never do themed weeks again. I hate the time pressure. The sole thing that this "week" extended for over half of a month is terrible. I'm throwing the idea in the trash, forevar. This however doesn't mean that I won't add flac format from time to time (along with mp3).

Mp3 links and fixing current flac links will occur tomorrow if everything gets uploaded by then.

Until then you must sing this song.

HARU KA NAAAAA

I should really post a movie. Haven't done that in a while.

Coffins / The Arm and Sword of a Bastard God

Last flac post so I wanted to post something really great and not so common among the blogsphere (I think :O).

I'm sure anyone who's into metal has heard of Coffins. It's one of those legendary doom bands alongside with Corrupted and stuff like that. But who is The Arm and Sword of a Bastard God? I'll say again, The Arm and Sword of a Bastard God. I love that name, it's so, long. Anyway they are from US (California to be more exact) and they are an relatively new band. So far the only official release is this split. There is a demo available on their myspace if you are interested but it's not really that good as are the songs on this split.

This split is one damn fine bone crushing sound orgy. Slow, heavy and br00tal. It has all that I need from doom metal and associated genres. I'm not really good with explaining so I guess it's up to you to decide. It got good reviews on Metal Archives if that means anything to you.

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Halo


More metal? Why yes, by all means. :P

Halo was always an peculiar band to me. Some records I liked and some I didn't. I still consider their Body of Light to be their best album. I don't know why it's so hated on Metal archives? Maybe because it's not true? Well I don't really care anyway. This is some damn fine drone/sludge/noise whatever. Guattari - From the West Flows Grey Ash & Pestilence is an more musically driven album. The songs have usual song structures, standard sludge awesomeness and pimped out vocals that ties it all together in a nice psychedelic trip. Body of Light on the other hand is more about epic and less about being sludge. It's also less structured and has more drone feeling. Well, the band is pretty much popular (I think :/) so I won't ramble any more because you probably heard about them anyway.

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Burzum - Filosfem


Good old Vargy! I think It's hilarious that his birth name is Christian. Ideology statements and his life aside this album is really good. It's kinda like shogaze but not really, something like that. Filosfem is more or less an album that holds all my favorite songs by Burzum. Which is why I bought this in the first place. I always listen this in the middle of the night while I'm in my bubbly bath. (^o^)

If you are new to Burzum I think this is an great album to start with. It has great atmosphere and the raw essence of black metal (or something poetic like that). Not as raw as his first albums and not as cheery like his later works. The golden middle. The only bad side of this album for me is that cymbals pretty much sounds like someone is shaking plastic bags constantly. It's not annoying or anything like that but when I heard them I always imagine Varg sitting in some dark room singing while an old man stands behind with a huge grey beard grimly shaking his plastic bags full of food supplies that he bought in the morning. Because of that I always break into laughter.

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Dead links

Seems like a part of my links died a hideous death at the hands of Specules (actually mediafire but I just had to make a reference). At any rate if you find a dead link just leave a comment and I'll reupload it (presuming that I still have the content because one of my hard drives died in the meantime).

So far I found out that a lot of Boris releases died out, one uziga one shot and something else I think but I can't remember.

I also fixed that link for that compilation. :3

Oh and:



Every time that blond says "sucking" I get an erection. :D

LET ME HEAR YOU SAY VAHT. JAAAAA

Blind Guardian - Somewhere Far Beyond

Ah, this was the first original I ever bought (if we don't count The Prodigy - The Fat Of The Land tape that I bought randomly (and loved it) when I was about 8 or 9). ^_^

Nowadays I'm not much of a fan of power metal. It got too cheeky and baroque for me. Nevertheless I still tend to spin this album once in a while and remember the good old days of my early rebellious youth. Somewhere Far Beyond was their fourth full length album that got out in 1992. In those days Blind Guardian was much more leaning towards thrash than power metal (I guess the genre itself hasn't formed in its now popular shape) which can be clearly seen in their albums before this one. Despite the high thrash feeling it still holds the power metal vibe of magical thematic and Lord of the Rings references etc. The signature Hansi vocals are present here as well, with a much more harsher sound than it is today. Overall if you are looking for some power metal but not those dragon guitar fluffy masturbation of Rhapsody and Dragonforce you should get this. Also if you are interested in this genre and haven't heard it before I strongly suggest you start with this.

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Boris - Flood


Speaking of great bands how could I not mention Boris? Well here it is, Flood, one of the most unique albums they did. I went through a lot of trouble getting this one. Since the label has a great policy of not shipping their albums to my country I had to order it through a store from my city. Apparently they ordered it as a selling item that they will sell in the shop. The conversation I had with the shop owner was, intriguing.

Me: Hi, I'd like to order a cd.
Owner: Sure, just tell me the name.
Me: Boris.
Owner: Uh? The bands name not yours.
Me: Yes, Boris.
Owner: Are you trying to make fun of me? Tell me the name of the band.
Me: ...Boris.
Owner: The Band is called Boris?
Me: Yes.
Owner: And where are they from? Russia?
Me: No, they are from Japan.
Owner: Rrrright. So this obscure band is from Japan and they call themselves Boris? After a Russian name?
Me: They named themselves after a song from Melvins and they are not obscure.
Owner: I worked here for 17 years and I never heard of this band.

And so on and on. XD I don't really get it. I had to do the same conversation each time I came there and asked if the album arrived and every time they gave me a strange look like I just ate their mothers. Finally after 3 months of waiting it came direct from Japan. :3 Looks like first press too which makes it extra cool.

In any case if you are a bit older follower of this blog you probably remember when I posted the whole Boris discography (it was complete when I posted it, now there are a few releases missing). So I assume pretty much everyone heard of Flood before. There's not much to say. It's their own version of post-rock music of sorts. It's not really pure post rock as in Explosions In The Sky and similar. It actually starts with an really dull (to me at least) intro of one riff repeating and repeating. I usually like this sort of thing but this one just isn't enjoyable to me. So after that it switches to pretty much relaxed and laid back post rock and afterwords a tsunami comes and kills everything. In any case, get this, you'll like it! >:| It's just one long track split into four parts so I won't write the tracklist.

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Tralalala



Can't get this out of my head. Argh!

Translation here.