I've Never Liked Reviewing Music

But here I am, reviewing an album. To tell you the truth, I never USED to like reviewing music, but this is kinda fun, so I might do this more in the future. Anyway I decided to review the album by Tom Bown's new band, Mute. I'll get straight into it:

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It's not quite right to say that Mute only have one sound, but it feels like they will constantly be mining the same sonic vein well into the future -- Mute always feel familiar, although the group spends some palpable energy weaving together the two sides of their personality that they borrowed from their main influences, being Foo Fighters and Fall Out Boy. Here, on their debut LP 'Take Shape', Mute gently slide from side to side, easing from delicate fingerpicked folk (including "Apatura," an instrumental duet between Tom Bown and guitarist Luke Pickering) to the surging, muscular hard rockers that will be the group's modern rock radio signature. Take Shape never lingers too long in either camp, as it's sequenced with a savvy professionalism that only debut rockers have. That sense of craft is evident in all the songs, whether it's the subtly sly suite of the opening "Bullet" -- after a slow build, it crashes into a crushing riff into a chorus, building to a typically insistent chorus before taking a slightly surprising bluesy boogie detour on the bridge -- or the sweet melodic folk-rock "Worlds Apart," a song as warm and hazy as an August evening. "The Escape" is one of the unassailable highlights here, and all the rest of the truly memorable tunes on Take Shape share its same, strong melodic bent, particularly "Pennyword," a wide-open, colorful anthem that feels as if it's been resurrected from a late-'70s AOR playlist. These songs place the melody at the forefront and also have a lighter feel than the rockers, which are now suffering from a dogged sobriety. For whatever reason, Tom Bown has chosen to funnel all of his humor out of Mute's music and into their videos or into his myriad side projects, like his blog. When it comes to his own band, he plays it too straight, as almost every rocker on Take Shape -- with the notable exception of "Gee Whiz!," a song that has a riff as nimble as those on the Foo Fighters debut -- is clenched and closed-off, sounding tight and powerful but falling far short of being invigorating. They sound a little labored, especially when compared to the almost effortlessly engaging melodies of the softer songs, the cuts that feel different than the now overly familiar Mute signature sound. And since those cavernous, accomplished rockers are so towering, they wind up overshadowing everything else on Take Shape, which may ultimately be the reason why each Mute album will feel kind of the same: Bown and his band have grown subtly in other areas, but they haven't pushed sounds that came from their influences; they've only recycled it. Since this is a sound that's somber, not frivolous, Mute can sometimes feel like a bit of a chore if they lean too heavily in one direction -- as they do here, where despite the conscious blend of acoustic and electric tunes, the rockers weigh down Take Shape more than they should, enough to make this seem like just another Foo Fighters album instead of the consolidation of strengths that it was intended to be.

3/5

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And there you have it! Hope you enjoyed the review, I believe I'll do more in the future.

See you next time

Lachlan

THIS WEEK'S CRAPPY BAND - FOO FIGHTERS

Foo Fighters are a band of incredible musical pedigree, however fall short in their music in every single way, pushing the musical boundaries to the point of radio friendly aging rock, while influencing a whole new breed of bands coming out today who can only aspire to the mediocrity that Foo Fighters have set as their example.

I've Never Liked People Telling Me To Blog

I'm blogging, ok?!?!?

So yeah, It's been a while since I've blogged due to Schoolies, The Beatdown (150 person LAN party), some other random stuff, and just general laziness. I'm back now though, ready to unleash my scathing criticisms onto topics of my choice.

Bees:

I fucking hate bees. Actually, make that - I fucking hate 'things that fly and sting you'. Seriously, this is probably my only irrational fear in the world. I flinch whenever i hear a bee buzzing around or a wasp or a hornet or whatever the hell is big and insect like and can sting you and create a huge welt. This is because at an early age, I was stung on the back of my neck and it hurt like hell, and I haven't been stung since but my memory tells me it should definitely be avoided. Honestly, why shouldn't i be afraid? It flies, its hard to avoid cause it can fly much faster than you can run, and it fucking hurts when you get stung. Its not like I'm afraid of cockroaches or cicadas (Rob would say otherwise, but he deliberately has put them on me/provoked me with these in the past just to piss me off) cause they can't hurt you, but bees? Scary. Oh and honey is overrated. I've never liked honey.

Southern Rock:

My god, is this just the most overblown musical genre ever? Actually progressive rock takes that accolade, however that rant can be saved for a day where it particularly pisses me off. The disdain I have for southern rock is quite fresh in my mind after playing the second last tier in band mode of Rock Band. Each song is one southern rock masterpiece after the other. And by masterpiece, I most certainly mean '5 consecutive solo piece of boring shit'. One of these songs, 'Green Grass and High Tides', is most certainly the winner of the 'worst song in the game' prize. 5 solos in a 10 minute song, with each solo going for about 60 seconds roughly, give or take (the last one is like 3 minutes i swear). 'Flirtin with Disaster', another southern rock steaming-pile-of-shit-fest is almost as bad. But let me remove my biases for a minute (difficult I know), and take a look at what are the pinnacles of southern rock. 'Free Bird by Lyrnrd Skynyrd' I hear you say? Fair enough.

...

Oh wait, there aren't any more, ARE THERE? This overplayed, god awful pretentious piece of crap reared its ugly head in the second Guitar Hero game, and has been opened up to a whole new generation of music listeners. It has taught many a-new guitarist and music lover that the most important part of the song is 'the solo'. That the bass should be barely audible above the southern drawl of the singer and the cameo of the slide and pedal guitars. Thank you very much, Free Bird, for showing us what this generation has been lacking in music.

Terrible Facebook Applications:

- *insert name here* has just bought you! Click here to see how much you're worth!
- *insert name here* has just rated you against his/her other friends! Click here to see how you rate!
- *insert name here* has just answered the question "Do you think Lachlan smells bad?" Click here to see what what was said about you!
- *insert name here* has just bound and gagged you in 'Domination'! Click here to slap and punch him/her back!
- *insert name here* has substituted his/her real life for Facebook Apps! Click here to do the same!
- *insert name here* is an idiot for signing up to this application! Click here to do the same!**

I rest my case.

**this is actually what i think of you if you sign up to a shitty app.

So yeah, that's it for this entry. Hopefully i've satiated your facetious, sarcastic humour quota for this week.

NEW WEEKLY ELEMENT - Shitty band of the entry:

Every week I will nominate a band which is just plain shit and give one sentence why I've never liked this band.

This week's band: WEEZER (long awaited entry)

Weezer use terrible, post grunge distorted guitars, boring song structures which may only subscribe to the 'verse chorus verse' pattern, and a generally disinteresting collection of members (Rivers Cuomo looks like he could have just come from the set of Degrassi Junior High playing the role of the weird awkward kid who just asked the counsellor how he can stop getting embarrasing erections in class).

See you next entry.

I've Never Liked Starting A New Blog

Well here I am, my first blog. I'd kinda been put off the idea for a while, for fear of seeming like; a) A complete narcissist who likes to hear his own words, b) A guy who wants everyone to hear his whining, and hope they will care about it, or c) A guy who just hates stuff too much. To tell you the truth there is probably a little bit of all those things in me (probably a bit too much of option C, as noted by the name of my blog), but the purpose of this blog is just entertainment really. Some people find it funny when I make fun of or mock a certain band, movie, person, place, whatever it may be. If you aren't one of these people, you should probably leave and never come back, for you may become transfixed and mesmerised by my astounding rhetoric and eloquence, whereby your opinions will undoubtedly be shaped to fit my opinions. Hold on to those opinions boys, they might help you when you want to defend why you like listening to Fall Out Boy! (apologies to Bown, but i'm not pulling any punches here.)

So what to expect from my blog? A number of things:

1) Me ranting about things I've never liked.

and thats about it. What, you're saying you expected more? 1 was a number last time I heard, so shut your trap.

I've got to get back to studying (curse you HSC, you'll get your turn in this blog) but after that I'll get to work on posting about my first, and probably my most notable thing I've never liked.