Well, back once again from a long, long break from reviews. Sorry for the wait.

This week we have a very under-rated artist by the name of Boom Bip.

Artist: Boom Bip
Album: Seed to Sun
Release Date: 17 September 2002
Label: Warp/Lex Records
Tracks: 13

A little background on Boom Bip. Bryan Hollon was originally from Ohio, but moved to L.A. to start his career as a DJ, in a few months after this Hollon began to collaborate his efforts with a few local Djs to create an EP called the “The Low End Sequence EP”. Since then Boom bip has gone to record three (four?) studio albums, one of them being with cLOUDDEAD’s Doseone. Seed to Sun is Boom Bips second studio album, and transcends several genres while still keeping a common theme of Hip-hop-esque beats and electronic synths.

[audio:http://blog.explodingwumpus.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/03-closed-shoulders.mp3]
Boom Bip – Closed Shoulders

Hollon starts the album off with a guitar riff that sounds like it was taken from the B-sides of Thom Yorke’s Eraser album, then slowly turns into a joyous melodic pulsating experience that sets the mood for the the album. The rest of the thirteen tracks changes between creepy with “The Unthinkable” and calming, yet inspiring i.e., “Pulse All Over”. Its downfall is its melodies in some songs… Let me explain, Autechre gets away with having no melody because that’s the type of music they write, math electronica shit… Boom Bip on the other hand writes Hip-hop straight forward electronica, so they having a very repetitive bass line with little or no melody can make the songs boring, and seem to drag on forever. This is a shame because most of the times this only happens at the beginning of the song and the ending is usually a stroke of sheer genius.

Now, let’s talk about the mood of this album, well… the first half is incredibly happy, inspiring, hopeful and fun… while the last half, everything after “Pulse All Over”, is quiet, foreboding and well kind of a downer. This is one of those albums that when you listen in whole contrasts itself and leaves you feeling empty. It makes you think, which is the best quality of any music. So, once again like EVERY ALBUM EVER, this one deserves to be listened to front to back.

[audio:http://blog.explodingwumpus.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/11-me_-the-new-you.mp3]
Boom Bip – Me: The New You

Boom Bip is one of those artists that are extremely under-rated. You won’t find any of his albums in any record store and if you try and torrent this shit? Good luck, it’s not there either, try iTunes? Anyway, Hollon once released an album called Corymb and it’s a remix album of Seed to Sun, featuring remixes by; Four tet, Boards of Canada, cLOUDDEAD, Venetian Snares, and Lila Puna, all artists I know and respect. So from that I can tell that the Electronica community doesn’t neglect Boom Bip, it might be just that Lex records doesn’t distribute their music very well? Who knows? But I do know that this album is hard to find, and in all honesty should be one of the best electronica albums of the decade.

Here’s Hailing to Seed to Sun
Spittal

Just had to share this

I lol’d

Christopholo’s Choice

This week I’m talking about Shadow’s Fall. Shadow’s Fall is… really good, mostly. If they weren’t good I wouldn’t be reviewing them obviously.

IMHO, Shadow’s Fall is one of the most brutal groups out there. I would put them a couple steps above All That Remains. However, they manage to tie this in with harmony and melody very well. Their album ‘The War Within’ demonstrates this fairly well. While the majority of the album is metal and involves plenty of rage, there are plenty of acoustic sections to add incredible and seamless juxtaposition within the music style. And while I will admit that sometimes it degrades into screaming and random discordant notes on the guitar, it always manages to pull itself together and present an overall enjoyable musical experience. I would recommend them if you are into metal, obviously, but if you are put off by screaming, then this is not your band. The singer of Shadows Fall has some pretty brutal screams, but sometimes it just does not flow with the song. All in all, they’re pretty good, check them out.

The Light That Blinds (one of their more well-known songs)

Those Who Cannot Speak

Acre’s Choice

A friend of mine once asked me what the most aggressive album I had ever heard was. Ok, so that never happened, but it’s still a great way to set up Converge, quite possibly one of the most terrifyingly heavy bands to ever exist. Converge have been the darlings of the post-hardcore/metal underground for years, and there’s good reason for it: they’re fucking monstrous. Armed with a vocalist whose scream is just as powerful as it is terrifying, and one of the greatest drummers in modern metal (and I mean that literally), they have gained widespread critical acclaim for some of the rawest, loudest, most emotionally draining albums you will ever here.

The gem of the band’s discography is 2001’s Jane Doe, quite possibly the most brutal relationship album ever. Yes, I know that’s just about the worst selling point for anything ever, but it’s absolutely true, and the band pulls it off flawlessly. Everything from the 79 second kick-straight-to-the-face opener, to the epic eleven-and-a-half-minute closing track pulsate with a mixture of anger, fear, sadness, and despair (the key ingredients in any breakup). While the album’s production values are nowhere near as good as their more modern albums, like 2006’s No Heroes, the fact still remains that Jane Doe represents everything raw about both heartbreak and music, and is a modern metal/hardcore triumph.

Oh, and their drummer could take on Mike Portnoy. Yep, I went there.

“Fault and Fracture”, from Jane Doe

“Grin Heart/Black Rose”, from No Heroes

Moyah’s Choice
Posting a day late (sorry) I have an opportunity to see what my comrades have posted. They both chose agressive metal bands. Now for a distinct contrast!

I bring you my addition, Kotiteollisuus. Like most things I end up posting, they’re Finnish. They strike an odd musical balance, sometimes making melodic songs and sometimes hitting their instruments and yelling (I think that they’re mocking metal; their singer loses any attempt at creating tones when they do this). Either way, their unique style creates a welcome contrast to much of the music I listen to.

They’ve also been busy, releasing ten albums and 23 singles. They’re one of the most popular metal bands in Finland, having had one album go platinum and several gold. They’ve recieved awards for not just best metal album, but also best DVD.

Minä olen

Vieraan sanomaa

Almost all of the Wumpus crew uses Firefox but i’ve come to love Chrome. I only run Linux (Ubuntu) and Mac OS X systems though so sadly Chrome is only in alpha stage there. But it’s a fantastic browser and i can’t wait for it to develop further. As soon as it has good plugin support and multi platform capability, i’m going to seriously consider switching!

Just watch it.

There’s a reason I don’t listen to Vocal Trance. First and most importantly almost All the lyrics have to do with love and when you really think hard about the music that you are listening is just f’in depressing… but the music is so damn good! Above and Beyond is a damn good example of this awesome and very UNAWESOME combination. I hate it i love it i just cant listen to it for more then 1 day out of every month and today is one of those days. Heres the first thing song that baited me in and reeled me into a Vocal Trance obsession for the rest of the night.

If this baited you in too heres some more!
Dash Berlin – Till the Sky Falls Down
Above and Beyond – Can’t Sleep (ATB Remix)
Paul Oakenfold – Southern Sun
Don’t Judge me I almost NEVER listen to Vocal Trance… its kinda faggy
Fenix OUT!