abasio

Try Shulman's albums

Scorb Ipso Fvcto Trick Music 2007 Tracklist 1 Pareidolia (0:41) 2 Sol Invictus (8:58) 3 Yodyssey (7:52) 4 Rave From The Grave (6:41) 5 Apohenia (1:21) 6 Wobbly Matter (5:51) 7 P2P (5:25) 8 Pyrotechno (6:25) 9 Tower Of Klorox (9:07) 10 Angleterror (6:12) 11 Ipso Fvcto (8:14) 12 Aquiescence (5:53) 13 Supraliminal (4:16) Scorb is back with his follow up to his magnificent self titled debut album. That one was a twisted freakish album dripping with psychedelia so I was looking forward to this one so much & when I read the review from Psyreviews I nearly wet myself with anticipation. So did it live up to my sky high expectation? Let's see 1. Pareidolia 41 seconds of atmospheric ambience is just an intro into the real music here. 2. Sol Invictus Following on from Pareidolia this one has a soft ambient intro before the pounding beat kicks in with a crispy baseline & a synth line that disappears as it repeats. The sounds used around these are very much what I was expecting. Dark twisted sounds dripping with psychedelic goodness. The melody is excellent, at the start it echoes through the mind and the baby of it that continues manages to twist around everything very well complimenting as it goes along. It's a pretty complex track with a lot going on. Perfect to listen to at home, on the train, in the gym & I can see it working brilliantly on dancefloors the world over. The twists & turns, the timing of the breakdowns and the energy given by the synth line are beyond great. 3. Yodyssey Yodyssey has a more prominent bassline that seems to dominate the track which is a shame as the music behind it is oozing with trippy goodness. The sharp acid sounds & spooky ambience are delightful. After hearing the releases this year on Gi'iwa though I expect more from my basslines now & a standard pedestrian fullon bassline no longer cuts the mustard. That 303 is bloody amazing though and sends this from mediocre to well above average. Shame it's so brief. 4. Rave From The Grave Church bells ring out instantly giving this a dark eerie atmosphere. A slightly bouncier bassline and a thumping beat give more energy to the scene. The quality of Scorb's production is really evident here. The sounds are all pristine and when you have nice ideas coupled with great production the end product is always going to be good. The melody is dark and works well to create the party in a graveyard feel. Zombielicious 5. Apophenia Has a nice pokey melody at the start. Probing the mind like a scanner & really sounds nice with the light percussion accompanying it. Shame such a nice track is so short. 6. Wobbly Matter Apophenia seemed like it was just an intro for Wobbly Matter. The sounds are sharp & flitter about through my mind like bats on acid. The bassline thankfully moves a bit more than on Yodyssey & that adds an extra element of danceability to this. For a track that starts with a lot of energy this sure manages to continue building the energy. My only problem is that it never releases the energy it has built up. 7. P2P While I don't like the cheesy ass opening sample I do like the Drum & Bass beats and bass in it. When I heard that Scorb had made a D&B track I imagined the best D&B track ever with Scorb's twisted sounds under those huge beats. While this is a nice D&B track it's very much D&B track & the Psychedelic elements are lost in the glare of the coked up beats & overly confident strut of it all. This sounds like D&B through & through, it could do with more melody or more fucked up acid in it. Still it's a nice variation from your regular Psy fare so it's very welcome when it comes on the album. 8. Pyrotechno The beat now feels very slow & plodding in comparison to P2P but with that the sounds are given room to breathe & I can feel the darkness creeping through this track. It's exactly what I was hoping from this album. Creepy in the extreme, insanity in the background and beat that allows you to fully appreciate the weirdness that is going on. Nice stuff, no wait nasty stuff, twisted nightmare type music. The wet squelchy sounds are my favourite 9. Tower Of Klorox This follows on similarly from Pyrotechno but has more energy to it. A more danceable less mongy track. The psychedelic elements can still be heard but they are not as foreboding as in the previous track & while good the first half lacks the insanity level of Scorb's best works. The final 3 minutes though have a lot more feeling behind the music. The darkness shines through (???) and it all seems to drip seamlessly down from the UFO infested night sky, down through the soil into the basement where it seeps into the minds of the party goers. Worth the wait 10. Angleterror This is the track that Damien of off Psyreviews in his infinite praise of music he likes described as evolution. He said he wants to have it's babies & stalk it etc etc and went on for some time about how good it was without actually describing it. It is not a bad track, the bassline is very crisp & has some movement. A fluttering synth is among the most trippy sounds I've ever heard & sounds like dark moths have gotten into my brain. Other than that though it's a very standard track with a cheesy star wars sounding sample. I'm not sure what is so evolved about this track. Nice but not that great. It seems like it's just about to get great but then ends. 11. Ipso Fvcto This is a wonderful piece of break beat psy. The intro is long & teasing & the beats come in, in cool confident fashion. Very smooth & twisted at the same time. The psychedelic level is kept high while exploring other sounds. Much more intersting than the D&B track and the variation adds another plus to this already very good album. The sample is actually pretty good & well placed to complement the track rather than detract from the greatness. 12. Aquiescence Starting to slow things down a bit now and the trippiness of this track is pretty high. Very nice psy track. Slow plodding beats & a lot of weird noises coming from the darkness. The slight touch of melody that rings out is so isolated at the start of the track that the brain reaches out for it, opening it up for the other sounds to permeate & confuse. Excellent stuff indeed but that's not it there is more melody in the second half which is really nice but you can still here the slight melodious touch from the start coming in & every time it does is like an ice pick of joy to the brain. 13. Supraliminal We finish on an ambient track. Nice melody & dark feeling to close the album with. Soft, slow percussion & weird sounds just like the rest of the album only without the energy. The atmosphere is among the best on the album & is almost medieval. Just a shame it's so short. Well to sum up I'd say this is a damn good album. Is it as good as his debut? No, but it's almost as good. Is it the best album ever? No. Is it the best album of 2007? No, but it is a damn good album that is definitely worth buying. It's crisp, clean, dark, twisted, psychedelic stuff with enough variation to keep it interesting throughout the whole album. In the future I'd like Scorb to listen to Gi'iwa artists & try & make his basslines a little more dynamic like theirs. Scorb's basslines here were a little flat and boring & I'm grateful the rest of the music was more than enough compensation for that. Not life changing but a very nice album here

Scorb - Ipso Fvcto

because....it's not a DJ mix!!! Kinda obvious question

Something to look for in the new year then. Cheers guys

That's good stuff right there! Try also Interior horizons. That's if you can find any of these that is

I'd just put FOL on repeat

Well I must admit I'm being very selfish here. I thought that I want my favourite artists would make more music in the style I liked best if they got more recognition & sales for that style so if I got other people to hear just how good they were they might buy some CDs so said artists could keep producing music so my future is that much happier. Very selfish in the end

what do they sound like?

Butterfly Dawn

No I never listened to Amber. Tri Repetae & all the horrible compilation tracks put me off & Autechre albums here are always really expensive so I've never been tempted to part with my (now) hard earned cash for something I'm sketchy about.

Hahaha Fantastic

There was none in Oxycanta : Winter Blooms either, but I was not too upset, the music on both CDs is top drawer stuff

I thought it was easier as everything you could buy sounded so good Now there is so much to shift through

Nice, definitely one of my picks of the year Never got into Autechre

Play really underground shit like britney spears & Eminem

Yeah but it doesn't save any music, just a php file that doesn't play any mp3 or wav downloads?

Scorb - Tower of klorox

I want to hear that

The Orb The Dream Traffic Inc. 2007 Tracklist 1 The Dream (The Future Academy Of Noise, Rhythm And Gardening Mix) (6:25) 2 Vuja De (5:45) 3 Something Supernatural (0:36) 4 A Beautiful Day (6:48) 5 DDD (Dirty Disco Dub) (5:03) 6 The Truth Is... (6:43) 7 Phantom Of Ukraine (0:30) 8 Mother Nature (6:30) 9 Lost & Found (6:19) 10 The Forest Of Lyonesse (1:09) 11 Katskills (5:55) 12 High Noon (6:03) 13 Sleeping Tiger & The Gods Unknown (1:09) 14 Codes (8:13) 15 Orbisonia (5:47) 16 Let The Music Set You Free (7:01) The Orb's latest release has been out for some time in Japan but I still see no release anywhere else. This is definitely one for fans of Alex Paterson. Fusing ambient dub, reggae, ragga & psychedelica in with nice basslines and some cool melodies. Interspersed with Orb style samples. The opening track The Dream (The Future Academy Of Noise, Rhythm And Gardening Mix) has a very Orb like spoken female vocal reminiscent of Little Fluffy Clouds & Apple Tree in My Backyard. The rest though is a very tight little psychedelic dub number, the ambience floats your mind while the vocals my it trip away. Vuja De meanwhile is not so dreamy, much more urban in style. Closer to pure dub but with some trippy little sounds & a female singing like it's 1990 again. Think early 90's rave infused into modern dub. The short track Something Supernatural is just a collection of samples put together. Quite a trippy especially the Ohayo Gozaimus backwards one. Following that comes my favourite on the album, A Beautiful Day has a tight little beat, bassline that hums through the track and some really nice singing. I'm not usually a fan of lyrics or samples but both here are very well done. It's hard not to smile at this one DDD (Dirty Disco Dub) borders on damn right cheesy. The lyrics Honey Honey Honey Hooooney Honey! & come on y'all, lets go we're going down to the disco are almost unbearable in their cheesiness and it seems an odd inclusion to an otherwise good album. Much more musical is The Truth Is... which has well placed samples laid subtly, melody & capable female singing. The melody comes from all different sources, guitar, piano what sounds like a harpsichord while the bassline gives it all a nice danceable quality. Phantom of the Ukraine is just a sample without a song. I guess they really liked it but couldn't fit it into any tracks Mother Nature is a Ragga track & as that it's quite good. Imagine that hot chick shaking her ass at super human speed as you stand behind it mesmerised. The melody played in it is actually really good. Majestic at times and better than the track around it. Back to dub with Lost & Found and it's a nice track reminding me of dub clubs in London on a sunday night in summer. The girls swarming around, everyone talking & laughing with each other. The singing in the last couple of minutes is really good & gives this a special atmosphere of detachment from the world. The Forest of Lyonesse is a short interlude again. A thin flute melody makes it sound very much like in a forest in some 1970's martial arts movie. There is more eastern sounding flute in Katskills. The bassline is a fat one the vocals come flying at you & the beats are like relaxed D&B. A pretty cool track but very shallow. No depth, no layers. High Noon digs a little deeper with a lot of psychedelic sounds flying about & a subdued bassline buzzing in the back of my mind. The piano melody is soft & dreamy and the vocals flutter nicely adding extra trippiness to the track. The track evolves very nicely with good progression keeping it interesting on repeat listens Another interlude, Sleeping Tiger & The Gods Unknown is more musical than earlier interludes. A soft ambient track with a beautiful warm feeling to it. Why oh why only make this 1 minute long? The sort of stuff I'd love to hear a full album of. Codes seems to follow on for a while with a nice ambient intro. Then soft beats & a softer bassline come in creating a nice magical feel. I imagine a warm summer evening just on the edge of a forest, watching the sun sink behind the trees. Such is the feeling of the music that I'm actually feeling warmer just listening to it. Really great stuff. A very psychedelic piece of ambient dub just right for chillin' in the evenin' Orbisonia is ambient in the old orb style. Sample heavy making it sound random in a well organised way. Bizarre & cool stuff as always. Let The Music Set You Free is a bonus track only for the Japanese release so if you want it you'll have to get the import. Seeing as the release date elsewhere seems to be nowhere in sight that might be a good idea. It's a good track as well. So damn British. It puts me in mind the early 90's. The beats, bass & repetitive lyrics all give me a nostalgic feeling. Very cool indeed with nice melody under the bass and punchy, crunchy synths There is some good stuff here. As a dub album it's really good & the best I've heard from the orb in a while. There are hints in a few tracks that they could make a new fantastic ambient album which would please me no end. The dub/reggae tracks are cool. The singing is good & the samples as always are well placed. Only does DDD (Dirty Disco Dub) let the show down & it does in a very big way. Way too cheesy and needs to be skipped when I listen to it. Other than that though this is one of the tastiest dub albums I've heard over the last few years & the ambient tracks towards the end are superb.

27 eclipses

There are so many tracks in the world now. So many have the same name. Even artists have the same name. Look on discogs some artists have (2) after there name. I've seen up to about (9) People just aren't as original as they think they are being

2007 mix

Shulman Endless Rhythms Of The Beatless Heart Aleph Zero 2007 Tracklist 1 Retroscape (11:32) 2 Transmissions In Bloom (12:50) 3 Odd Reflections (10:17) 4 One Step Closer (8:49) 5 After Silence (6:46) 6 Invention (11:13) 7 Mia Nihta Mono Den Ftani (10:07) 8 Eternal Bliss Of The Grateful Souls (4:59) The build up to this album passed my by almost unnoticed. I was never going to have high hopes as in my opinion Shulman's albums have decreased in quality. The first being the best followed by the second & the half hearted random thoughts coming in a sorry last place. I feared this would just be another step down. So when I finally bought it & stuck it in I wasn't expecting much. On the first listen I really had mixed feelings about it, I thought there was some good stuff in there but that they really overused the Shahnai Zorna & Ney instruments I have in my travels come to despise as almost everywhere I've been they are played tunelessly & annoyingly. That put me off at first but I'm glad I stuck with the album as after overcoming my prejudices about that instrument, I noticed that Shulman & the musicians they have gathered for this are not your talentless back street player but people who can really play. I found myself loving the melodies played on instruments I can't stand. This has had some heavy play time since I first got it & I'd go as far as to say it's my favourite Shulman album yet. 1. Retroscape We start off with an 11 and a half minute track but Shulman's progression & ideas are definitely good enough to make long tracks like this. The vocals are at once sad & hopeful like optimism in the face of adversity. It takes a while for the melodies to come in but the one on the roads is particularly nice. A glitchy mid section gives way to more energetic melodies & some nice soft but quick beats. I'm put in mind of Deep Forest a little when listening to this especially the melodies in the final thought & the twisted vocals. 2. Transmissions in Bloom This track is almost 13 minutes long & it doesn't start too well I'm afraid. The melody is damn annoying in tone at the beginning but somehow it snakes around my brain & once this passes the 3 minute mark I've started liking it. Some really odd sci fi noises run through the background giving quite a contrasting feel. The breakdown on 4:30 is jaw dropping in it's beautiful ambience. The melody creeps back in & out again but the emergence of the beats in the 8th minute is staggeringly good. Slow heavy yet subdued beats. The track from this moment on builds up slowly adding more layers, melody after melody intertwining and a huge long synth line in the background, all in all it has blindingly moments. As it built up it also strips itself down in the end removing layers until it's completely gone. A few noodley moments where it seems they have gone to far trying to show off but all in all a very good track. 3. Odd Reflections Soft glitch at the start, kind of wet sounds zipping about. A nice soft bass comes which is beautiful & the violin is interesting if not quite as nicely played as I'd like. I really prefer my classical violin than ethnic violin. Not as many melodies in this track & it sounds kind of thin throughout most of this track relying on glitchy beats and a lot of random sounds. There are some good moments in this track towards the end, some twisted sounding melody & violin going a little nuts but all in all it's just too glitchy for it's own good & too shallow. 4. One Step Closer This one instantly sounds much deeper with a deep resonating bass drone & cool IDMish beats. A saxophone, another instrument I can't stand, is played in away I would usually cringe at but in the context of this track it seems to fit & conjures images in my head of seedy back alley bars at 3 in the morning being seduced by some sultry woman in her late 30's in a tight red low cut dress & black stockings smoking a long thins cigarette in a way that just screams take me. Quite a nice track 5. After Silence A very glitchy ambient track. Not much rhythm or melody or structure just long drawn out soundscapes. Standing alone or on a different album with similar music this would be a very nice track but here it feels like an unnecessary interlude. The best thing about it are the vocals. Subtle & merged with strings so it's hard to tell when they start & end. The beats creep in & I feel like it's just getting into something but then it stops. 6. Invention Now we are entering the business end of the album. This is the reason you need to buy this album. This track is worth the cash alone. It's deep, beautiful & very emotional. The melodies come from everywhere & twist around each other perfectly. The melodies are sweet & melancholic at the same time. At once jazzy & ethnic, serious & fun. This without a shadow of a doubt is the best track that Shulman have ever released, definitely up there in my favourites of the year & it has made me very glad I bought this album. The progression of the track is nice with an ambient mid section that is very dreamy after which it rebuilds & brings the melodies back in, slightly different layers this time. Enough heart stopping moments to cover an entire album. Only 11 minutes long though, I wish it was longer, 30 minutes might have been a good length for this masterpiece of audio engineering 7. Mia Nihta Mono Den Ftani Following on in almost as good style, we have here once again nice melodies, deep atmosphere & emotion crammed into the music until it's bursting out. The melody on the Zorna I initially found to be very annoying as I outlined above this instrument never used to instill much in me but it's so well arranged in here & the deep melody that follows is another jaw dropping one. The same adjectives as I described for Invention can be used on this track. It doesn't quite reach the dizzy heights as Invention but it comes damn close. A slight reggae feel to it as well is pretty interesting but at the end of the day it's all about those melodies. Very nice stuff indeed. 8. Eternal Bliss of the Grateful Souls Finishing on an ambient number and what a nice ambient piece it is too. Soft & dreamy sounds build an atmosphere of warm summer nights looking up at the stars. Accentuated by the starlight melody & the long strings which end the album on such a beautiful tone that I want to listen to it over again. Blissful indeed & it makes me grateful to Shulman for this album. Just a shame that it's so short, only 5 minutes which seem to pass much quicker, this could have been much longer & still very interesting. As I said, this is Shulman's best album to date & I would urge anyone that likes either Shulman's sound or is a fan of well made world music should get their hands on this. The last 3 tracks are just amazing. One thing I'm not so keen on though is that there are moments when it feels like Shulman are showing off & they just try a bit too much to add character to their work. When they simply layer the sounds, the melodies & the beats & ambience it sounds so good. The glitch is often decent enough but they overdo it a few times & it sounds a bit like it's trying to climb up it's own arse. Just sometimes though. The high points are dizzying and this is a so far unique album in my collection, guaranteeing a lot of play time over here