Trollheart reviews your favourite music

[DJChameleon]

I'll join in too. I saw this thread much too late but I'll give you some time to free up before dropping my list.

[Lexi Darling]

I'm down to post mine too once you're more free, TH.

It seems you and I align pretty well on the new age/electronic side so I'd love to share some more of that kind of stuff that I think you'd dig.

[Trollheart]

Love the new avvy, Lexi! Is he/she yours? So cute!

[Lexi Darling]

Love the new avvy, Lexi! Is he/she yours? So cute!

Thank you! And yes, she is mine; her name is Francesca, I have some more pics of her in the pet pics thread assuming the links haven't expired.

[Trollheart]

Well, colour me suprised! It seems the thread is




so I guess

[Trollheart]

Thank you! And yes, she is mine; her name is Francesca, I have some more pics of her in the pet pics thread assuming the links haven't expired.

Just gorgeous!

And the cat is lovely too.


I love how she seems to be saying "No photographs! I deserve my privacy just like anyone else!"

[Norg]

What's happenin' @Norg?

Also, what's the deal, I thought you were running for President this year?

uhhh no i dont really care much for polotics TBO  it does nothing for us poor middle class folks

[Norg]

Thanks guys. Unfortunately, your timing couldn't be worse, as I'm knee-deep in football reports at the moment. But I will get to your music, never fear. Just have to get through the FA Cup first round, Match of the Day and the return of the Champions League, then I'll be right with you.

for a sec i thought u meant football like the NFL i was like u watch the NFL ..  but no Fifa americano LOL soccer

review my stuff like a astrologer studies the universe in his wet dreams ? 

[Trollheart]

for a sec i thought u meant football like the NFL i was like u watch the NFL ..  but no Fifa americano LOL soccer

Sorry, we don't consider that football. Football originated in England, so soccer will always be football to us; your sport is American Football over here.

review my stuff like a astrologer studies the universe in his wet dreams ? 

[DeepMinder]

https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLL6aKcXALC1sw7-pm7b1iNqtK8tXNoIUr&feature=shared

November 19th^

[Trollheart]

Selection is from:

Track: "The Bar (China)"
Artist: Koji Hayama/Hayato Matsuo/Shigeki
Genre: Video game soundtrack
From: Front Mission 3 OST
Year: 1999
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Not what I had expected at all. Sort of a bluesy ballad, instrumental of course, but no beep-beep-beep or mad squealing keyboards. Quite lovely in fact. Pleasantly surprised, and I suppose just illustrates how we - or at least I - tend to make rash pre-judgements and take things at face value. Mostly piano driven with some nice harmonica, very relaxing.
Rating:


Track: "Never Rest"
Artist: Leatherbäl
Genre: No idea
From: Don't know
Year: Fucked if I know
Personal familiarity (album): Zero. as I have no idea what album it's from, if any
Personal familiarity (artist): Zero
Comments: Thanks Norg! An incredibly obscure artist, whose odd spelling makes it even harder to look them up. Got nothing on my usual sites, ended up with Google, who directed me to Reverbnation. They had little information, showing only one album, and this ain't on it. So I got nothing. As for the music? Sounds kind of like 70s hard rock when it starts, then has a sort of EMF "Unbelievable" riff going through it. The vocal is female but I can't say it appeals to me. I see words like "splatterfest", "Fetish ball" and, um, "Revenge of the pigs", so maybe some sort of punk thing? Not sure. Certainly don't like it though.
Rating:


Track: "How Do I Move On"
Artist: Part Time
Genre: Indie Pop/Dream Pop
From: 4th album PDA
Year: 2013
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: The problem with having to research these artists (mostly to find out who they are and what albums these tracks come from etc) is that occasionally you stumble across a nasty story, and it seems that this guy was a serious abuser of women, leading to all of his content being deleted from most record outlets and presumably online too. I don't know him and I don't want to pre-judge, but given that he admitted the allegations it makes hard reading. Putting that to one side for now, I want to concentrate on the music.

There's a nice sort of jangly guitar but the vocal is, to me, quite muddied and reminds me of Morrisey sort of. There are some small elements maybe of Deacon Blue here, but overall it's all right but nothing I'd be rushing out to buy. Oh right: you can't buy his music anymore as nobody stocks it. Serves the abusing cunt right.
Rating:


Track: "Underground Big (Headfulofhyena)" ??
Artist: Bring Me the Horizon
Genre: Not sure
From: Don't know
Year: Not a scooby
Personal familiarity (album): Shrug
Personal familiarity (artist): I've heard one album (that one with the big long name I'm not going to write down)
Comments: Look, once again you guys have got to help me out. If you want me to review your music give me a source. I have searched through BMTH's discog and I don't see this on any of them, and now I kind of get the feeling it may be some collaboration with a rapper or something? I don't know these things, so do me a solid and give me the information I need. It's a pain in the hole searching for this stuff.

Speaking of a pain in the hole, so is this. Basically a rapper doing what rappers do behind possibly music by BMTH - although it doesn't sound anything like the album I heard, so I'm confused. More like listening to a hip-hop track maybe, but it's definitely not for me. Strike three.
Rating:


Track: "17765744"
Artist: Scala
Genre: Dream Pop
From: 2nd album To You in Alpha
Year: 1998
Personal familiarity (album): Nada
Personal familiarity (artist): Zilch
Comments: Sort of a drum loop or something and... that's more or less it. A driving repetitive guitar riff doesn't make the piece any more interesting for me. Not going well Norg, I'm afraid.
Rating:


Track: "The Faultless"
Artist: Meshuggah
Genre: Progressive Metal/Technical Death Metal/Djent
From: 9th album Immutable
Year: 2022
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): Have heard of them, but never heard anything by them
Comments: Slightly more in my wheelhouse now, if I am clutching on by my fingernails to avoid being thrown out. The guitar riffs are great, the sort of Egyptian theme running through the riff is cool, the vocal, scratchy and raw, I could live without, but overall, not bad. Got a kind of doom metal vibe going through it at times, too.
Rating:


Track: "Cyaho"
Artist: Molchat Doma
Genre: Synthpop/Coldwave/Darkwave/Gothic Rock
From: 2nd album Этажи (Etazhi)
Year: 2018
Personal familiarity (album): Nyet
Personal familiarity (artist): Nein
Comments: I think I would be correct to say that this is the first Belarusan band I have ever heard. Certainly the first synthpop one. Sounds a bit soulless now to me I have to say (suppose the tags coldwave and darkwave should have been a bit of a giveaway). Not bad for what it is, but definitely not something I'd be listening to again, comrade!
Rating:


Track: "The Nurse Who Loved me"
Artist: A Perfect Circle
Genre: Alt-rock/Art rock/Hard rock
From: 2nd album Thirteenth Step
Year: 2003
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): I've heard of them, that's it
Comments: Not quite sure if this is going to explode into some sort of hard rock seether or anything, but it's certainly started off nice and relaxed, with an almost mono vocal and some piano and whistling, vaguely Beatlesesque or maybe Julian Lennon, very pleasant. No it stayed that way. Enjoyed that.
Rating:


Track: "Still they Laugh Pt 2"
Artist: Hamadryad
Genre: Progressive Rock/Neo-prog
From: Debut album Conservation of Mass
Year: 2001
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): Nary a screed (Irish way of saying none)
Comments: This is more like it! A prog band, nice. Very firmly in the old wheelhouse now. A short piece, just over two minutes, with some nice reflective guitar that gets quite Steve Rotheryesque at times,  and a vocal that gets a little histrionic at times, but overall really nice. Would have preferred a longer track to be able to judge the band better, but I like what I hear here (hear, hear!) and will probably seek this band out to check out more.
Rating:


Track: - Pokajanie Покаяние
Artist: Zhanna Bichevskaja & Gennadiy Ponomarjov
Genre: No idea
From: Not a clue
Year: Ya got me
Personal familiarity (album): N/A
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Nice sort of laid-back ballad but I have no clue who these people are, nor where the song comes from. Information like that is key, especially when the artists are not English, or at least don't sing in English. Nothing I can tell you, but the song is nice.
Rating:

Average rating:

[Trollheart]

In future, then, if you could either give me the album each track comes from, or, as SGR has helpfully done, throw down a list of YouTubes, this will help me and make this a more enjoyable task than it was.

TVM.

Up next:

[Guybrush]

Here are some things I currently enjoy:

• Oingo Boingo - Private Life (from Nothing to Fear from 1982)
• The Replacements - Alex Chilton (from Pleased to Meet Me from 1987)
• Fever Ray - Kandy (from Radical Romantics from 2023)
• The Prodigy - Girls (from Always Outnumbered Never Outgunned from 2004)
• 10cc - Don't Hang Up (from How Dare You! from 1976)
• King Crimson - Dinosaur (from Thrak! from 1995)
• Thulsa Doom - Lady Nina (from A Keen Eye for the Obvious from 2017)
• Hatfield and the North - Your Majesty Is Like A Cream Donut (incorporating Oh What A Lonely Lifetime) (from V (Virgin sampler) from 1975)

I figured this was enough as the last track is a little lengthy 🙂 I also made an effort to keep out some things I know you despise 😄

Links point to YouTube.

[Trollheart]

Selection is from:


Track: "Bill is Dead"
Artist: The Fall
Genre: Post-punk, probably
From: I have no clue. The Fall have over 30 fucking albums and I will be damned for all time before I go through them all to find out where this comes from. I don't even like them.
Year: Don't know, but 1990 or before, as the video is from that year.
Personal familiarity (album): N/A
Personal familiarity (artist): Heard a track or two. I loathe this band. Yes, nice and unbiased, I know.
Comments: It's nowhere near as bad as I had feared. Nice kind of I guess it's indie guitar feel to it, is it? The keyboard riff running through it is sweet, but I just hate Smith's laconic, almost bored delivery on the vocals. It's not going to get as bad a rating as I had expected though.
Rating:


Track: "Missing You"
Artist: Tchami
Genre: Not a clue
From: I refer you to my answer on The Fall track
Year: No idea
Personal familiarity (album): N/A
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Another one I'd have to wade through albums, remixes, compilations and collaborations to find, and I just ain't doing it. Gimme the information I need, or accept that I just won't be filling that in. I have a feeling this may be house, given the miniscule amount of that genre I've heard and also given SGR's love of it, but for me it's a shrug. I mean, there's nothing wrong with it, but I'm not interested in it. Sorry, not missing you Mr. Tchami.
Rating:



Track: "Get a Hold"
Artist: A Tribe Called Quest
Genre: East Coast Hip-hop/Boom Bap (there it is again! Anyone going to enlighten me here? Still sounds like a booby-trapped sandwich!)
From: 4th album Beats, Rhymes and Life
Year: 1996
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): A vague, passing familiarity if anything
Comments: Sort of sounds a little chanty when it starts, like Gregorian monks or something, but the tempo is slow and kind of coasting along, in no particular hurry. It's... okay.
Rating:


Track: "The Spoils"
Artist: Massive Attack
Genre: Trip-hop/Downtempo
From: No idea; I checked all their albums (even the soundtrack one) and no dice
Year: Nil fhios agam (Irish for I don't know)
Personal familiarity (album): N/A
Personal familiarity (artist): I've heard two albums
Comments: Like this a lot. Very laid back, which I assume is usually their vibe as they possibly say though probably not any more. She has a very soulful voice and the backing music is almost ambient in its way. Best so far by a mile.
Rating:



Track: "Up the Down Escalator"
Artist: The Chameleons"
Genre: Post-punk, Gothic Rock, Dream Pop
From: Debut album Script of the Bridge
Year: 1983
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Even before I hear a beat, I love the idea, though of course it's just me: a bunch of lizards barrelling up an escalator that's coming down, all fading into the background as they camouflage themselves so nobody can see them, creating havoc and chaos. Ah well, so much for my crazy imagination: let's see what the music is like. Surprisingly, in tempo and rhythm it sort of fits in with that vision, edges of Big Country there and maybe a touch of Bono and the lads with a slice of Lloyd Cole, with or without The Commotions. That singer sounds very familiar... Not at all bad, lads. Just don't go getting stepped on all right?
Rating:


Track: "One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer"
Artist: John Lee Hooker
Genre: Blues
From: Dinnae ken
Year: No clue
Personal familiarity (album): N/A
Personal familiarity (artist): Who doesn't know the blues legend?
Comments: If I wasn't going to go through 30 albums by The Fall, I sure as hell ain't going through Hooker's 6,178! Anyway I can imagine what this is going to sound like, and it does. I prefer my blues slow, to be honest, those soul-wringing, regret-drenched "my girl done left me" type, preferably with a large slice of squealing guitar solo, but hell, this is classic. Surprised to realise I do actually know it, or if I don't, someone copied it and I know that song. Unassailable, as someone used to say. No ice in yours, right, SGR?
Rating:



Track: "Glory Days"
Artist: Pulp
Genre: Britpop
From: Sixth album This is Hardcore
Year: 1998
Personal familiarity (album): Just the singles from it
Personal familiarity (artist): I know a few songs and have reviewed one album (not this one)
Comments: I like the almost proggy synth intro, then the piano cuts in perfectly, and Jarvis Cocker's understated voice complements it well. Picks up nicely and rocks along smoothly. I need to listen to more Pulp.
Rating:




Track: "We On Fire"
Artist: Hot Boys
Genre: Gangsta Rap/Southern Hip-hop/Dirty South
From: Debut album Get it How U Live!!!
Year: 1997
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Now this was almost fun! The perils of not having the pertinent information; I checked under THE Hot Boys and I got a German psychedelic folk rock band from the 1970s! With all the tracks in German! I thought, nah, surely can't be? And it ain't. But you see, if I'd had the album we would never have come to this hilarious pass. Anyroad, on we stagger. A contender for my "Music for Witches" thread, surely?

These guys are funny. I love the video, though I must admit, the chances of the ATF sending an all-black squad after them are, at best, unlikely. I love the symbolism of their jumping into a white car to escape, and there's a whole lot of "What kinda nigga" which is very amusing. Sure made me smile.
Rating:


Track: "Europe"
Artist: Killing Joke
Genre: Post-punk
From: 5th alum Night Time
Year: 1985
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): I've heard the odd song
Comments: Very 80s indeed; transports me right back to my 20s. Yes, I was 20 once. I was. I can prove it. Well, maybe not. Ah, those ringing, clashing guitars so beloved of one Echo and any number of his Bunnymen, as well as, um, many more. New Model Army, That's another one. And The Stranglers. Maybe The Smiths, though I wouldn't know. Anyway I'd have to say the song is not very distinguishable, quite generic for bands of the time, but as I say, it takes me back. What do you mean, hopefully it'll leave me there?
Rating:



Track: "Chant of a Poor Man"
Artist: Leftfield
Genre: Breakbeat, Dub Techno, Trip-hop, Big Beat, Dub
From: 2nd album Rhythm and Stealth
Year: 1999
Personal familiarity (album): None
Personal familiarity (artist): None
Comments: Sounds like some version of reggae perhaps? Also sounds like there may be a duck playing the synth. Kind of engaging, perhaps hypnotic. Really not bad at all.
Rating:

An interesting choice of time periods, mostly from the 1980s and 1990s. Different.

Average rating:

[Trollheart]

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