Rate The Song Above You

9/10. Very effective and creepy song. The instrument change in the last third allow the song escaped from being boring.

Taylor Swift ft the Dixie Chicks - "Soon You'll Get Better"

A song obviously written with noble intention, however, it falls flat in execution. The whole thing sounds so sappy it's kind of hard to believe this is sincere. Then again, to each his own, and this song was allegedly written for one person only, so I hope Taylor's mom liked it. (5/10)

Into Another - Running Into Walls

I'm just generally a sucker for the early 90s alt-rock sound, I admit it. You always feel nostalgic for the music that kicked off your obsession, I suppose, and, well, I'm a pasty white indie kid. Do the maths. 8/10

DJ Spinna - Ladbroke Groove

Nice beats to relax/study to. 7/10

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Beat the Devil's Tattoo

Fun and dynamic, though a tad bit repetitive blues rock piece, 4/5.

Puddles Pity Party - Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne cover)

Loved the unconventional take and the costume. 9/10

Aurora - Black Water Lilies

This was a very relaxing listen, even though I think these gentle percussion loops are somewhat overused. The vocals and the piano are charming and not exceedingly sweet like it sometimes happens in this style. The way this song is sung gives me a folkish feeling, which also adds to the atmosphere. (8/10)

Jerry Cantrell - Locked On

Gotta appreciate the sync between the lyrical theme and the sound, even if I'm not a big fan of either one individually. The use of the wah pedal is a tad inappropriate; makes the rhythm guitar sound like a second vocalist shouting over the song. 6/10

Ximena Sariñana - Sin Ti No Puede Estar Tan Mal

Catchy Latin Pop, though a bit unengaging. Then again I'm not into Latin Pop that much, 3/5.

LP - Halo (Beyonce cover)

Finally getting around to this. It's pretty good, the instrumentation is beautiful and it the way it builds up and explodes is very powerful. I do have some little reservations which prevent it from being great to me, in particular I'm not really as into the vocals as I am impressed by them. 7/10

░▒▓新しいデラックスライフ▓▒░ - プロミセス「▣世界から解放され▣」

Whatever this is, I don't get it. At first I thought this is just a culture issue and that I'm missing something, but it seems that nobody has any idea what it's supposed to mean, or even be. Maybe it's a comment on capitalism. Maybe it's just a bunch of random noises put together. Nobody seems to have a clue. If anything, it reminds me of weird Flash games with creepy empty rooms played at night when procrastinating on going to sleep.

I like a good mystery, especially of this Internet random finding kind. So in a way I'm glad that this... thing exists, if only to make the world a slightly weirder place. No number rating, that is pointless here anyway. It did make me do a bit of research, so it at least provoked some reaction.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll calm myself down over at Port Horizon.

4/10 I'm really not digging the disruptive nature of the radio stuff, it's a bit too disorienting. Otherwise a fairly standard calm piece of music.

The War on Drugs - Red Eyes

Very upbeat indie rock with a tinge of airy psychedely, 4/5.

Dimash Kudaibergen - Sinful Passion

A surprisingly awesome listen that started good and got even better with the vocals as time went on, mixing a few genres here and there and with a nice beat to flown through it. All in all, 9/10.

Opeth - BlackWater Park

Edited by Lalapolpolpol on Dec 30th 2019 at 3:00:24 AM

43/100 - Opeth is one of those bands that on paper should be great (accomplished musicians, distinct aesthetic, as comfortable with distortion as they are without it) but none of it works terribly well as in spite of their highbrow aspirations their grasp of songwriting epic-length tracks usually boils down to "tape a bunch of smaller songs together and separate them with emotive cleanly played acoustic sections." They end up feeling not actually complex enough such as when they open with a weirdly lowbrow grooving riff, then one of their infamous acoustic sections pops up, then back to that, and it almost sort of picks up the tempo for something exciting near the end and then uh, doesn't really do that.

The Chameleons - View from a Hill

Edited by StillbornMachine on Jan 8th 2020 at 9:35:11 AM

Dreamy post-punk, thick with dark atmosphere, like going through the fog at dusk. Though I'm having trouble connecting the two parts of the song thematically, 4/5.

Gary Moore - I've Still Got The Blues (For You)

7/10 on this one. The vocals and the guitar work is top-notch, and the strings add something to it, but the synths almost seem to bring it to Narm territory a bit.

The Brian Jonestown Massacre - Straight Up and Down (Long Version)

Possibly the most 1960s 1990s song I've heard; this is so Rolling Stonesy I was barely even surprised when it metamorphosed into a full-blown "Sympathy For the Devil" homage in the last two minutes. There's a lot to be said for a band who can keep such a raw, simple tune pretty engaging for a full eleven minutes, but honestly? By the ending I was wondering why I wasn't just listening to the real "Sympathy For the Devil". There's such a thing as being too indebted to your influences, lads. 7/10

Le Tigre - The The Empty

35/100 - Perfectly fine catchy quasi hard rocking riff you could genuinely make a pretty neat song out of? Check. Amazingly annoying nasally grounded teenybopper vocals with a touch of helium combined with said riff not actually developing to anything of note? Also check.

Orgone - The Joyless Parson

...I still find this kind of death metal too chaotic for my tastes. It's not the technical proficiency - the riffs are great and the drumwork complement them nicely. It's the songwriting itself. Little for the mind to latch onto, and while the slower sections in the middle try to develop earlier material, they don't always do it in a satisfactory manner. Props for creating the atmosphere, though. Very ominous and dramatic sound in general. I caught myself thinking about Beethoven's darker works for some reason while listening to this, 2/5.

Obsequiae - In The Garden Of Hyacinths

2/5, sorry. I actually like the music just fine, but I've always found those kind of vocals fairly unpleasant to my ear and they tend to knock me out of the song, so they kind of brought the thing down a fair bit for me.

Reel Big Fish - Don't Start A Band

What a joyous little song. There's something about ska punk that makes even the most cynical topics sound hopeful and innocent, and I'm a fan of this kind of blunt self-deprecating, Weird Al-type humour as well, so I had fun listening to this. (8/10)

Mindless Self Indulgence - Revenge

(song starts at 0:24)

A mix of Electronica and Punk is not something I listen to often (read: never), but MSI make this eclectic thing work. Energetic, playful and unique-sounding, 5/5.

Batyrkhan Shukenov - Otan Ana (The Motherland)

While there's an obvious Kazakh vibe to this song, ultimately it sounds like a pretty Westernised soppy, reverb-saturated ballad, which has never exactly been my thing. There are a few aspects that hold my interest a little more than usual, though, particularly the booming traditional percussion. 6/10

Miles Davis - Will O' the Wisp

There's a lot to like about this one. It has a nice rhythm, and I enjoy Miles' trumpet a lot on this one. On a lot of his other songs I feel he focuses on his band as a whole (especially post "Miles in the Sky"), but on this one he's far more prominent. The beat is very catchy too. While I prefer the fusion stuff he made in the seventies, I wound up enjoying this one more than I thought I would. 8/10.

Hawkwind - Born to Go (Live) (Best version I could find attaches "Earth Calling" to the beginning, sorry)

Edited by Vantastic on Feb 17th 2020 at 6:07:13 AM