MUSIC ROUND-UP - THIRD ENTRY FOR 2011

My third posting for 2011 on what I've been listening to. My first one is here http://rgdinmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/04/music-round-up-for-2011-so-far.html

 and my second one is here http://rgdinmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/06/music-round-up-what-im-currently.html

Not to mention my post on The Weeknd http://rgdinmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/05/house-of-balloons-by-weeknd.html 

 (a review on their second album also released this year is forthcoming) 

Here's the new entries.... 

FAMOUS FIRST WORDS By Viva Brother

It’s like 1995 again and here we have the classic Brit pop sound – Nothing new here but such a glorious well produced collection of songs (Nice to hear Big Oasis guitars again) that it pushes the music sugar spot again and again regardless of originality.

LE NOISE by Neil Young

Neil Young’s best album in 15 years.  The hook here is that there are no drums either the songs are buried in orchestral feedback or are acoustic.  In the last decade, Neil’s albums have often been ambitious and contained a couple great songs but also much filler.  Here we have consistent songwriting all the way through and Neil sings these songs with such grizzled majesty.

BLOUSE by Blouse

Synthpop from Portland, OR  with a beautiful torch singer type female vocal over the blips and beats and occasional guitar and Peter Hook type bass rhythms.  The difference is the amount of memorable melodies they produce here.  A band I will be following in the future.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF FIX by Bombay Bicycle Club

I wasn’t sure what this was going to be like. After the herky jerky new wave throwback of their first album led to the almost completely acoustic arrangements on their second album, would the third album be synthesisers or a full orchestra or death metal perhaps??? No the end result is closer to the first album albeit less frenzied with some pianos and other things thrown into the mix.  Here the songs are slower, longer and there is an older man’s wisdom behind these tired vocals and lyrics.  A good record - let’s see what they do next