Calliope Music Weekly Roundup
September 28 - October 11 , 2024
Reviewed Albums
Ramper - Solo Postres
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7.5/10 |
Best Tracks: Un Miembro Fantasma -- Reina de Faroles -- Poderoso Puño
Delicate as a flower, acoustic guitar introduces nightly passages, gently persuaded by pecking drums and dolorous keys. As a surreal narrative of haunting love develops, graceful acoustics encounter a thin layer of distorted guitar topped by a canopy of sugary woodwind and grounded by palatial brass. In the midst lies Álvaro Romero Sepúlveda's soft reflections, restrained among shaded synths and dim harmonies.
The four-piece band carefully crafts a fine-drawn environment, finding great value in subtle embellishments. Although elongated structures can drag on and often fail to push stand-out moments, the astute composition of the record allows the listener to soak in each element in sweet detail. It may be a test of patience for some, but Solo Postres is a beautiful take on Post-Rock, never lost in its world of phantom memories and graceful grief.
Merce Lemon - Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild
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7/10 |
Best Tracks: Birdseed -- Backyard Lover -- Slipknot
A welcomed addition to Country's developing Indie scene, Merce Lemon balances pulpy ballads and biting Rock bits with much poise. Naturalistic poetry wistfully navigates through plump guitar-driven crescendos and fleecy acoustic patterns, escorting an engaging woodland sound. The middle of the record tips a little too far into the swampy cliché of Indie Rock but rebounds with the haunting heaviness of 'Slipknot' and the title track. Clean production, but raw songwriting defeats contemporaries' generic "soft-loud-soft-loud" formula, creating a truly touching take on Alternative Country.
Nubya Garcia - Odyssey
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7/10 |
A clear-minded and ravishing Jazz affair, Nubya Garcia charms with thriving spirits and evocative cinematics. When Garcia's saxophone is in full motion the record kicks with soul, full and warm under red waves of quick tempo double bass and nimble drums. An overflowing string section then heals tension, adding dramatic movements to broad Jazz chambers. Sadly, the album can't keep pace throughout, running sluggish past the halfway mark. Nevertheless, as the final track's title suggests, the record ends triumphantly, making Odyssey an explicit winner of contemporary written Jazz music
Blood Incantation - Absolute Elsewhere
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8/10 |
Best Tracks: The Stargate [Tablet I] -- The Message [Tablet I] -- The Message [Tablet III]
Scrolling ancient tombs and searching the limitless bowels of the universe, four-piece Metal outfit, Blood Incantation fashion titanic space invocations on their third studio album.
Prodigious suspense is built by celestial Rock progressions, floating alongside echoing proverbs. Then, the bubble bursts, unleashing blood-curdling Death Metal passages full of erupting guitar, boiling bass, and blast-beat drumming. While these transitions are often abrupt, they lend to the overall theme and narrative of the record; a journey to find the meaning of everything, and the rude awakening upon discovering that meaning. Certainly a combination of vintage sounds (some more worn out than others), Absolute Elsewhere delivers a colossal performance, enriched in its primordial yearning for far-away truths and histories.
Clarence Clarity - VANISHING ACT II: ULTIMATE REALITY
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7.5/10 |
Best Tracks: ALLATONCENESS -- Playing Our Parts -- Rage Quitting, Quietly
The always-kinetic Clarence Clarity (CC) is back with another full-length Electropop release, incessantly springy and texturally diverse.
Bopping beats teeming with rubbery bass, hollow drum kits, and celebratory claps jump across the walls of a beaming mix. Complemented by glittering chimes, sweeping synths, and charging guitar, CC gushes out catchy chorus, hitting every beat on the nose with a layered soprano. Eccentric lyrics of heartbreak and an increasingly insane online world mix well with equally outlandish Glitch resonations.
Such a bold Pop sound relies on its ability to be memorable long after listening, to which ULTIMATE REALITY succeeds for the most part. A few sections actually feel a bit too unstable, fumbling instead of gripping. Regardless, the 38-minute album is a tingling Pop experience; a bouncy ball erratically fun in consistency and character.
SOPHIE - SOPHIE
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2/10 |
Best Tracks: Always and Forever -- My Forever
Largely motionless and unfinished, the posthumous self-titled record by EDM extraordinaire, SOPHIE can hardly be called a SOPHIE album. While there is an intriguing rave-like atmosphere, rubbery and poppy with some of SOPHIE's signature synth and bass sounds, the record runs almost entirely bare of substance.
Clearly a collection of unfinished concepts, guest artists contribute very little aside from short vocal samples and small beat adjustments. It really feels like a Garage Band assembly, a child playing with a Lego set missing an essential piece; that piece being SOPHIE themself. Even the more developed tracks like 'Reason Why' and 'Exhilarate' come off as tacky, settling for basic Pop refrains and shallow textures. Hannah Diamond and Cecile Believe are able to conjure more spirited performances on 'Always and Forever,' and 'My Forever,' but an overall vacancy of energy and deserted mix make the hour-long record a slog of a listen.
Other Notable Releases
Tommy Richman - COYOTE
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5/10 |
Genres: Contemporary R&B
Best Track: VANITY
Pyrrhon - Exhuast
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6.5/10 |
Genres: Dissonant Death Metal, Avant-Garde Metal
Best Track: Out of Gas
Floral Tattoo - The Circus Egotistica
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6/10 |
Genres: Indie Rock, Emo, Shoegaze, Neo-Psychedelia
Best Track: Yeller
Phuyu y la Fantasm - A| Tetralogía de bichos y setas
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6/10 |
Genres: Noise Rock, Post-Hardcore, Cueca
Best Track: balance de muerte e indiferencia
Origami Angel - Feeling Not Found
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7/10 |
Best Track: Feeling Not Found
Sadness - I Want to Make Something As Beautiful As You
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6.5/10 |
Genres: Shoegaze, Post-Rock
Best Track: Damzamkeit
Lucy Bedroque - Fête de la Vanille
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3.5/5 EP |
Genres: Art Pop, Digicore, Alternative R&B
Best Track: Mimosa
Coldplay - Moon Music
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5/10 |
Genres: Pop, Pop Rock
Best Track: Moon Music
prettifun - FunHouse
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6/10 |
Genres: Trap, Rage
Best Track: Quarters Pennies
The Smile - Cutouts
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6.5/10 |
Genres: Art Rock
Best Track: No Words
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