Techno Takeover 30

Bulwark Bazooka - Wumpscut 

Casual reminder this was written earlier in the month and I just had horrible writers block and didn't finish it until now...

I really wanted to review this a while ago but school kicked me in the butt and I was way too stressed to form any sort of opinion on this album other than my original fangirling response. It's been almost three weeks since Bulwark Bazooka was released and my general opinion has not changed much. I really enjoy this ten song album and the stuff I don't like isn't that bad.

"Bulwark Bazooka," is not for the faint of heart, which is why I've come up with alternative meanings for most of the songs on here. I have the lyric booklet, fought iTunes tooth and nail for it and all it did was make me question life. "Rubber Corpse," has two of the most horrifying choruses out of any song I have ever heard in my life. Yet if you listen to the the catchy beat, don't have the lyric booklet, and can't understand some of the words because (insert reason here) that fact wouldn't be known. Curious as to what the lyrics are well here are the verses:

"I got a deal for you, I got a clue. I got a dead one oh yes it's true.

I got a corpse down there with a bad smell.

I reserved human flesh oh I can tell."

"Downstairs at Eric's I put it in wax, upstairs at mommy's I erase the tracks.

Of my latest fancy of my latest joke.

To late to revive it to late for evoke." 
 

That is set to a catchy beat and chorus, but the chorus is addicting as all hell and it is why I decided "Rubber Corpse" is about taxidermy... clearly forgetting about "upstairs at mommy's I erase the tracks," and the fact that someone might have murdered someone as a joke and the person thinks it is funny.

In all seriousness, "Rubber Corpse" is on my list of Wumpscut songs new listeners should listen to. Lyrical content aside, it's not too crazy musically and it's catchy. If you're new to Wumpscut, it is definitely a song to check out. Also if you're new to Wumpscut, how the heck did you find this album first and how are you not scared out of your mind?

If the first song didn't scare you, then "Furunkel Lolita," will probably make you feel a little weird... Because most people know what the term Lolita means. But I don't know how Furunkel fits into the meaning of it. It means boil. Those two words can not mean the same thing thrown together in this song's context. It can not be a person who looks like an underage child, or is underage with boils being found sexually attractive. That's horrifying, the giggling children in the beginning don't help either. This is also my favorite song from "Bulwark". It grabbed my attention and kept hold of it with just a short piece of the last chorus all those weeks ago. It was this song that made me determined to review it.

Tress means a lock of a woman's hair.

"Hell is what awaits me if (when) I touch (all) your tress." Not hell is what awaits me if I touch your dress, hell is what happens if and when this persons touches someone's hair. Their hair is that tempting, not the dress, the piece of clothing that would be most tempting to touch or maybe their cheek, the tress. This isn't meant to fit a rhyme either.

"I can not resist your young charm, come to me to find my true warmth.

Heaven is what your young body flesh promises, Hell is what awaits me if I touch all your tress" or "Hell is what awaits me when I touch your tress."

The hair has been touched okay, and this is weird. I am not okay with the weird. But this will never stop being an awesome song. Nothing about these lyrics are okay. But it has to sound amazing, it has to have the amazing electronic horns happening, and the crazy nature of the chorus with a small throwback to "In The Night." "Furunkel Lolita" is creepy, intense, and it is my favorite song. The struggle is real.

Skipping Cross of Iron, Atrocity Dancer, and Heresy, because "Supergurl" "Vienna," and "Flesh Trench" need to be discussed. "Supergurl," is growing on me. This song (and "Rubber Corpse) features vocals by Aleta Welling (she's credited on a bunch of Wumpscut songs, one of them being "Death Panacea" from Woman and Satan First.) I had mixed feelings about this. I thought it was kind of annoying as well as "Flesh Trench" and "Vienna," but with time I changed my mind and now I like it. The lyrics aren't up on websites yet which is strange, and I am terrible with hearing lyrics and understanding them without the words in front of me. If I understand anything it's in pieces and I can't make sense of it, sometimes not all the time. This song was one of those cases, and the lyrics are sort of sad at first and then it gets dark, really dark. This is song almost reaches Furunkel Lolita levels of not okay, but it seems to be the most obvious song out of all the songs with actual lyrics. There is a woman, out of someone's league, and I'm guessing she's an independent woman who don't need no man, and she ends up killed. Or... it's one of the songs that is 'if I can't have you (no matter what the reason is' no one can have you,' and I am not okay with this fictional premeditated murder being thrown in my face.

"Soon it is too much how you thrill me,

With a touch too much, you will kill me,

Soon a glancing touch, it will thrill you

With a lethal touch I will kill you."

With that out of the way, "Flesh Trench," is confusing as all hell and I decided it is about discovering a kink you didn't know you had before with a partner that enjoys said kink as well and they both think they are nothing and they want to share the nothing.

"You are nothing, I am nothing, you are nothing, let's share."

You can't share nothing, nothing is just... well nothing. It isn't a physical thing. You'll just be left with more nothing and how does this relate to having a strange kink?

"Come be a flesh trench only a sex mensh,

Come and submit to me."

That's the first chorus of the song. A mench is a person. Urban dictionary says so. The word is spelled wrong in the digital booklet?

Anyways, I thought this was annoying at first as mentioned before. I can't put my finger on what changed it for me, maybe the way it sounds like he's growling the verses, or singing into a fan that is silent. Also as strange as the chorus is, I love it, the music is perfect, and his accent kind of comes through in certain spots and it's kind of attractive...

"Vienna" is a song made entirely of samples from things I can't find because I don't speak whatever language it is in. It might be German, it isn't mentioned in the digital booklet where any of the samples come from. And to be honest this was a very boring song until it got stuck in my head. That is the only reason I can tolerate "Vienna," and the one sound effect that happens at 1:48 is pretty cool.

Pagan Crusade is the one song I was COMPLETELY wrong about originally. There are lyrics, and Rudy is singing said lyrics. It is not instrumental like it seemed to be. I feel silly for thinking it was completely instrumental. Other than that, the song is just kind of there. It doesn't really stand out it never grabbed my attention like "Furunkel Lolita," or "Rubber Corpse," did. I don't listen to it as much as those two songs either.

And then there are the songs I don't particularly like or feel like I want to like but can't seem to care for. "RTL Hariti" the song about is an Iranic ogress and Bactrian (Peshawari) mythological figure who eats your children or then feeds them to her own children, then one of her kids goes missing and she converts to Buddism when a monk shows her the error of her ways. And she vows to protect them as a result. There are not enough lyrics for this song to be nearly seven minutes long and have the same music looping once the lyrics end. Something has to change in order to keep me interested but nothing changes drastically and I quickly lose interest in "RTL Hariti."

Don't ask me what the RTL means, I'm still waiting for some sort of answer to all my annoying questions I ask Wumpscut in his facebook fan page.

"Atrocity Dancer" and "Heresy" are the other two songs I don't care for, but they are far from terrible. All I can say about Atrocity dancer is that it is the only song I found the source of one of the quotes. It is from the movie AI: Artificial Intelligence. Also why is the C-bomb dropped for the sake of a rhyme? For real though that word always makes me uncomfortable... but that's just me being weird. I feel bad for "Atrocity Dancer" because I really love Rudy's vocals on the verses, but I hate music and everything going on in the chorus.

Heresy has a great start but it gets boring halfway through. There are no set lyrics and Google has no idea what the quotes are from so I'm back to where I started. The sad part is the audio clips are in clear English for the most part. "Ejected from the communion of (something like a holy mother charged) as a disciple of Satan." Google has no idea what I'm talking about and I don't understand why, it's not hard to hear at all except for a few words. Anyways, The song feels too long and boring for how many times it loops without something different. The song goes until 2:47 before "What's the difference?" is repeated a few times and then it just kind of ends awkwardly after the quote from the beginning of the song shows up again.

If anyone is curious I just wasted four pages getting this silly review out. So here's a brief summary of what I actually thought of the album. Wumpscut's always been creepy but the creep meter was cranked up on this album and I like it. If you're already a Wumpscut fan you're well aware what is in store for you. If you're not, this is not an album to listen to as your first exposure because it probably will scare you away before you realize how awesome some of his previous stuff was, unless you like creepy, then this album is for you.

2013: Year End Review : Part 1

2013: Year End Review

 Part 1: Disappointments

I have started at least ten different reviews over the past month and I have finished none of them. I apologize for that. I'll finish them at some date I don't know when. I also have no idea what I'm going to review for my year end review. And then I remembered Pandora happened, well it's been around for a while to be fair, but it came into my life earlier this year...

Yes, Pandora radio might not be the greatest internet radio service and it's really only available in the USA from what it seems... which is highly irritating, but it works and I've discovered new music, rediscovered old music, and dove deeper into genres I already liked to find more awesome music. For instance folk music is amazing, I started with Corvus Corax and Hagalaz Runedance radio stations, then Blackmore's Night station and somewhere in the mix Medieval Babes popped up but I just added that group to another station and eventually Kate Rusby showed up. It took a few months but now I have a Kate Rusby station.

On the other end of musical things, I discovered a band called And One that only has one good song. I've heard most of Body Pop and I have no desire to listen to anything else other than Military Fashion Show. However, Beborn Beton a band I didn't particularly care for the first few songs I heard from them, have grown on me since June.

Some Major Disappointments...

Yup starting off the year end review with the negative. Last year if I was told VNV Nation and Wumpscut would make albums that I didn't like and were a step backwards in their musical progression, I'd have laughed at you. I'm glad nobody mentioned this to me because I'd have felt like an idiot for laughing.

VNV Nation and Wumpscut put out new albums, VNV nation is also touring Europe and show no signs of being anywhere near the Americas anytime soon destroying my hopes of attending their Transnational Tour. And riding that disappointment wave is Wumpscut's new album. I don't know if I've disliked something as much as this album. Woman and Satan First was very meh at best. Madman Szpital never stood a chance. I hated writing that. I really did, because Rudy has some really enjoyable songs. And it's not because his sound is completely different from his past albums it's because they're boring and annoying with nothing to redeem either qualities.

For example, "Loyal to my Hate" from the 2011 album Siamese. That song is way too long for one repetitive chorus mixed with some musical interludes. The reason I like it is because the music is extremely catchy and counteracts the repetitive chorus. Madman Szpital is just boring. It's almost as disappointing as Evoke but without a song like "Churist Churist" to save it. The only slightly redeeming quality is "Tod Essen Leben auf" I can tolerate listening to it again for the sake of reviewing than the rest of the album. However, there's a little voice I hate that happens randomly and echos a few words and it doesn't need to be there.

Can I just ask what in the world "Vegan Witch" is about? Because I have no idea if there's a deeper meaning than someone tried to be a vegan and went about it horribly wrong and decided to only eat grass. Of course she died if that's what she thought being a Vegan was all about!

In all seriousness Madman Szpatial does not work because it's a whole bunch of things thrown together. It is the audio equivalent of someone taking different puzzles of the same size and forcing different pieces together of the same color but from different puzzles. Like half of the edge pieces from one puzzle let's say a tree, and half from an outer space puzzle and having them somehow fit together. Then the inside pieces are from a fish puzzle and the other of an ocean, and one from a puzzle of a sky. It doesn't work at all and I hope his next album takes a better direction than this one did.

Now for VNV Nation. I was so happy with Automatic I still listen to just about every song. I still don't like "Radio." Figuring that Automatic was such a success I had high hopes for Transnational. I was wrong for having high hopes because it met them just barely halfway. Should I be bothered by an okay album? Yes if the previous one and even the one before that were pretty much amazing albums. Transnational was like hey I'm here, and I tried. It doesn't fail at life like Wumpscut's Madman Szpatial, it's all one happy puzzle with all the pieces in place from that one puzzle, but it is a boring picture. It was fun putting together but the pay off wasn't that great. In other words, it's okay to listen to but in the end they could have done better.

In January of this year, Three Days Grace suffered a low blow with their lead singer abandoning ship during their tour. One reason offered was a non-threatening health issue, other less favorable rumors were variations on he just didn't want to be in the band anymore. Whether it was a health issue or not, he has since reformed another band and has no plans at the current moment to rejoin Three Days Grace. I wasn't a huge fan to begin with and call me butthurt but I lost a little respect for him after that. No matter what his reasons were he abandoned his band during a tour and then formed a new one with very little if no warning to his departure. Last minute issues happen I get that and maybe he had a problem he had to deal with I don't know the guy so I can't ask him. And he doesn't owe me anything, but I can't help but think of the fans who were so excited to see Adam and the rest of the band on their Transit of Venus tour maybe even for their first time only to be told, Adam resigned and the My Darkest Days singer is filling in his place. The departure of Adam hasn't gotten the band down, supposedly they're releasing another album, good on them for pushing through this unfortunate event.

And now for the biggest musical disappointment of 2012/2013. I've mentioned before that I am a huge Breaking Benjamin fan. Well my musical world almost exploded and died when I found out they were going through legal issues and Ben was suing band members for putting songs on their greatest hits album without asking him. They shut down their fanclub site, their forums went down, and all was silent from them. All because of a stupid cover of "Blow Me Away" and maybe the few previously unreleased tracks that are on Shallow Bay. I loved "Better Days" and "Lie to Me," so if Ben was worried about those songs or convinced that they weren't good enough, I reassure him they are perfect. And I can put my love of a band aside to judge the quality of their music. Case in point, those massive paragraphs about Wumpscut's Madman Szpital.

After long months of silence and nothingness from Breaking Benjamin's website. People started saying oh they broke up. Even when there's a quote of Ben Burnley saying when this s all said and done he's going to return to making music. It didn't change some people's opinions, and months of hoping this stupid law suit would end soon and Ben would return and be awesome again it happened. 

 

I was convinced that the silence meant bad news for the band and for Ben. I prepared myself for the worst even though part of me knew Ben wouldn't just quit music forever. Not like this anyways. And then out of the blue one day the wait was over. The Breaking Benjamin twitter account posted something, good news...

Techno Takeover 2: Save Your Heart (Revised)

“Save Your Heart”

Remady

 (Remady is the guy in the hat

 and the guy in the white shirt Manu- L)

((I originally reviewed this as the second song of techno takeover, it’s still the second review of Techno takeover but I felt the need to improve it because I’ve been doing this for a few months now))

I don’t have a reason for editing this other than I hated the original so here’s the new one. Hopefully I like this one slightly better.

From the time I originally reviewed this until 2013; Remady was given a Wikipedia page and has some pictures on Google as well. I can now efficiently tell the world about this guy.

Remady (named Marc Würgler) is a Swiss music producer from Basel. In the beginning of his career he worked with DJ Player and went by the name Player & Remady. Remady found fame when the single “No Superstar with Emmanuel Gut (Manu – L) spent 48 weeks in the international single chart and sold 300,000 copies. He’s worked with Lumidee; for anyone who doesn’t remember her she was kind of famous a few years back for some songs she did that I forgot the name of. I suggest Goggling her name if you’re interested in her.

Emmanuel is the vocalist and guitarist for the band Myron and they aren’t on Wikipedia. From what I’ve heard, he’s a pretty decent singer.

That’s about all I could find from Wikipedia and Remady’s website, so I guess it’s time to move on to the song and music video. This is a song that actually got a music video; I know those are rare in Techno Takeover.

(Opening verse)

“You gotta save your heart

You gotta save your heart
You gotta save your heart for me”

It’s really important that you save your heart that the singer has to repeat it twice before getting out the full sentence.

Verse One:
“Woke up in the morning and my heads all messed
I must have made it through the loneliness
But I can’t find your address where are you now
Everywhere I go all I see is your face
There’s something missing that I can’t replace
I turn around but it's not you, will we ever meet again?”

Wait a minute?! “All messed” I thought it was “… and my head’s a mess...” I like my lyric better. Oh and the music video is basically this guy becoming superhuman while trying to return this woman’s key that she dropped while getting into a taxi. There are two security guards (Manu-L and Remady) helping him track her down while watching the whole thing from monitors located somewhere... Another thing he's not very clear when he said I can't find your address, it seriously sounds like “I can't find another your address…”

Chorus:

“You gotta save your heart (oh ooh oh)

You gotta save your heart

You gotta save your heart
You gotta save your heart for me”

Yes it’s a weak chorus, but it works for the song. I think a staple in some electronic based songs, is that the music does the work and the lyrics are there for the sake of having it stuck in people’s heads.

And again with repeating I understand your emotions are strong but you only need to tell me once.

Verse two:

“No matter what I do I can’t let go
I got to find a way to let you know
But all I do is spin around and around where are you now
You got me going crazy can’t you see
That I was made for you and you for me
If not today I know tomorrow I will be with you again”

In the video the guy does some epic jumps and just does this spinning jump right over the heads of a couple making out in the middle of the sidewalk. He then proceeds to jump off of a roof then onto some lower levels and then onto a sign and twists onto the ground... this guy is bad ass!

I really want to know why the couple felt the need to hog the sidewalk, seriously just stand off to the side, sit down, or just generally move out of the way so other people can walk, it’s really irritating to other people trying to walk somewhere and then people are just hogging the walkway like they own the damn place.

The bridge:

“Don’t cha don't cha don't cha forget about

Don’t cha don't cha don't cha forget about
Don’t cha don't cha don't cha forget about me”

This man doesn't want the girl to forget about him even though no dialogue was shared between the two they just looked at each other smiled and she got in the car and left. I don’t think she listened if he has to constantly repeat himself…

Also he gets the keys back and a kiss on the cheek from the girl he pulled out Spiderman stunts for to give back her keys...

I’m pretty sure this is how filming the video went:

-Director to stunt man-

“Okay you're going to do this and jump down there then flip over that wall and land on your feet.”

-Stuntman to director-

“Sure no problem but how are we supposed to explain this to the bystanders?”

-Director to stuntman-

“We don’t need to explain it, they can just watch in awe.”

This song is rather odd with its message of: don't forget about me since we met for a brief period of time and that we might not be able to be together now so save your heart for when we can be together.

Saving your heart rarely works and is just time to build up this fantasy relationship only to be heartbroken in the end. That’s how life works most of the time. It might be nice for a day but that’s about it.

This kind of reminds me of another song with short lyrics but is straight to the point...and quite brunt about it...

((Spoiler, this was part of a thing leading up to my review of stereo love by Edward Maya and Vika Jigulina. I was going through a time in my life where that song was my life. Literally it was describing exactly what happening at that time. I might post those reviews just to give me more time to review other things.))

So that’s the end of this revised review, I think it turned out slightly better the second time.

~Pugsly

My Obsession 3: "Heretic" - Soil And Eclipse *Repost*

**Originally from:

 My Obsessions and Guilty Pleasures blog 

that next to no one knows about because I never update it... Enjoy. ** 

“Heretic” -

Soil and Eclipse Review

( http://soilandeclipse.bandcamp.com/track/heretic
they put the song on their website)

Soil And Eclipse: Jay Tye and G.W. Childs IV

Hello wonderful people, I just heard a song called Heretic on AOL’s Gothic Radio. It’s from Archetype, and I’ve listened to the album all the way through a few times but for some reason this song didn’t leave an impression on me until now. I don’t know how that’s possible either because holy crap is it dark compared to well… “Whispering Trees” don’t act like you didn’t see that coming. Random fun fact time, although Jay does about 85% of the vocals on the songs, this one features G.W. on the verses and Jay on the choruses and embellishments. I don’t know what embellishments are exactly, but I’ll assume they are the other vocal parts of the song.

It wastes no time in letting you know something’s about to go down, that opening, while subtle, is the audio equivalent of a creepy guy in a dark alley, trench coat and all trying to sell something to some naïve idiot out at the wrong time of night on the wrong side of town.

At first glance, I literally had no idea what was going on with the first verse:

“Father says you say
To start again
There's no redemption here
It never ends”

Someone’s asking their father for forgiveness and the response is that there’s no redemption or forgiveness for whatever this person has done. That’s harsh they really messed up most likely why they’re being called a heretic.  

 If that’s not doom and gloomy enough here’s the second verse:

“There's no love first left
That can save the world
You destroyed long ago
I feel no pain as my head explodes

I won’t let it go”

Revenge song time, that verse just screams revenge on the black sheep of something… that’s currently a mystery to me. The chorus is cool though.

Chorus:

“Heretic
I feel your heart stop
I will be your angel of death
That can guide you to Hell

Heretic
I won't back down
I won't forget
The promise you made
Heretic,

Heretic”

That first part of the chorus is nothing but an angry held back whisper and it’s eerie as hell. I thought Rudy Ratzinger’s had a tendency to be creepy, the second Heretic is somewhat yelled and it gave me the creeps. This is an angry song and you can hear it all in the forcefulness of the “Heretic.” Good job Jay you’ve convinced me you’re the silent rage type of person and I know to avoid pissing you off. Just kidding but the anger just oozing out of the chorus is insane. 

Right before the third verse starts there’s an amazing little vocalization bit that completely kills the mood but sounds amazing. It doesn’t take me out of the song at all but it’s not angry or forceful like the previous parts of the song. Moving on to verse three:

“There’s no second place
Rest assured
Leave without a trace
Nothings pure”

I don’t have any comments for this verse so onto the next one, verse four:

“There's no shooting star
You can wish on now
That your life's astray
I feel a sense of redemption
And I won't let it go”

I’m not sure who feels the sense of redemption, the heretic or the person punishing the heretic. I would assume the heretic is feeling the redemption and doesn’t want to let it go but then the song just switches views randomly for no real reason. That end of the verse threw everything out the window… not the anger though, the anger is still there but all sense of ‘narration’ is gone. Well there is one more chorus but that’s the same as the previous ones so there’s no need to talk about it again.

Heretic is going as my second favorite song on the album, I don’t know why I didn’t love this before, but I sure do now. 

-Before I officially end the  review, I'm going to explain why Soil and Eclipse does not belong on my Techno Takeover blog. They're not electronic heavy in their songs from Archetype that I end up reviewing. They have elements of it in places and they have a bunch of remixed version of their songs (on that album) that are electronic in nature, but until I review one of those electronic heavy songs, the reviews focusing on the band will be here in the My Obsessions/Guilty pleasures page... until I find a new home for their reviews.-

Seriously if you're not listen to Soil and Eclipse yet go do it you are missing out on epicness by not listening to them. I'm serious, go listen to them now.

From Pugsly