As 2015 comes to its close and we look ahead to 2016, it's time to do the cliched task of recollecting the albums released in 2015 that we enjoyed. These are not presented in any particular order, but these were some of my favorites. What were some of your favorite albums!?
Duran Duran - Paper Gods
Duran Duran - Paper Gods album cover
Duran Duran returned this year with Paper Gods, an album that proves they still have "it." The album is a rich combination of what Duran Duran was most known for in the new wave/new romantic period of the 80s mixed with a refreshing flourish of pop bravado common to today. Like many 80s bands, Duran Duran still falls victim to the trend of trying to rediscover themselves, failing on the first couple attempts, but then reclaiming that flame with the newest album. For Duran Duran, Paper Gods is the reclaiming album they and fans alike have been looking for. We'll have to see what comes next for the group, but hopefully this is just the beginning of a strong upward trend.
Chelsea Wolfe - Abyss
Chelsea Wolfe - Abyss album cover
We reviewed Chelsea Wolfe's newest album a while back and it has only continued to grow on our ears. Easily her heaviest album yet, Abyss is a concept album of sorts that revolves around the phenomenon of sleep paralysis. Dark, brooding, moody music set to guiding vocals characterizes much of the album. Not only is it the heaviest album by Wolfe to date, but it may well be the most solid. Given how great this album is and previous effort Pain is Beauty, the only place for Wolfe to go is up, regardless of whether the music continues to get heavier or is reigned back. Added bonus - the live show is really strong and Wolfe is such a delightful performer. You're missing out if you've yet to see her on the live stage.
She Past Away - Narin Yalnizlik
She Past Away - Narin Yalnizlik album cover
She Past Away returns with their second album, Narin Yalnizlik. The Turkish darkwave group (yes, Turkish, and darkwave, and lyrics in Turkish!) makes a strong showing on this album, experimenting more with sounds and textures than they did on their debut album. While on the whole I prefer the debut album, this one is not an album to snub your nose at. She Past Away keeps a firm hold on their 80s darkwave roots (similar in ways to Xymox/Clan Of Xymox), meshing broken Turkish lyrics to a lush musical backdrop. The group finally reaches the US for a couple quick stops in California early 2016, but this is hopefully just the beginning of the group's foray into the US.
Killing Joke - Pylon
Killing Joke - Pylon album cover
Another album reviewed earlier this year here, Killing Joke returned full force with Pylon. Easily their strongest album in years, Pylon meshes the post punk aesthetic Killing Joke helped pioneer in the late 70s/early 80s with heavy distortion and an industrial feel characteristic of the group's more recent efforts. Almost their highest charting album ever, Pylon may well be the best album of 2015, for me at least. The group tours the US in 2016, hitting Texas towards the end of January.
Peter Murphy - Remixes From Lion
Peter Murphy - Remixes From Lion album cover
It wouldn't be a year it I couldn't write something about Peter Murphy, now would it? The Godfather of Goth (I can see his eye twitching at me saying this, but I didn't pick the title!) released a follow-up album of unused material from the Lion sessions. Most of the remixes offer an interesting reinterpretation of tracks from the main album. Better yet, the album includes the previously vinyl-only track "Gabriel" in all its multi-layered glory and a very solid series of newly released "The Sound of Water" and the Youth remix of "Loctaine," the one remix I think I may actually like more than the original (though the original take of "Loctaine" is also very strong and a favorite of mine). 2015 was a strong year for Murphy, even if quiet, in a sense. In addition to the Remixes album, two live albums were also released (the full audio from the Mr. Moonlight Tour as one and finally an official recording of the House of Blues show from April 2000 via Cleopatra). However, Murphy only played a handful of dates in June in California. By all accounts, 2016 may be a very loud year for Murphy, starting with a major role in the upcoming psychological thriller BlackGloveKiller.
Killing Joke embody so much of what made late 70s/early 80s post punk amazing - brooding lyrics half sung, half screamed by a wide-eyed Jaz Coleman over a backdrop of edgy guitars and driving bass. The last couple of Killing Joke releases, however, seemed to have lost much of that strength that the band has been known for. This year, the group returned with Pylon. Long story made short - this may actually be one of their best albums ever.
2015's Pylon album cover
The groups previous efforts with the reunited original lineup (consisting of Jaz Coleman, Martin "Youth" Glover, Paul Ferguson, and Kevin "Geordie" Walker), 2010's Absolute Dissent and 2012's MMXII, were strong ventures in their own rights, but don't stand up as well compared to the prior efforts of the group. For as strong a band as they were, it seemed more and more that Killing Joke would be on a path of constantly trying to recreate the flame they once had in the 80s, coming close each time, but not quite fully igniting. With Pylon, the fire is finally burning strong and bright.
The album opens with perhaps my personal favorite, "Autonomous Zone." A catchy drum and bass driven number (love that small flourish of a bass solo lick Youth cranks out when everything else drops out), Coleman paints a picture of what humanity should strive for - end to war, but an end to mindless control, as well.
Pylon then winds through songs like distortion-laden "Dawn of the Hive," which carries the auditory equivalent of a beehive and playing follow the leader blindly, to the absolutely relevant, brooding "New Cold War," which outlines some of the recent tensions between the West and the East.
"Euphoria" loses much of the industrial distortion of the prior tracks, instead donning more of a new wave feel and lacking the yelling Coleman was known for. Instead of sticking out awkwardly, however, the song provides a nice transitional point in the album, signaling a change of pace from the driving beats of the first few songs to the slower riff-heavy songs like "New Jerusalem" and "War on Freedom."
The album wraps up with lead single "I Am the Virus," a driving more punk-styled number set to Coleman's chant-worthy yells, helping wrap the album in much the same way as it began. "Into the Unknown" officially rounds off the album, guitar-driven, yet smooth, clean, and certainly catchy, leaving the listener anticipating more, but being left on that cliff hanger ending with nothing further to fall on.
Killing Joke's original lineup. Left to right: Martin "Youth" Glover, Jaz Coleman, Paul Ferguson, Kevin "Geordie" Walker
Of this year's offerings, Pylon may well be at the top of my list. It's every bit as much a classic nod to the old Killing Joke mixed with a healthy dose of new ideas, emerging as one of their strongest albums to date. Killing Joke begin their tour of North America in January. The group will play here in Dallas at the Granada Theatre on January 21, marking the first time in 22 years that the band has visited North Texas. This is not a show to miss. Tickets are on sale now through the Granada Theatre's ticketing site.
Today's Music Review will be of Peter Murphy's tenth album (ninth studio), 2014's Lion.
Cover art for Lion
If there is one thing to expect about the "Godfather of Goth," it is to expect the unexpected. Over more recent years, Peter Murphy's career has gone places few would expect - starting perhaps with a turn of the century reinvention that spurred 2002's unique masterpiece, Dust, followed by 2004's return to pop rock form that Murphy had previously built his career on, Unshattered, and ending most recently with 2011's rock triumph full of attitude and energy, Ninth.
Lion, produced by Youth (Killing Joke), is everything you would expect from Murphy at this point and still so much more than you could have guessed. With most of the tracks originally written and recorded on the spot in the studio and in the span of only a handful of days, the album flourishes with an immediacy that makes Ninth feel tame in comparison. Richly sprinkled along the slew of single-worthy anthemic songs are compassionate, emotional ballads that still show off Murphy's rich vocal prowess and beautiful lyrics.
The album opens with the first single, "Hang Up," a synth-heavy song laced with screaming vocals that have been atypical of Murphy's career so far. Afterwards, the album winds into the electro-dance song "I Am My Own Name," which may be Murphy's response to much of the criticism he received in 2013 for endeavoring to do a full Bauhaus tour around the world without the other three original members of the band.
Amid the instantly dance-able songs come slower, passionate pieces that are a bit more reminiscent of Murphy's earlier works, including "Compression," "The Rose," and the soaring "Loctaine." Perhaps a nod back to Murphy's roots in the 80s music scene, songs like "Holy Clown" and "Low Tar Stars" carry the feeling of an 80s new wave song created for the dispossessed (the latter in particular sounding like the dark version of Michael Sembello's 1983 hit song "Maniac").
Lion rounds out with other notable songs "I'm On Your Side" and "The Ghost of Shokan Lake." "Eliza" is a slight change of pace for Murphy, not focusing so much on forms of love, introspection, and religious ideologies, but instead on the idea of leaving self-blame behind, being yourself, and celebrating life.
Murphy's tenth album ends with the title track "Lion," which has a lofty, atmospheric background music to fill in around Murphy's lush, deep vocals, creating a song that alludes to some of the many qualities of an actual lion - powerful, majestic, and encompassing. While not a fast, hard hitting song to round out the album in a fashion of how it started, "Lion" leaves the listener with a feeling of completing a musical journey guided by Murphy through introspection, religion, history, and even a glimpse into the future.
Lion is the rock-dominated album many would expect of him following Ninth. Given his desire on the previous album to prove a point of existence and importance, Ninth was in some regards the album Bauhaus never made, serving to assert Murphy's place as a solo musician and a rock star. Lion is the vastly more experimental follow-up to Ninth now that the audience and self-imposed (to some extent, at least) expectations of the former Bauhaus-frontman are squashed. What comes next only Murphy knows, but Lion may well be one of the best works he has done to date, combining much of what he was originally loved for during the Bauhaus years, the complex lyric writing that has persisted throughout his solo career, and an ingenious musical progression that is neither forced nor completely alien to long time fans. This album will certainly be on repeat for a long time to come.
Peter Murphy will be joined by current band members Emilio "Zef Noise" China (bass guitar, violin), Andee Blacksugar (guitar), and Nick Lucero (drums) for a tour of North America to support Lion that begins June 9, 2014 in New York. Peter Murphy visits Austin at The Belmont on July 29th with local favorites My Jerusalem providing opening support once again (they opened for him on last year's Mr. Moonlight Tour).
It's been ages folks, but we're back with more music and show reviews for your reading pleasure. A little late to the bandwagon, surely, but as a welcome back to everyone, today's Music Review will be on Peter Murphy's second single off of Lion, "I Am My Own Name."
Peter Murphy, 2014.
Murphy approaches Lion from an interesting standpoint - it will be his tenth album (ninth studio), the follow-up to his successful rock monster Ninth (his prior work has categorically fit under pop rock where Ninth became his first solo album to firmly grasp the rock field and take it by force), and an album born mostly during a time where the singer revisited the vast catalog of his original band, British post-punk act Bauhaus.
"I Am My Own Name" is a healthy dose of everything you expected given the above (a very gutsy, complicated mesh of emotion and freedom), and yet Murphy surprises the listener by throwing in something utterly new and foreign - synthesizers in a Numan meets Reznor-esque produced dance track for the dispossessed.
The song opens with moody electric violin work from current bass guitarist and violinist, Emilio "Zef Noise" China. In a style that classically eludes to the Middle East (which Murphy, who has called Turkey home for the last roughly 20 years, has done on nearly every album, both subtly and dramatically), this soft introduction begs the question of "What is he doing? What does Murphy got up his sleeve?"
The vocals then kick in, smooth at first, but then with an edge, a harsh scream as Murphy declares that he is "[his] own name." The song then gains in tempo, guitars and drums starting as Murphy tells his story of who he is and is not, merely to say that he is his own name, for what that may or may not mean.
"I Am My Own Name" lyrically appears to focus on some of the recent naysayers who have criticized Muphy both professionally and personally. Some such lyrics include at the beginning "No thin Pixie/white and drawn/no shaded shadow...no jaded shock star..." (Apologies for any errors in the lyrics as they've not been published and this is a best guess) The first part about not being a pixie could be a reference back to the Bauhaus song "Crowds" which has the line "A slim Pixie, thin and forlorn," suggesting that he may not be so innocent and gullible, in a sense, as he was when younger and also not depressed as many have been led to think (also in line with the upbeat tone of the music). "No shaded shadow" to perhaps mean he is no longer going to "hide in the shadows" and not do certain things because it is frowned upon, and not a jaded shock star as there is more value in his work than just going for the easy shock that many stars today try for.
Whether these interpretations hold any merit is, of course, unclear. However, Murphy takes us down an interesting journey with this song, proving once more that he can do something incredibly different, yet still make it his own without alienating the listener. One thing is for certain with this song - if it is performed live and no one is moved by it, either physically or emotionally, nothing will move them.
Lion, produced by Killing Joke's Youth, roars to life June 3rd. Murphy kicks off his North American tour to support Lion June 9th in New York and will visit Austin July 29th at The Belmont (regular and VIP tickets on sale now). Finally, Murphy is in the middle of a Pledge Music campaign to fund the release of a live DVD from the Mr. Moonlight Tour. Check it out here and support today!
