im gonna do a review of nothing lasts but nothing is lost - i use to write reviews for an ezine and i also produce so i am gonna go into a bit of depth - hope you dont mind

ok - so - easily my favourite album of last year. I listen to everything from rock, to house to drum and bass - everything except pop and country pretty much - and there is no album that is produced to such a high standard with such a range of style and craftmanship as this.

It quite simply is the ultimate musical journey. From start to finish this album seemlessly creates an atmosphere unlike anything i have ever experienced. Alot of people say that tales of the inexpresible is slightly better, easier to ‘chill’ to and slightly more quirky. And i would sort of agree. The epicness of some of the tracks in TOFE is mindblowing - but then, when you takeinto consideration that the whole of the newest album is one long epic track it puts that completely into perspective.

The album starts with plenty of energy. It builds up slowly as you would expect but once it gets going, the south american style guitar and beats create a fantastic rythem which cover pretty much the first 3 tracks. Periscopes of conciousness then slows it down a little, hard drums and an awesome vocal leads you into shmaltz herring which picks up the pace again and rolls on with typical shpong atmospherics and great little sounds bipping and blopping all over the place.

The next 3 tracks then mould together to make my favourite section of the album. It gets quite dark and intese. The bass line is emchanting and rolls superbly with the beats. This is where mr posford really flexes his filter control. The beats suddenly start warping all over the place and make mind boggling sounds. To me it sounds like a mixture of a comb filter and phaser - and ive never heard beats sound like that before!!! ON top of that, there is the crazy synth line that comes in and out of the tracks ( ithink it may even be the flute with lots of distortion and fx but im not sure) and as per usual the attention to atmospheric detail is astonoshing.

Next up comes when shall i be free - great guitar - beautiful vocal just an all round great track

im not gonna go through each track though there are just a few more points i want to make

1) the use of guitars throughout the album is immence, from the samba style in the begining, to the fantastic distorted guitar towards the end i am truely impressed by the vast range of styles they manage to emcompass.

2) The volcal filtering on the album is truely groundbreaking and has blown my mind

right, am gonna stop there as i could go on forever and disect to my hearts content, but i shouldnt - you will probably think i am mental.

All that remains to be said is that this album is a conceptual and musical masterpiece. From a producers point of view it couldnt be more mind blowing - there is no one in the digital music world who can touch mr posford!

Peace

J-level

Re: something lasts

[quote author=“j-level”]

I listen to everything from rock ... except pop and country pretty much ...

J-level

What? No Johnny Cash?? Not really into the country thing but there’s always an exception to the rules eh? 8)

ps interesting review

hahaha

for sure, the man in black is awesome, a true inspiration, i should have been a bit more specific, modern country like leanne rimes and billy joel - not really my cup of tea - dont really put jonny into that catagory - but you are right i shouldnt generalise -  except about pop music - and by that i mean all music that is thought up in a board room by executives who are just trying to make a buck or two - that even goes for shit like 50cent and all these pansy ass rock bands with their tailor made look and shameful lyrics - you want a rock band, listen to the mars volta - now thats music!!!!!

very good review)) I study to be a ceramics artist… every morning in our workshop we listen to this album during one or two months…. everybody likes it sooooo much! everytime you find something new there… I can listen it million times! i think that i will never tired from it)

i know exactly what you mean. there is so much depths and its so intricate that it would be inmpossible to single out everything all at once

yup
great album (but what did you expect)
anything simon touches turns to gold

shpongle-rific

Yeah, Simon is a modern day Mozart, but Shpongle would be nothing without the magic of Raja’s flute and Indian influence.  Been great since Quintessence.

Yeah yeah… Simon is great, but he’s no 50 cent.

Re: shpongle-rific

[quote author=“psyclone”]Yeah, Simon is a modern day Mozart, but Shpongle would be nothing without the magic of Raja’s flute and Indian influence.  Been great since Quintessence.

I thought Raja was Australian? He was born there anyway

Re: something lasts

[quote author=“j-level”]I listen to everything from rock, to house to drum and bass - everything except pop and country pretty much…

No country?!!

You should check out Gillian Welch and Steve Earle, contemporary country that will leave your hairs standing on end. It’s quite folky and very beautiful.

nor britney spears

Top notch album :!: makes you ponder on things you wouldn’t consider worth pondering :D

Except from that part about you being a producer and writing interviews for ezines, I could have written that review myself. I fully agree with every word.

Shpongle is the most rythmically and harmonically sophisticated musical artistry on earth. <3

/ray

s’alright but ease off on the superlatives…

I think Simon_P makes the trippiest noises in the world but he’s not a dancer.

the latin licks / familiar guitars / song structure sound much more like attempts to boost sales than original creative expression.

stacks of drum / drum machine percussive noises which is pretty inexusable given the range of sounds that could have been used.

rajaram’s flute sounds fairly self impressed and doesn’t move me very deeply to be honest.  compared to say Hariprasad Chaurisa or Yusef Lateef

deffo sense that music can do so much more…

suggestions for improvement:
involve a dancer(s) directly in construction of sounds - psy trance is 50bpm too fast (think heartbeat and marathon runner) - so more slow motion styles & linked up to one of those motion capture thingees & a midi interface so dance drives creation of sounds/groove - with a feedback loop involving Si_P & co. to soundtrack the dancer(s)

drop use of cliches.  Has this noise / sequence been used before?  What’s the alternatives?

think bigger!  think less!  bits of it sound like face of producers pushed up against the screen and somehow sense of fun is lost a little.  Scope to be more influenced by much broader range of music & sound in general without tokenism.

LOL

great album.