My shelf isn't full yet. But I'm working on it. So here are three more tapes!
TORI AMOS - Ocean To Ocean (2021)
I know, I know, I am part of the problem. Cassettes are becoming a new big hype and increasing in price just as vinyl... and I am buying tapes from big major label artists. Shame!
But then this series is such a good excuse to write more compact reviews of albums I otherwise would spend way too much time gushing about... And a new Tori Amos release more often than not is a potential candidate for that. Unless I avoid a review by coming years too late to the game of course, like I did with her 2017 masterpiece "Native Invader". The truth is that even in weaker shape Tori isn't capable of delivering anything bad. Maybe one or two fillers per album, but the rest will usually be at least very good.
On "Ocean To Ocean" however she doesn't have time for any notable variations in quality, since it's one of her shorter releases with "only" eleven songs. Fueled by isolation and frustration, from which she played herself free, this album grew into a creative sweeping blow, that both serious in its subjects and very playful in their execution feeds from decades of experience and inspiration.
Only recently I called Emma Ruth Rundle's extremely stripped down "Engine Of Hell" one of the best Tori Amos albums not actually recorded by Tori herself. I still think that's true, yet it seems somehow noteworthy to me that the real Tori steers into a completely different direction of production here. "Ocean To Ocean" goes fully big with extra percussion here, strings there, rock guitars, kate bushian flutes... but if you took it all away and left only Tori on vocals and piano, this album would still work, because the songwriting at its core is so flawless. And all the creative energy sparkling around it is only a welcome luxury which makes it even better. Especially the whole second half following the title track is an exhibition of greatness that doesn't need to hide from anything in her discography.
A pop masterpiece.
On "Ocean To Ocean" however she doesn't have time for any notable variations in quality, since it's one of her shorter releases with "only" eleven songs. Fueled by isolation and frustration, from which she played herself free, this album grew into a creative sweeping blow, that both serious in its subjects and very playful in their execution feeds from decades of experience and inspiration.
Only recently I called Emma Ruth Rundle's extremely stripped down "Engine Of Hell" one of the best Tori Amos albums not actually recorded by Tori herself. I still think that's true, yet it seems somehow noteworthy to me that the real Tori steers into a completely different direction of production here. "Ocean To Ocean" goes fully big with extra percussion here, strings there, rock guitars, kate bushian flutes... but if you took it all away and left only Tori on vocals and piano, this album would still work, because the songwriting at its core is so flawless. And all the creative energy sparkling around it is only a welcome luxury which makes it even better. Especially the whole second half following the title track is an exhibition of greatness that doesn't need to hide from anything in her discography.
A pop masterpiece.
BELL WITCH - Demo 2011 (2011/2019)
But now let's immediately restore my undergound music collector credibility! Ok, it's not the original first demo of the funeral doom gods Bell Witch, but a 2019 re-release by Tartarus Records. It's still quality cult material though.
The four crawling tracks (of which two would later reappear on the debut album "Longing") sound a bit dryer and not as incredibly huge as later recordings, but that's not even a bad thing, as it adds to the intimacy and clarity of it. Maybe some of the clear vocals aren't quite there yet, but honestly this cassette already displays such a perfectly formulated vision, that Bell Witch basically insulted themselves by calling it just a "demo". Mightily sad doom grandeur!
The four crawling tracks (of which two would later reappear on the debut album "Longing") sound a bit dryer and not as incredibly huge as later recordings, but that's not even a bad thing, as it adds to the intimacy and clarity of it. Maybe some of the clear vocals aren't quite there yet, but honestly this cassette already displays such a perfectly formulated vision, that Bell Witch basically insulted themselves by calling it just a "demo". Mightily sad doom grandeur!
ULVER - Scary Muzak (2021)
Appearantly Ulver were bored, so they did a thing. And then they gave the thing to synthwave guru Carpenter Brut to do the mix-thing.
Casually dropped on Halloween, this collection of mostly electronic horror scores interpreted by the Norwegian chameleons is pretty much all you want it to be. And with the powerful mix by Carpenter Brut even more. So good! So fucking good!
Casually dropped on Halloween, this collection of mostly electronic horror scores interpreted by the Norwegian chameleons is pretty much all you want it to be. And with the powerful mix by Carpenter Brut even more. So good! So fucking good!
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