From MY Ears To Your Eyes

Brandon here again. I’d like to thank the J-Man for his musical insights and for his inspiration to get my ass back on here to post something again.

It’s been a minute, so I’ve got a handful of new music to bring your way today. So much so that I might have to post again tomorrow or Wednesday to get to it all. Let’s begin, shall we?

Advent – ‘Remove The Earth’
Solid State/Tooth & Nail
Released Feb. 12, 2008

First up today we have yet another release from those cats at Solid State and Tooth & Nail. They’ve really been cranking out the cds early this year, kinda interesting strategy as they’re really the only things consistantly coming out..it sorta seems like they’re flooding the market and not giving people time to digest this new stuff. Ah well, I’m not paid to make their marketing decisions for them. Anyway. Advent is your typical metal/hxc band from North Carolina I believe, and from the what I’ve read, contains various members of the band Beloved. This band really bares no resemblance to that Beloved though, as there’s not really any worthwhile melody or clean vocals or goodness in general. I find this to be dreadfully boring and repetitive, I think that’s probably because the singer does nothing for me at all. Plus I totally love to hate on gang vocals. The only song I found interesting from this disc is a tune called ‘Three Seasons’, and that’s really only because a violin randomly shows up in a mellow part mid-song. Check this out if you like boring music.

Year End List Potential: 1/5

City And Colour – ‘Bring Me Your Love’
Vagrant Records
Released Feb 12, 2008

Hooray! Good music! Anyone that knows me knows that I am an absolute sucker for acoustic music; good acoustic music more specifically. City And Colour is just that. It’s the side/solo project of Alexisonfire singer Dallas Green, and this is his 2nd record (it’s the follow up to 2005’s ‘Sometimes’) and I think it’s just lovely. This album sounds a little more expansive, a little more confident, a little more comfortable, and the production values have been stepped up a bit. This is pretty easily comparable to say, Dustin Kensrue’s cd last year which was a breakout hit, and I can see this gaining some momentum as well once people start to take notice. There’s a lot more folk inspiration this time around (as last time there was much more of a ‘just a guy hangin out playin his guitar’ factor), and I can dig that. The songs are well written and I haven’t found myself getting tired of anything yet, soooo, cool. If you’re in the mood for some chill acoustic folk stuff, give this a try. I think you’ll like it.

Year End List Potential: 4.6/5

This Is Hell – ‘Misfortunes’
Trustkill Records
Released Feb 19, 2008

Year End List Potential: 0/5

and just to switch things up…

This girl’s name is Priscilla Ahn. She does the whole singer-songwriter/acoustic thing as you might be able to tell from the picture, and she does it quite well. I’ve been a big fan of her music for a while now, and as it turns out she has her debut album coming out pretty soon via Blue Note Records, so I’m super excited about that. That’s not really the point of this little blurb though.
The point is that she has this song called ‘Dream’ on her EP that I’ve loved for a long, long time but for some reason I’ve not been able to stop listening to it the past few days. It’s such a cute, beautiful little song and I just can’t help but feel all warm inside every time I hear it. I can’t put a finger on specifics, but there’s just some quality in her wonderful voice that brings a smile out of me. I really feel that this is about as perfect as a song can get. High praise, I know, but I think it deserves it. Check it out on her myspace, maybe you’ll like it as much as I do.