psychedelic / alternative rock

The Netherlands are well-known for their diverse and eclectic music scenes. From the dullest shlagers to the raunchiest grindcore, everything is being made there. That obviously includes rock music, and in this case, I'd like to call it long-distance rock.
Long-distance rock music, the kind which makes you want to step in a old Chevrolet and drive for hundreds of kilometres while cranking up the volume, that's what you get with this album by Dutch rockers No Man's Valley. Or at least, that's what I experienced, especially with the gritty, grungy and bluesy opener 'Outside The Dream'. 


The music on this album cannot be easily described, although I can throw in heaps of styles and references. While the opener was a stoner blues cracker, 'Eyeball' blends alternative rock with cabaresque experimentality. Throughout the entire thing I hear influences from bands like Pearl Jam, Pink Floyd and Deep Purple, plus, since the final track is titled 'Murder Ballad', I expect some Nick Cave references in there too. Oddly enough, that gloomy slow rock feel mostly shines through in the beautiful 'From Nowhere'.

So there is alternative rock, there is grunge, there is psychedelic desert blues but there is also a brilliant atmosphere that brings me back to underground venues and the sheer joy of discovering live music. If No Man's Valley manages to deliver the same quality on stage as on this album, I see great things coming for them. Although I doubt if any of these songs with ever make it to the charts, their solid composing skills will certainly turn some heads into their direction.

On stage, the gritty rocker 'Lies' will probably be a fan favorite. For starters, it's one of the few uptempo tunes here. It has an infectious chorus and massively enjoyable organ melodies. Many butts will be shaking, that's pretty much a guarantee. In all, I think you just can't go wrong with No Man's Valley if you're into original and authentic rock music. So yeah, I think this is a pretty damn good album, one that will quite often appear in my day-to-day playlist from now on. 


​Serge

post rock / alternative rock / noise rock / math rock

Now. is an album released on February 22, by Finnish alternative/ noise rock duo NYOS. A thirty-nine minutes instrumental album, the record has eight tracks: 1) Urgence; 2) High Five; 3) L.W.P.; 4) Zebracazebra; 5) Tiglio; 6) Mutante; 7) Death Star; 8) Aveiro; an interesting and abrasive – exceptionally authorial album –, Now. is an intriguing and sculpting experience on the alternative and noise rock subgenres, with a very peculiar sound, whose math rock melodies definitely increase their amazingly skilled and dry sonorous potential. 

With an audacity that insinuates itself at the epicenter of a singular diagram that envisions no limitations to its creative horizons, Now. definitely proves itself to be a very consistent, elegant and serious album. With a precisely defined style, its virtuous and imperative musical direction displays an artistic security that underlines an impressive and dominant degree of professionalism. NYOS is a marvelously sophisticated musical act, that understands perfectly the veracity of its meritorious grandiosity, and knows how to execute with graceful efficiency and majestic sensibility its delightful and inherently genuine perception of sound artistry. 

Since the album is relatively concise, its main musical statement also reclaims a modest and revolutionary degree of objectivity. Nevertheless, its genuine qualities and wonderful originality certainly makes this album a glorious musical achievement, whose sound navigates over the intensity of its own celebratory, restless and somewhat impulsive harmonies, though everything here mostly seems precisely calculated, premeditated and carefully sculpted. The song Mutante definitely has proved to be my favorite. Its volatile, nervous and highly concentrated density displays a cohesive degree of neoclassical elaboration, whose salutary and pragmatic devices overlaps its own vortex of utilitarian harmonious dissolution. 

Although the album has some minor moments of tedious passages, in a general evaluation, Now. is an excellent work of art, that has no faults or deficiencies whatsoever. Displaying a brilliant work merging several musical genres – and showcasing a sensational domain of math rock, upon which several harmonies were conceived – NYOS delivers to its audience a splendid and exceedingly sophisticated work, whose art and synergy are consecrated by its virtuous, incomparable and latent talent, filled with marvelous and innovative authenticity. 


Wagner

ambient / classical

Sound In Silence

experimental / noise

alternative rock / psychedelic rock

death metal

post rock

ambient / classical

doom / black metal

black metal

hardcore

metal / death metal / metalcore

facebook

hardcore / grindcore / crust

black metal

grunge / alternative metal / progressive rock

doom

alternative rock

death metal

punk rock

bandcamp

electronic

electronic / darkwave / EBM / Industrial

shoegaze

shoegaze / alternative / electronic

Shipwreck Karpathos is one of those bands that you simply love, but you don’t know precisely why. The intrinsic and majestic poetry that seems inherent to their sound makes you float through the infinite ages of a cosmogony that is designed by their music using a highly versatile sensibility, easy to follow, but hard to passionately rationalize. And to define their splendidly peculiar style – especially this album – is no easy task, since they make use of a wide range of elements, that creates labyrinths of inextricable sensitivity on the translucent oceans of your conscience, never limiting themselves to established musical ideas, or easily predictable formulas.  

Deviations is an interesting, effective and visionary work, since it is filled by remixes of other artists; so, what we have here, basically, is the creative nucleus of Shipwreck Karpathos, adorned on the exterior sonorous features of its composite musical layout by harmonies conceived by a versatile team of artists. The final result is, indeed, intriguing, unpredictable and ostensibly amazing.  

The album has an abundant and splendid virtuosity, that reluctantly and subtlety reclaims in the diagram of its eloquent qualities the highlight of its rapturous and organic impulses: the third track – Bring Down The Sky (Metavari's Prelude Redesign) – is an intermittent, but poetic, serene, delusional and profoundly dense rhapsody, that effectively makes your sensibilities to drive high on the dispersive energy of its ambivalent, but pungent mordacity. You are simply submerged drastically into an abstract universe of sagaciously obliterated parameters, that doesn’t respond to ordinary sequences, nor feel the reality as a cohesive diagram of emotions.  

Although by the middle of the album, the sound becomes more homogeneous, the primary qualities of the work are not affected. The perfect soundtrack for an endless dream that never seeks the arbitrary paradigm of a coherent layout, Deviations is an interesting experiment in sound, that definitely stands out for its audacious, stable and pure creativity. A formidable mosaic of effectively playful and transient musical dispositions, Deviations certainly deserves to be highlighted by its lucid originality, and sensationally graceful musical style. 


Wagner

drone / ambient

death metal / grindcore

death industrial / dark ambient

Exabyss Records

post rock / ambient / electronic

ambient / classical

funeral doom

gothic rock / alternative / metal

drone / ambient / folk

dark ambient 

alternative rock / funk rock

facebook

indie / dreampop

industrial / electronic

Perc Trax

​Serge (2 & 3 by Patsker)

alternative rock / stoner rock / grunge

One might wonder, "what's in the Belgian waters?" Bands and releases are popping up by the minute here. A rock band in that corner, a noise act over there and a trip-hop act in another place, it never seems to end in this little country. To answer that question: I don't think it's in the water. It's what Belgians do with that water. We turn it into beer, another thing we have been doing for ages, and pretty damn good too. It's a magical chemical process, turning ingredients into something almost otherworldly. The same goes for our music industry, people come together and create magical chemistry. 

Another one in the never-ending tsunami of Belgian releases is 'Superglue For The Broken' by Antwerp residents Tangled Horns. Influenced by rock music of all ages, from the psychedelics of the sixties & seventies to the raunchy grunge scene of the nineties, Tangled Horns invite the listener to a wicked ride of their rock 'n roll rollercoaster. In short: 'Superglue For The Broken' is a groovy-ridden powerhouse that can get any rock 'n roll heart beat a little faster.

Of course, these days you can't write and record a decent rock album without adding a heap of influences. The most obvious reference on this album is Alice In Chains, whose sound shines through in opener 'Shadow (A Personal Piece Of Darkness)' and in 'The Timeline Is A Noose'. Loaded with groove and power, these two tunes can easily get any rock party started, and metalheads will join in on the fun.

Other bands that come to mind include Soundgarden, Kyuss, Queens Of The Stone Age and The Foo Fighters. That surely makes one interesting list. But, even if it's all in good fun, Tangled Horns also show a well-thought out, mature sound. It's not a bunch of youngsters messing around in a rehearsal studio. It's five bearded dudes paying tribute to the one thing that kept them living their lives the way they do: alternative rock.

'In The Now' clearly shows that. Along with the aforementioned songs, this is my favorite here, a strong rock song that aims for a spot in the grunge-classics lists. On the noisy, gritty 'Beautiful Flaw', Faith No More even comes to mind, combined with either Led Zeppelin or Brant Bjork. Yes, I can easily imagine these tunes rolling over big, crowded meadows next summer. I can see people dancing on 'Destination Tipping Point', go nuts on 'Magnificent Maniac' or make sweet love on 'Icebound'.

So if you're looking for a groovy, versatile and immersive rock album, you should really give this one a change. Once again, a local band proves my point about this country's musical underground (read 'Belgium Rock City' - Dutch only). Naturally I will recommend this to every fan of decent rock music. 


​Serge

alternative rock / post punk

Aurora is an album released in the end of September, by Belgium alternative rock band Slow Crush. Almost thirty-five minutes long, the record has eight tracks: Glow, Drift, Tremble, Shallow Breath, Aid and Abet, Collide, Beached and Aurora. Already in the first song, the fabulous, fantastic and thunderous Glow, the band struck precisely the epicenter of the most dense, infamous and great standards of melodious heaviness, with powerful guitar lines and absolutely furious drums, eager to completely destroy and dilacerate all the decadent patterns of normality. With a formidable level of sonorous audacity that highlight their authorial musical strength, Slow Crush is an exceptional band, that goes directly to the point, and knows how to make a great record, with a somewhat simple, but efficient musical formula. 

Despite the fact that the band rapidly alternates to a more modest, quiet and sentimental tone, the sound of Slow Crush can generally be qualified as moderately aggressive and rude, but even then, delivers with candid and methodic proficiency its sincerely humane sonorous graciosity. The album delivers mostly splendid cantilenas, with more quiet, poetic and charismatic passages, where the extensive serenity of an emotional density hits the harmonies, favoring quite a balanced and versatile musical universe to the audience, that certainly will be surprised all the way through, as the album isn’t monotonous nor predictable. The subtle change in tone from the tracks at the beginning, that are more aggressive, contrasts brightly with the rest of the album, that is definitely more philosophic, dense, emotional and serene – though this mood interchanges occasionally –, and the unexpected element is one of the greatest triumphs of the group. 

With a marvelous sonorous style, that definitely enchants by the fragrant tenacity of its beauty, the flavored and colorful harmonies that Slow Crush delivers in Aurora are generally quite slow, aggrandizing and simple, but in the end, the group showcases all the beauty, elegance and effervescent grace of its marvelous sonorous tonalities, that juxtaposes the sentimental placidity of its musical nature,  with its more hostile – though filled with the emotional contrivances of a lyrical sensibility – perceptions of the world. 

In the end, Aurora reveals itself to be a very good and majestic album. With a very personal, precise and characteristic style, the group has definitely conceived a very peculiar work of art, that deserves to become a reference in the alternative underground rock scene. 



Wagner

alternative rock / indie rock / experimental

Death Spells is an album released in mid-September, by American alternative/indie rock group Holy Fawn. One hour long, the record has ten tracks: Dark Stone, Arrows, Drag Me Into The Woods, Yawning, Seer, Two Waves, Take Me With You, Vespertine, Same Blood and Sleep Tongue. A formidable album with a very dense and melancholic tone, Death Spells is a musical study on deliberative melodious introspection, with no clear boundaries between genres, flirting sometimes – very discreetly though – with genres like metalcore, atmospheric black metal and indie rock, albeit their general musical compass is mostly engraved on an alternative rock sphere, radically indebted to post rock. Without any fear to experiment, the band delivers a secure, but volatile sound, that virtually exposes a very mature style. With an audacious, but sensible level of originality, that is deeply intertwined in their inherent musical abilities, Holy Fawn consecrates a very lucid and serious work on Death Spells, departing mostly from slow harmonies, that elaborates in the epicenter of its majestic beauty a solid grace between sorrowful serenades of philosophic serenity and aggressive thunderous downfalls of mordacious agony. 

With latent, soundscapes that appeals to very sentimental harmonious propensities, the sound of the group is generally elegant and profound, though they mostly abuse on slow rhythmical devices. Nevertheless, it is possible to feel a very surreal, but dormant fury discreetly positioned at the core of each song, which vehemently adds to the genuine folklore they gracefully elaborate in the vast expansive diagram of their music.

In Death Spells, beauty is everywhere, and strikes with such a peaceful and serene charisma, that is impossible not to feel enchanted by the lucid, delicate and captivating musical tonalities they perfectly expose. Creativity here is transposed as the most excellent device for authentic artistry, and evaluates in an ever aggrandizing sonorous panorama the possibilities exposed by its ostensibly virtuous, but despondent harmonies. Even their hardest passages – some of them remembering metalcore act We Came As Romans – seems to disclosure a deep sense of tranquility, although also delivers, paradoxically, a disturbed hemisphere of afflictive, deceptive and lucid sense of reality. 

Although the album is somewhat very long, their general musical anatomy remains cohesive, and their creative greatness is free of any sentimentality and generic passages. Holly Fawn easily flows between genres, in a fluid ocean of sonorous synergy, delivering a very appreciative and peculiar sound, that becomes quite characteristic, as one can hear the album entirely as only one long track, without any disruptive feeling of impatience or monotony. Emerging as the marvelous result of an energetic and meticulous musical confluence, Death Spells has ardently evolved from the sophisticated standards the group established themselves to follow.  


​Wagner

alternative / metal / metalcore

heavy metal / power metal

hard rock / stoner rock / alternative rock / grunge

thrash / death metal

doom

doom / sludge / post hardcore

pop rock

pop rock / alternative rock

​Serge