Edit: If you want to get in touch with me while you’re there, best way is going to be via twitter

Do you ever struggle to find something to listen to late at night when the day is winding down and you just need something really slow and dreamy to parallel your state of mind? That’s where a space rock band like Pacific UV comes in handy. Their new album Longplay 2 is a very solemn collection of tracks that sedate your soul like a breeze blowing through a field of wheat as you watch the setting sun. It’s a very beautiful album in it’s sheer atmospheric tranquility, which is interrupted only briefly by moments of distorted noise that act as a break from the constant, somberness.

One of the most striking aspects of the album is how Pacific UV manages to keep it from becoming too repetitive. Styles of ambient music such as this typically rely heavily on electronic instrumentation and there is a great temptation to let catchy beats and melodies loop several times over within a song while occasionally switching patterns up here and there. This adds a severe amount of redundancy and length to a lot of electronica songs. Just think of the stereotypical techno song and how ridiculously repetitive it is. However, Pacific UV uses typical electronic techniques infrequently on Longplay 2 and relies more on clever composition to evoke a sense of ethereality while providing sonic variation as well.

The first track, “Alarmist,” is a perfect example of Pacific UV’s style. It uses repetition as an element of the song, but is not a tiring kind of repetition that makes you become bored with the song. It is a repetition that at first builds up to create a melodic theme and then uses variations on that theme later in the song. As I said previously, it shows the use of creative composition reminiscent of classical music rather than simply pounding away the same looped samples over and over again.

However, the best song on the album by far is the final track “Ljiv,” which is the most likely song to be appreciated by those who aren’t fans of the space rock genre. It makes use of repetition in order to build up to a sonic theme as I mentioned before, but does so to a more effective end. The song consists of an ever-growing number of classical strings and gentle piano strokes that eventually weave into each other to form a melodious gossamer of sound so overwhelming that it sends shivers through your body. It’s almost so gentle as to be sad. It may cause tears to start to well up in your eyes if you are one who is easily affected by the evocative power of music.

I highly recommend Longplay 2 for those of you who need an album that is more calming than what you may already have in your collection. Even if you don’t want to get the whole thing, then I suggest that you get your hands on “Ljiv” via iTunes or some other source once we take it down from the site. It will be well worth your time.

Purchase Longplay 2 by Pacific UV at iTunes and Amazon.

Pacific UV - Alarmist
Pacific UV - Ljiv

For more information about Pacific UV, visit their MySpace page and Warm Records.

You know those “what if” scenarios people like to come up with? What if Buddy Holly were still alive and recording music? What if Biz Markie had never recorded “Alone Again”? What if a hardcore punk band turned to indie rock? Well, I could spend a long time arguing the hypothetical repercussions of the first two scenarios, but I can provide a short, concrete example of what the third might sound like by introducing you to Sarandon, a trio from South London.

I tell you these guys really kick out the jams on their newest album Kill Twee Pop!. They have the chaotic energy that a hardcore rock band has with frenzied guitar playing and plenty of drum fills, but they rely more on catchy riffs and solid song structures than just going crazy on their instruments. And replace wild screaming with more low key yet still highly invigorated vocals that are reminiscent of The Ramones or other classic punk rock bands of that era. You really get a great feel for their style once the album’s title track starts off the listening experience. Once that song got into gear, everything I was going to say about Sarandon in this post popped into my head all at once and I knew I was going to love the rest of the album.

One particular aspect of Kill Twee Pop! that really sticks out is the quick and precise musicianship, which I briefly touched on above. As I also mentioned, Sarandon’s music has a sort of speedy madcap style to it, but everything is played so cleanly that it sounds incredibly clean and coherent. This is a stark contrast to bands like Melt Banana or The Locust where everything tends to meld into a wall of sonic fury. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I mean, that’s what I love best about those two bands, but it’s nice to have groups like Sarandon come in and mix things up. Even so, they do seem to indulge in moments of seemingly more improvised noise making at the very beginning of “Very Flexible” and towards the end of “Massive Haircut” along the lines of their more cacophonous sibling bands.

Of all the great instrumentation, I particularly enjoy the heavy, dead-on drumming on this album. I always love a good drummer and Tom Greenhalgh manages to stray away from the typical rock percussion to come up with some great, catchy beats that really add some oomph to the tracks. “Remember Mavis?” stands above the rest as an incredible track for outstanding drumming. Even if you aren’t playing the song loud enough to have your floorboards shake, you still feel vibrations going up through your legs just because of how much the drums are quaking up the album at that point.

Kill Twee Pop! is an album that I cannot recommend highly enough for those of you who like high energy rock music or hardcore punk. Sarandon is one of those bands that crosses boundaries and is hard to classify within one single genre, but all the better in this case; it gives more people with more diverse musical tastes something to agree on. At least I hope so. I bet Sarandon hopes so as well.

Purchase Kill Twee Pop! by Sarandon at Slumberland Records, Amazon, or iTunes

Sarandon - Kill Twee Pop!
Sarandon - Remember Mavis?
Sarandon - Massive Haircut

For more information about Sarandon, visit their MySpace page.

Let me start off by saying that I predicted the sound of this artist’s music just based on her name. It seems like some musicians are born into their genres, just like everyone named Jeeves is doomed to a life of servitude and/or consulting. Just the sound of the name Arianna Solare made me think of indie folk-rock, which is exactly the kind of music you find on her debut EP Book of Us. But hey, maybe it was just dumb luck or post-hoc reasoning on my part.

Either way, Arianna Solare is a very engaging artist with a unique vocal style. Her singing has a rich deepness to it that is very alluring and also provides an emotional maturity to her compositions. There is also a distinctive quaver that wafts her voice across the soft instrumentation in the background. This is probably a technique she picked up during her time spent performing in temples in India, which, according to her biography on her webpage, is where her current singing style began to take shape.

Lyrically, Arianna Solare seems to remain focused on the subjects of love and her own life. Basically, the first four tracks can be dumbed down to songs about relationships, successful and not, represented in natural and spiritual metaphors. But they aren’t exactly the typical boy meets girl pop songs. For example, the first track “Lift Me Up” is at the same a song about hope for the future and regret for the past. Arianna Solare sings in the chorus, “Love ain’t gonna break me this time / It’s gonna lift me up / Love ain’t gonna leave me dry / It’s gonna lift me up,” which shows that in the past love hasn’t always been so kind to her, but this time it will be different. And I have to wonder whether the line “The gods they must be crazy” is an intentional reference to the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy. That could score a higher rating for this album in the minds of some reviewers who really dig obscure pop culture references.

The final track of the album “Are You Coming With Me” is an autobiographical song that describes some of the details of Arianna Solare’s life. Sometimes I wonder if these kinds of songs are just the artists being egotistical and saying, “Hey, look at me! I’m interesting!” But I can’t fault someone for finding some therapy in expressing themselves through music, especially if they’re a smalltime artist. There is also the potential for others with similar tales find a connection through a song like this, especially if the details aren’t particularly specific. It seems that verses like, “I was livin where the sun don’t shine / Survivin on whiskey and wine / And the teardrops they fell from the sky / I found god in those city lights,” could apply to any number of people who had similar experiences.

Purchase Book of Us by Arianna Solare at CD Baby, iTunes, or Amazon.

Arianna Solare - As I Walk to the Edge
Arianna Solare - Are You Coming With Me

For more information on Arianna Solare, visit her MySpace page.

By the way, I have a confession to make. Arianna has always been one of my favorite names that I’ve never actually heard in reference to a living person. However, the meat of the confession is that it’s always been a standard name that I have used when naming characters in fantasy or sci-fi role-playing games. Yes. It’s true. I’m a geek. I doubt that you would have been able to guess that by the fact that I write a music blog.

Now this may seem to be an irrelevant starting point, but I’ve been a huge fan of Adam Carolla since around 1996, which is when I first started listening to Loveline. I’ve always enjoyed his very blunt and irreverent sense of humor as well as his tendency to maintain a realistic view of the world. One of the topics he frequently covers on his morning show, The Adam Carolla Show, is music. And, finally coming around to the point of all this, he often makes fun of music from particular decades for not being particularly “timeless.” “Tainted Love” by Soft Cell, for example, is clearly a song from the 80’s because of it’s incredibly simplistic, synthesized beats and keyboards. By the same token, I don’t think anyone would place “Fun, Fun, Fun” by The Beach Boys anywhere else besides the 60’s, even if they had never heard it before.

I say all this because T.H. White is an artist with a multi-decadal (Did I just invent a word? No, I looked it up. It exists.) sound. His new album The Private Spotlight includes elements of 70’s rock and funk, 80’s R&B and new wave, 90’s alternative rock and trip-hop, and contemporary electronica. As a result, you can’t pin his musical form down to a single decade and say, “This is where it belongs,” as you can with Soft Cell and The Beach Boys. Maybe you attribute individual songs with a particular decade, but overall T.H. White has a very expansive sound, which almost sounds like it wouldn’t work in concept just because there is such a drastic difference between the genres being combined. You wouldn’t imagine 70’s classic rock and 80’s new wave melding well togethering, yet it all works out in the same way that Beck’s genre-bending music somehow pulls so many conflicting elements together.

I’ll have to admit that I’m indulging in a little exaggeration in the description of T.H. White’s style by making it sound a little stranger or more groundbreaking than it really is. I just want to get the point across that he produces high quality tunes that are not easily pigeonholed into a particular genre. In fact, The Private Spotlight reminds me a lot of Simple Things by Zero 7, another stylistically far-reaching album by a band that is primarily labeled as “electronica.” I would also include T.H. White in that very broad category, but the infusion of rock and funk into his compositions can really increase the energy levels beyond what is characteristic of Zero 7 and other, mellower artists.

There are few songs on The Private Spotlight that stand out either for reasons of quality or uniqueness. “Private People” and “The Loft” stand out because of their more funk and R&B oriented sound. Both tracks make extensive use of the rhythmic, almost the percussive guitar playing technique that is typical of classic funk as well as catchy, pulsating beats. The vocals found on “Private People,” provided by Meghan Wolf, are very reminiscent of early 80’s R&B while “The Loft” uses vocal samples that exemplify traditional funk and R&B. In fact, I could imagine driving around in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City listening to “Private People” on the same radio station that played “Juicy Fruit” by Mtume. Sorry for isolating those of you who aren’t gamers or who haven’t played Vice City, but it provides a good context for those who are in the know.

Anyway, “Katie Starr of Silver” also stands out for being a little more heavy on the rock elements than any other song on the album. T.H. White’s singing on this track reminds me of Damon Albarn of the Gorillaz and Blur. In fact, I bet you that I could convince someone that this song is a rare, unreleased track by the Gorillaz that was recorded in the 90’s. It has that kind of alternative rock meets electronica vibe that the Gorillaz have. And it’s also pretty fun and catchy. I think I’m going to have stop writing right now and spend the rest of my time scheming.

Purchase The Private Spotlight by T.H. White

T.H. White - Private People
T.H. White - Katie Starr of Silver
T.H. White - The Loft