Hiatus over

So it's been a bit since I've posted, but I hope to be posting more regularly now.

Administrivia: endmusik.com is now slightly redesigned, it'll be relaunching slowly with new content and will act as my "distribution" arm for all of the music (and maybe from my friends as well)

Anyway, I need to keep on point. If there's one thing I've realized - it's that I'm opinionated but stay relatively moderate out in the world of the web. I take the middle road. I take the easy way out. I'm not confrontational. I keep odd bedfellows in that regard - most of my closest friends are outspoken, opinionated and downright brazen.

Screw it. Say goodbye to the old Mike.

So let's start on a subject near and dear to my heart: music

In the past couple of months I've picked up a couple of newer releases (direct order or actually walked into a store and bought on release day)

Skinny Puppy - Mythmaker
Nine Inch Nails - Year Zero
Download - Fixer

I'll focus on those three for this edition.....

Background: I am a diehard Cevin Key fan - I've followed puppy, download, and most of the inter-related projects since I first discovered puppy back in junior high. I had a passing interest in NIN in high school but pushed it away in a hurry when I discovered "true industrial" and bought the line that he "stole his ideas from puppy and made a fortune".

I was under the impression that of the three albums above being released in the same calendar year, I would be partial to the Key related releases.... but shocker of shockers, Trent and crew have TROUNCED puppy and download on the scales.

While I'm not 100% impressed with Year Zero overall (never been a huge fan of his lyrics, and some of the sounds do kind of fall into the "not so new to the IDM world" category) - it has more interest, layering, groove and composition than either the Download album or the Puppy album could hope to achieve. Something happened somewhere to Cevin and collaborators that is now pumping out sub-par listenining music.

If Trent can fill stadiums and get the kind of coverage and exposure for this album that he will no doubt continue to get, then good for him. He deserves it. He's integrated ideas from disparate places and genres, kept his usual modus operandi intact enough for his "die hard" fans to still recognize this as a NIN album, and it looks like he had a damned good time making this record.

I don't want to go into a full on critique of the albums in question, I'm not a music reviewer. I just know that of the three albums, Year Zero actually made me excited to listen to it, and the other two are now stowed on a shelf and they will most likely not appear in an iTunes playlist anytime soon.

I think I lost my train of thought. Oh well! I'll find another later.