2011 in Music

Last year

pretty much rocked in music! So in this post I'm going to review every single album I bought/was given in 2011. In chronological order, and maybe with a rating if I feel like it. :)

Just thought I'd join the reviewing crowd, and it looks like an interesting way to write a blog, a

nd better than the usual random stuff I write.... it's good to have a focus to this sometimes!

(Note: this idea was kind of stolen from Tanner's blo

g, however he probably did an infinitely better job of it than me! Go read it for tons more (good!) reviews!
)

Over the Hills and Everywhere - Seabird

Got this one right at the start of the year at Parachute! This was after seeing these guys play an amazing acoustic set in the

awesome, so I went and brought it. Anyway, I should probably explain that this is actually a Christmas album. How village where they did a lot of material from this album. It was

So I had no qualms listening to this about two months after Christmas. :)ever, I find the concept of Christmas albums slightly misguided. Christmas songs are so good, both lyrically and musically, so why should they only be played for a month of each year? It's actually quite

annoying....

It's actually a really good album! Well EP actually as there's only 6 songs.... The songs which are on there are mostly the typical Christmas ballads (Joy to the World, Silent Night, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, etc...) but they are redone so the tunes are a bit different. While this can often fail miserably, it works surprisingly well here! If you didn't listen to the lyrics, you would probably think that these are totally different songs! My favourites from this album would be

Good stuff. "Silent Night", "Joy to the World" and a great Christmas song which I'd never h

eard before called "Go tell it on the Mountain". The album itself has a mostly acoustic, feel-good vibe.

7.5/10 (but in saying that, one of the best Christmas albums I've ever heard!)

This Beautiful Disaster - Mayday

It's actually pretty hard to review your own EP haha! This came out after Open Air 2011 (where we played on a bandstand). Unfortunately it hasn't been very successful at being sold, so we've reverted to mostly giving it away. :P Oh well, at least I know that Ryan Morgan from Seabird and Mark de Jong from Parachute Music got a copy - whether they listened to it was another thing! Our cd wasn't too bad - however it is a little bit under-produced as we were a bit too excited once we got it to do it right. It is an interesting listen though. Practically everything you

hear on it was done as we play it, all three of us recorded at once. And that is something to be proud of I guess, that we got it tight enough to sound completely bang on without mixing everything separately. Plus they're all 100% original material, which is awesome! This EP has it's highs and lows - some of the singing isn't so great, and there is a lack of guitar solos (sorry!). But overall it's not too bad for our first time in a proper recording studio. If you haven't already heard it, check out the tracks at our myspace - I'd recommend Crash this Party, Everywhere Tonight, and Not Forsaken as good song off there!

The Water EP - Luke Thompson

This EP is amazing! I'd heard of Luke Thompson before, and one of his songs which was on the radio called Water amazed me from the first time I listened to it. However, it wasn't until I'd seen him live that I knew I had to get his EP. His voice, and guitar playing is absolutely incredible, and very relaxing to listen to. I've almost fallen asleep listening to this album - but not because it's boring! The music is great - it's kind of like a cross between indie, folk, and country.

The only real problem with this EP, apart from the lack of songs, is that the only lyrics included is to a random poem called "Beggars of Wealth" - which has amazing lyrics but doesn't even feature on the album! However, that mil

d

disappointment aside, this EP is stunning.

If you don't do anything else, go look up the song Water. You won't regret it!

9/10 (I just remembered how brilliant it was, got all excited and am listening to it now!!)

Rocks into Rivers - Seabird

I kind of went on a bit of a Seabird craze for the

first half of the year, in part brought on by a friends enthusiasm, and in part from their awesome performances at Parachute. So I bought this cos their Christmas EP didn't have enough

songs to satisfy me! This cd was pretty good. It does start to feel old after awhile though. I don't know, but I find it hard to listen to the whole album from start to finish. Yet despite this, there are

some real good songs on Rocks into Rivers. Don't You Know You're Beautiful, Sing To Save My Life and This Ain't Home are great songs and definitely worth checking out. Also there's Baby

I'm in Love which is a great feel-good song

which Seabird did with a ukulele orchestra at Parachute. It was awesome!

5/10 (Good songs to start of with, but the album lapses and finishes on a lower note than what was started with)

HAARP - Muse

Initially I had no liking for the band Muse. They were just too.....weird.... for me! Strangely

enough, that's actually why I like them now. I heard this cd after borrowing it from a friend, who later gave it to me for my birthday after I raved on at them about how good it was!

This is actually a cd/dvd combo, and of the two the dvd is infinitely better. This band is truly incredible live. They look so good on camera, but I can only imagine what it would have been like

to be there when they recorded this! Matt Belamy, the lead singer is an amazingly talented musician, and that's what made me change my opinion of them. The dvd shows of his great solos in songs like Invincible, Knights of Cydonia, and Plug in Baby. Plus I also found out he's an amazing piano player too! Jealous of his skills!

Time is Running out, Map of the Problematique, and Starlight being a few of my

favourites.The cd isn't as great as the dvd, as it misses out a couple of the really good songs. In saying that, there's still a couple of good ones on there,

Finally, while I have been converted to Muse, they still can get a little bit to out there, even for my liking! Some of the high notes Matt Belamy hits on Supermassive Black Hole are cringe-worthy. How can someone (especially a guy) even get that high?!!

9/10 (Very interesting and great musically, however it's probably not everyone's cup of tea...)

How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb - U2

2011 was the year where I got obsessed wi

th this band called U2....

I'd heard of them before obviously (who hasn't heard of U2?!) but like Muse, never really payed them much attention. Then I heard Where the Streets Have No Name and I knew that I had to hear more of this band.

Luckily I have an awesome friend who owned practically all their cds, and I borrowed them all! So now I have like 192 U2 songs on my ipod - but that's all good because U2 is a great band!

I got this cd given to me for my birthday (by the same friend) and so I gave this a re-listen.

This is one of their newer cds, which came out in 2004 so some of the songs off it still get played on the radio on occasion.

HTDAAB (it's too long to type properly) is both a great record and a not-so-good one. Put it this way: half of the album I love listening to. The other half I'm not so fussed with. Unfortunately,

this album starts off real good then turns out to be not quite as good as it looks. Man if U2 could put out a cd where every single one of their songs sounded as good as their hits, it'd be one of the best records ever made! In my opinion, at any rate. True to what I've just said, the first 5 or so song on here are amazing! The melodies, music and guitar work is so cleverly worked together to create an incredible song, and that's something U2 are very good at doing. My favourite songs from HTDAAB would be Miracle Drug and Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own. Two very beautiful songs, which if you haven't heard you're worse off.great cd, and a not-so-good one. Lets put it this way: half of the cd I love listening too. The other half - I'm not so really fussed with. If U2 somehow managed to make a cd where every song sounded as good as their hit songs, it would

6/10 (Would be better if half of it didn't sound like album filler....but the hit songs are more than good enough to make up for this!)

Vice Verses - Switchfoot

First up, Switchfoot is one of my favourite bands ever! Every single one of their albums is gold, and I relate so much to Jon Foreman's lyrics. Sometimes wonder if he knows what I'm thinking or something! However, they seem to have had the same fate as most bands when it comes to records. Y'know, the hit songs are REALLY good, there's a couple of other songs which are pretty good, and the rest is mostly just album filler...

Then they get out an album like this, and just take their coolness to a whole new level!!!!

Every single song off this album is amazing! Right from the gritty opening chords of Afterlife to the anthemic choruses of Where I belong, this record is Switchfoot at their best. The lyrics are incredible, the music is amazing, and it even throws in a couple of surprises (check out the song Selling the News and you'll see what I mean!). While every song off here is awesome, my personal favourites are Restless, and Dark Horses. The first because it was the song which really seemed to sum up 2011 for me. The lyrics seemed almost like they were written for me! And the second because - well it's just got that classic, unbeatable Switchfoot sound. Picking my favourites was hard though cos the whole cd is amazing!

Honestly, I could rave on about this album all day if I could! But I probably shouldn't - so go buy the thing and then you'll see what I mean.

10/10 (One of my favourite records ever!)

Mylo Xylito - Coldplay

I first heard of Coldplay when my old guitar teacher taught me the chords for Yellow. This is their first cd I've bought though. Not that any of their older music didn't interest me, its just I knew that this one was definitely worth purchasing! I'd heard the two singles Paradise and Every Teardrop is a Waterfall previously and loved them, plus lots of people were raving on about it (including Brad Dring from Rapture Ruckus!) So the day after Christmas I snapped it up at the Warehouse Boxing Day Sales. And I definitely haven't regretted the purchase!

While unsure of what this title actually means, I have to say that this album is stunning. The production is amazing. It's like Coldplay but with a lavish, orchestral, ambient grandeur that I've only heard hinted at in a few U2 songs. Seriously, this album has a "sound" like no other. Yet at the same time, the actual instruments can be defined clearly, and that's what I think gives it it's brilliance. It's like a lavish pop album but actually played by real musicians! While the album flows together quite nicely because of this, there is a couple of stand out tracks. As well as the two above mentioned ones, I'm addicted to listening to Charlie Brown, a song with an incredibly catchy guitar riff, and UFO, a great little song which sounds almost like a country ballad. The only problem with this album is THERE IS NO LYRICS!!! Argh, what is it with records doing this these days? The inside cover has an amazing design, but few words. I see I'll just have to use trusty old Google for this...

Pick it up now if you haven't already, and see what everyone else is talking about!

9.5/10 (It's not perfect but it's a work of genius. Pop and rock fans will both equally love this, and that's why it works!)

Hope you enjoyed my reviews as much as I enjoyed writing them!!!

Jordan