Secondwall [2015] (ep) Voice

indie meets emo meets pop is just a poor decision in my musical world. i can't get behind this tepid shit even if i wanted to. its like... almost likeable.. i just.. i dunno. something about it just rubs me the wrong way. there's a lot of this music in the indie scene that sounds like this and its never been my jam.

voodoo says 4/10 on first impression

Beardfish [2015] (album) +4626-Comfortzone

Blah blah blah. these guys are clearly talented, and i'm sure they have their audience... there's a lot of elements from song to song that i really like, but those elements are swallowed up by tedious neo prog that just doesn't do anything for me. it doesn't turn me on, it doesn't chill me out, it just makes me bored.  It's interesting because when the elements i do enjoy happen, they pop right out in contrast to the boredom and they seem real fucking cool, but ultimately i don't think it's enough to hold my attention. fuck it. i've got no time for these guys. flushing after 4 tracks. fuck ya later.

voodoosays 4/10 on first impression

Aoi Yamazaki (山崎あおい) [2015] (album) 12cm

Aoi Yamazaki follows in the footsteps of Yui (though Yui was actually fucking good!), becoming an overproduced singer songwriter turned into pop. you know, its not terrible. she has a really nice voice. she's pretty adorable. i'd just rather listen to her making acoustic rock than sugary pop, but such is the music industry. all the strings and melodic guitar lines and piano drag me right out of whatever good qualities might be happening. i'm not much for ballad type songs either, which appear more frequently than i'd like. i guess ultimately i want this to be what its not, but you know what, i have other artists who will give it to me. sorry, aoi!

voodoo says 4/10 on first impression

Panda Bear [2015] (album) Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper

its not a great sign when the first song is good enough to get you excited, but during the second and third songs you just want to go back and listen to the first one to make sure you heard what you thought you heard. i decided to ignore this impulse and let the boredom ensue. i didn't have much interest at all in what panda bear had to say musically. his digital soundscape is a boring and uninteresting electronic puffy white cloud. what he was doing with his voice, i found myself regretting to admit, reminded me of some of my favorite japanese new wave artists from the 80's. REMINDED me. nothing more, mind you. but even his voice he could only make interesting on a few tracks, and eventually ended up just being a washed out blur of white noise to my brain.  i don't frequently want to pull the plug on something, but come track 8's 'tropic of cancer' lullaby i was ready to move on. at this point i did go back and revisit the mr. noah track that had initially gotten me excited. this song is going in a playlist to not be forgotten. the rest of the album can eat shit.

voodoo says 4/10 on first impression