i hate the sound of guitars

Hard to slot this into a specific genre, it’s not very “rock” (not in the least “rawk”), largely (but not exclusively electronic). It’s the sort of record in which choices of “which instrument voices this part” seem driven more by sonic coloration than by personnel. There’s a lot going on if you pay close attention [...]

[Read more →]

The confusingly named L’essentiel is split into two halves: “Champ” (field) is 14 tracks culled (and remastered) from Holden’s previous releases; “Hors-Champ” (off-screen) is another 14 previously unreleased tracks. I suspect some, like a cover of The Smiths’ “The Boy With the Thorn In His Side,” were left off earlier albums because they simply didn’t [...]

[Read more →]

On my first time through this seemed to have less distorted guitar/shoegaze goodness than prior efforts, and Yuki Chikudate’s vocals struck me as a bit more thin and chirpy than I recalled. On second listen, with the volume up a little more, I don’t hear what bugged me at all. My favorite track is “Trance [...]

[Read more →]