Lust For Youth - Growing Seeds (2012)
Band: Lust For Youth
Country: Göteborg, Sweden
Style: Darkwave/Synth-Pop
Label: AVANT!
Before being sent this album, I had not heard of Lust For Youth before, so I was coming into this pretty fresh. This was the first AVANT! release I've listened to in a while so I was quite interested in what this more recent album would sound like. When I looked it up it said darkwave, so I actually thought I was going to hear some pretty cool stuff.
Truthfully, I don't know much about synth-pop music. I'd like to think I know a little bit about darkwave, goth rock, and post-punk, all of which I mention because they can be heard in here, but synth-pop is the predominant sound and is the one I am the least familiar with. This is one of those albums that has a sort of central sound and try out a different idea on each track, whether it happens to be the dance-floor ready It's You, the exploration of noise on We Planted A Seed, or the electro-goth groove of Champagne (and those are tracks two through four). While I do think that several of the electronic sounds used on here are rather generic and bland, I can't fault them for it if they use it in a song with a catchy melody or interesting idea. It's sort of weird because this is not the sort of music that I usually listen to, I'm really not into dance music, in it's various forms, and happen to prefer electronic music that is a bit more heady (like IDM for example), but I found myself strangely drawn to several of these songs. They're not all winners, I can't help but find several of them a bit dull, but I can deal with them being on here because the average track length around here is around three minutes, so it's not that big a deal for me.
It's actually a pretty dark little pop album, which I guess is what I hoped for, but not in this form specifically. It's certainly an album that I'm glad I listened to, if only for the experience, but I can't see myself taking any more than a couple of songs off of this to keep though. If you happen to dig electronic or dance music, definitely check this album out, you will not regret it.
Overall Score: 7
Highlights: It's You, Always Changing, Neon Lights Appear
Natural Assembly - Arms of Departure EP (2012)
Band: Natural Assembly
Country: London, UK
Style: Darkwave
Label: AVANT!
As with the album above, I wasn't aware of Natural Assembly before being sent this release. This one seemed, by the cover, to be a darker album and was what drew me to listen to it. Aside from that I haven't really listened to a whole lot of synth-based albums this year.
To be honest, I wasn't really sure what I was getting myself into before pressing play on this album, I mean, I knew that it was like a synth-pop sort of album, but that's still leaves a pretty wide range of things to be covered. I can say that after a few listens, this is a release that has things I like, and things I don't on it, if I'm being blunt about it. Being that this is an album that has the vocals play a very minimal role, something I was definitely caught off guard about on the first listen, the melodies and ideas of the instrumentals have to catch the listener's attention to really work. I didn't not like the approach taken on opener Nightfall, it just had that sort of modern sort of moody witch-house kind of sound that was sort of like electro-shoegazy, and I just didn't dig it. After that track however, the other five songs do pick things up a bit. I can't say that the witch-house sort of aesthetic is abandoned, but the melodies are more immediate and there's an embrace of more industrial forms of percussion, which I did think was a nice touch. Even closer Ruination, which has a very similar idea to the opener, is a bit more tolerable because of the choice of percussion. I also felt like that track covered more ground as well.
As a whole, it's a pretty decent little album. It's not without its flaws and I am a bit picky when it comes to the sort of sounds that were used on here, since I have heard them in a lot of witch-house groups, but I think they are used pretty well on here. The end result is something that I think will appeal to any fan of minimalistic synth based music.
Overall Score: 6.5
Highlights: Sunrise, The Figures Absolved of All Compulsion
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