✪ mimi's listening diary index

the following is taken from my diary's rateyourmusic page with some edits:

hii U^ ^U welcome to my listening diary!! here i will try to log what i review and gather my thoughts and write them. i did this last year for a month before abruptly stopping cause i'm really bad with continuing things, but this year i wanna try to go at least a bit further with it. when i started this in february, i said that i wanted to try writing entries daily or at least at a consistent pace which of course ended up not being the case... after multiple hiatuses thoughh, since late september i've been keeping up with this (albeit at a not very consistent pace but it's whatevs!!) and thinking about it every day soo hopefully that will carry through the rest of the month and into 2025 and stuff!!

keep in mind that my thoughts may not be very coherent or they may seem kinda pretentious / whatever else at times... my mindset with this thing i have going is that i'm actually more so writing for myself and even though they kinda take the place of reviews of the stuff i listen to they probably shouldn't really be taken that seriously. i'm still proud of what i write thoughh and i write these for a bunch of other reasons like the possibility of looking back at my older writing which is what compelled me to restart this project and try to keep it up back in september :>

please note that i rate things on a 4-point scale per each star - #b, #-, #m, and #+ ... on a 100-point scale, each end in 0, 3, 5, and 7 respectively. i'm considering changing to a 2-point scale where it'd just be the number and then i give it a plus or not which would turn my whole rating scale into a 20-point scale, but i'd probably have to do some more thinking on that since i'd wanna do it for all of the albums i've rated before too :/

Structures From Silence by Steve Roach: 1 December★

space is a concept that is as excruciatingly difficult to wrap your head around as it simply is huge. it's something that you don't really pay attention to much, whether that be deliberate because of how shitty it can make you feel like it used to do to me or just because the astronomical just doesn't really apply to our daily lives because it's not like dwelling on it is of use to you. the universe is the largest home ever, filled everything you'd ever need and want in sheer quantities that'd make your head spin from trying to imagine, from productive and useful to the unnecessary and playful. you're most likely never going to see what lays beyond the atmosphere of our world for yourself, at least not in the near future, but even daring to think about the possibility of imagining such an incomprehensible topic... however, that imagination is the embodiment of structures of silence. for the past few months, i've been really fascinated with the usage of repetition in music as i've probably talked about it before - how artists are able to convey emotions through an intricate canvas in an unconventional way that creates this rich emotional impact through this concept and how the artist goes about its progression in their own manner. i haven't really been able to listen to as much of genres like drone and the more broad ambient than i wish i could've, but what i have listened to has had a resounding change on the way i think about music for the better.

initially, i confused steve roach for steve reich, another mastermind that instead of ambient opts for minimalism, which shares some values with drone but obviously has its own stark differences as well. i had known reich's name for quite some time; of course i was fascinated with the length of his songs, but also about the fact that he was so highly regarded on this site, how his albums reminded me of the covers of educational cds or even educational books about music (i know what they look like, i've owned a few in the past), and the entire concept of minimalism itself was really intriguing to me as well. back during this summer which was when i first heard this album, i had no idea what minimalism was like, and my knowledge was barred to rym's description of the genre, since back then i still wanted to go into albums without having heard any of the artist's other music. moving on from reich, however, i think that roach is a mastermind of his own. he has a discography stretching multiple decades which comprises of different branches of ambient and co. majorly built off of his synthesizers, like berlin school, tribal ambient, and space ambient. synths are an essential part of roach's music that he uses excellently to create the textures and qualities of the songs he records, and his skill with them is not only what helped me not confuse him with reich ever again, but it's what sets him far apart from the average musician.

summer is always a time of change for me. every summer, i have so much time on my hands that now i have the time to something new, some things differently than i ever could've... not to say that i don't always have lots of free time year round because of how much i stay inside, but it feels very different during this time, and i'm sure it's not just me that feels this way. maybe people know this and they take advantage of this, making more drastic changes they've possibly been waiting forever to make because they know they'll finally have the time to deal with what comes after, good or bad. in hindsight, it's always been this way for me, but it's never felt that meaningful to me until as of recently. i've known that things come and go, that everything is finite, that i need to be realistic with things; i've always been an overthinker and someone who likes philosophy (not in terms of studying, but generally just more passively) and take note of it when it comes to perspective, but it's like when people talk about how they only gained consciousness after a certain age... in the past year, i've been made aware of so many things that i haven't even thought about before - things that at face value meant very different than what it means now to me.

change was something that didn't really come to mind much; maybe i just figured it was a way of life, so much so that i didn't even bother wasting time on taking advice from it. and of course, it very much is part of life, but i don't think i ever really understood the implications of that. change can be harsh, loving, and everything in between, the extremes like tsunamis compared to the little waves you enjoy on the shores of neptune beach, and sometimes maybe you wish that change wasn't so. embracing change is essential to life, and along with many other things, i've come to realize that recently. change's patience fluctuates wildly, as does everyone else's, which would be fine, but change's schedule will not always be on the same wavelength as yours. to have things feel how good they feel and have things be how nice they are forever would be nice.

when you look up at the sky at night, what do you see? wherever you live, it's likely that it'll be shielded by light, maybe little or maybe lots, but that doesn't really matter now, though - you look up and focus on what's there (really, a lack of what's there), and you find yourself looking at space, which looks back down at you in its infinitely condescending demeanor. space has no change. sure, it has things that change, and the universe itself changes, but the fabric that it's made out of is cold and static. space itself has no seasons. it has no tides or waves that could engulf you effortlessly if you were to be in their path. as for the things that inhabit it, while there is a change in perspective on many thing like how things can look or where they are, there is no change in their routine. everything is methodical, following their little routines until the end of time. we don't know everything that happens, or understand why it does, but space doesn't care about that. it's unwavering and will continue to do so until whenever time ends - the ultimate change - but until then, you can take in the beauty of the constant. it might be mundane to some, but, maybe for you, maybe it's just what you need. maybe you'll want it just for a moment, or maybe you'll want to feel it until you feel a change in yourself, in defiance of what isn't happening around you. whatever happens, the everlasting space that space provides is something to be appreciated.

drone is similar to space in some ways. unlike space, music can be made of different things, like the tides that space lacks both figuratively and literally, but what's important is it can be very constant too, repeating the same backbone for what can feel like an eternity. even though there's little change, it can make you feel many different ways. you can extract meaning from anything and everything, even places where there seems to be no meaning; ofc not to say that drone is nothing, because it's very much not (to some it would be...), but even in repetition, an element of the music that could be annoying or mundane in other things. with this album, however, it's different; it's more like it's a chunk of space itself. obviously i mention this because of the theme and presentation, but it's so much more than that. the music is expansive yet consistent, like you're floating infinitely while you feel the fabric of space surround you. even though the concept of infinity is often used and seen in a negative light, as you wouldn't really want something like pain or emptiness to continue on for longer than you could even comprehend, infinity in this place is the standard. space is finite like everything else is, but infinity really is everything about space - you feel this in the music too.

something that i really like about this album is how soft the synths are, and how the music is just composed of them. space is a vacuum, and because of that, there isn't any sound since the waves don't have anything to travel through. in the music, there isn't anything you can hear other than the synths - just like space. even if this isn't intentional, i think this quality is really cool, and i think i'd interpret the synths as what you hear in your head as you take in the emptiness that is all around you and you can't help but dwell on it. after all, both you and your head still can make sounds and you can hear them, but after your helmet, there's nothing to be heard. there's so much meaning to be derived everywhere, so much solace to be found just like there is throughout the album. i mentioned this before, but i really like how emotionally rich this album can be and the vast amount of different ways you can interpret it and think about what you're listening to. it can be the soundtrack to a barren landscape, or it can be a source of hope and contribute to perseverance; whatever it may be, you can land on any kind of resolution you think best fits the music. you can do this with any music, however, this album is different in that regard since it feels like the canvas is much more free, just like space is. i've never really been some kind of space geek or really that into space at all, but i still admire how beautiful just thinking about it can be at times!! U^ ^U

reflections in suspension begins as an amazing opener made up of graceful synths and little sparkles that become part of the continuous rhythm that is the one of the first things i think about whenever i think about this album. it sets the tone at a nice pace, with various different synths swelling into the harmony from the bassline that precisely shifts throughout its cycle to the assortment of different notes and textures that contribute to the melody, all of them making for this sound that i think just reminds me of how the word epic is used when talking about really good stories. this reminds me of a couple of things... both of course pertaining to the space theme. it kinda reminds me of how space itself looks and what lives throughout it. i know i was talking a lot more about the vast emptiness of the "fabric of space" that i find really fascinating about it, but if you did find yourself in the odd situation of being stuck floating in space forever, then you would definitely come across so many things that are scattered throughout. everything is so far apart, but you can still see the light that shines from what's beyond, and i think those are the little sparkles represented by the intermittent notes from the more puffy (?) synth that you can hear throughout the song. to me kinda feels as if it's detached yet part of the melody at the same time and they feel distant yet they are so instrumental to the atmosphere of the song. i think another way to think about the song ( this doesn't rly go that much with what i've been talking about but i think it's still cute :P ) is if it's like a spaceship launching and the journey from the launching pad to getting to space. in this, the little sparkles are more like the buttons that the astronauts on board press, and the gradual progression of the song spans the time it takes to get from earth to space and then it fades out as the boosters fall out and the ship begins to go slower... it's a kinda cute yet more cinematic perspective of the song. to be honest, i don't really watch a lot of movies, but i think the experience of it is unique, and you can feel when something else seems as grandiose as a beautiful movie like the sound of this.

quiet friend follows the first song in a more reserved tone, with a more narrow brush that still makes for this really cool song that grounds you with its flow and texture. the song begins much more quickly than reflections in suspension, starting with the track's main synth that patiently establishes the base of the melody with a soft pulse that you can kinda feel, but you have to concentrate on it to hear how it glides throughout. deeper synths join in to give it more of an ethereal and floaty vibe and the whole thing has these really interesting dynamics that make it a both nice and compelling listen. additional supporting synths that also remind me of sparkles also join in but they come in after a while and they become an integral part of the song from then on. this song feels like a bridge between the first and last acts of the album, but that doesn't mean that it's not important!! it definitely has more of an empty feeling to it, like now you've passed the solar system and you're beginning to soar through what lays beyond, through the molecular clouds and whatever else lies there. i think that its title represents it very well too because it's very tranquil and feels more like a void than anything else. however, this void, which could be the void of space, isn't necessarily a depressing one, more so one that just lets you be. the emptiness calms you down and even though you're in your head a lot because there's nothing else happening, for once you're not faced with the troubles and responsibilities of your life, so you can finally take this time to focus on the lack of what's there and do whatever you want with it. space doesn't care about what you do with your time there, but it's not like it wants to make you feel bad; maybe it's so empty for a reason - a reason that you wouldn't know, but maybe it's for a good cause, and you can find solace in the fact that maybe the emptiness is there to help you.

structures of silence is the longest song on here by 12 minutes, and with that length there's even more depth to be felt. it has the most rigid melody of the three, with it not having any bells or whistles for a majority of the song, and it going for this slow gradual increase in volume and force that takes up more and more space as it goes on. i think that this is the song with the largest atmosphere, which i think makes a lot of sense with how the album progresses. it's also more noticeably omnipresent, which you can hear as different notes roam around you which you can feel more than ever because of how separated every element of the song is from each other. the loudness of the song (it's not that loud but it's kinda like everything's under a limiter or something lol) crushes everything down a little bit... while writing this i just noticed a really cool thing about the instrumentation which is that you can hear this ringing that you can hear every time the melody's synths stop like it's the reverberation of them. it feels like it's at the front of everything and it is the part of the song that gets crushed the most but it fits really well in the song too!! it makes me think of a bunch of things, like guitar amp feedback, or whistles, or really just some more silly things in life which adds to the wonder of the song; it honestly amazes me a lot because it's super engaging despite how static it is because of how simply full of beauty it is.

this song reminds me of a couple of things: death, epiphanies, and of course, space in general - i'm not gonna talk about the last one since i've written about it bunch but i will talk about the others. i have talked about how i think the emptiness of space isn't really a sad thing, but there of course is still some sadness in how you think of it. the song feels cold, like what you're hearing is what you find at the end of everything - maybe you're looking at the edge of the universe and you've been watching it morph and expand for as long as time has existed, but then you notice it start to get closer to you as it begins to contract and then you find yourself in whatever lays outside of the universe. there may not even be the ability to think or exist after this point... there are theories of what happens beyond, the only one i know being multiverses, but i think whatever happens, there would be peace and that's what really matters - which is what the song would represent. now that i think of it, maybe you could interpret this as death, but would death even be a thing if you just wander beyond the universe? humans can't comprehend what the color of a void looks like - there is nothing that exists in it, not even color, so if you try imagining it by closing your eyes, it wouldn't even be a good representation of it because you're still seeing color. you just closing your eyes also wouldn't be a good representation because your body is still working and you're still thinking and the world is still happening around you even if you're trying to stop everything that goes on inside of you. void is unimaginable, and not even space can help you get closer to imagining it. this song is something that i think could be interpreted as a captivating imagination of what a void that lays after everything that will ever existed could be like.

at the same time, the song provides a warmth like sitting next to a campfire does. it's like you're freezing on one half of your body, while on your other half you feel the same warmth that you feel as you're snuggled under a blanket during a cold winter break. epiphanies are something that can be really important in someone's thought process, like mine. i feel a bit silly mentioning it because i can't really think of many times where i've had such a thing happen (and i'm kinda bad with talking about things like this in general), but when it has, i think it's contributed to shaping me into the pondering girl i am now, especially as of recently. i like thinking about things - even if i get overwhelmed and my own thoughts hurt to listen to, i'm still happy that my mind is as capable as it is. it's something that i probably take for granted a lot, since it's not really something that you would have much opportunity to think about. this song, however, along with the void is like a tribute to the realization of things through just getting to the bottom of them and realizing what you realize. i think this song is a really cool way of going about showing this interpretation since at surface level it does feel a bit mundane, but it feels really special too which is kinda the same way epiphanies become part of you. this realization stems from a thing that is really important to you, and it kinda feels like you should've known about it sooner... after some time, it becomes part of you and it doesn't really feel as important anymore, but before you had no idea about it, and the feeling of relief that you feel from finally getting it is the embodiment of the song. you find meaning in the things that didn't seem to have meaning, or you didn't think meant what it means to you now. things like space never really meant anything to me before i realized there was more to the emptiness than what met my worried and rushed mind before. the "art" of thinking and realizing is something amazing, as dumb as it may sound, because it's the very foundation of what makes you what you are. epiphanies are a part of this, changing parts of reality you once thought was one thing, but really it's the next!, but it's so much bigger than that, so much more consequential, vast, deep; you could use a bunch of words and still not get to the essence of it, just like you can't really get to the bottom of what makes space - yes, just that fragment alone, because space and its fabric is much more than you'll ever imagine, but you can make out what you can from it and use it in your life, and whether you use it for good or bad or just continue on with your life, that is the beauty of the difference between something as small as the human mind and as grand as space itself.

to reiterate: i'm not really a space geek and i don't think i've ever been. at one point, it probably even brought me to tears thinking about how horrible it felt being so insignificant and how everything was finite and that my little world that we all live on doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of the universe. however, the past year and its experiences have made me realize so many things that i haven't before, including that you can find meaning from anything, even emptiness. i don't think there rationally is anything truly meaningless, and even if you can't find anything that pertains to you in one thing, maybe you could use that as a learning experience in a different perspective that would help you as well. the emptiness of space is far from meaningless. the ability to think is an amazing thing, and this resounding rendition of the beauties of space and its silence by roach is just one thing that has come from the unimaginable things that come from thought.

Album Runtime: 58:28 Release M/Y: July 1984
Favorite Tracks: Reflections in Suspension (97) Full Listens: 59, 13 since 21 Nov (184 streams)
Rating: ★★★★½ (9m) first listened 5 July @ 03h, published 1 December @ 03h
3,768 words; 20,553 characters ⁂

Ocean Rain by Echo & the Bunnymen: 21 November⁂

after every album i listen to, i kinda always find something else with a different sound to listen to than the last one even if i say i want to look into the genre more. it's because of a mixture of things really, like me just having a ton of music i really wanna get to and finding the beauty in the contrast of one thing to the next, and this along with so many other things is why i enjoy being so into music. whenever i started using rym, i'm not sure if i ever really thought about the possibility of finding new mutuals on here, since i've only really been a part of one community and i've always found it really hard to find the courage to try to talk to others that i think would be cool, so most of the people i've gotten to know for the past however long it's been have basically just found me interesting instead, for whatever reason that may be, and i find that really cool!! i mention this because this album is an apparent favorite of a new mutual of mine (hopefully this introduction isn't weird or anything i'm just never really sure what to start with when i write my entries...) and because of that (and something else i'll get in a bit), i acknowledged this and put it on my backlog to put it in the running for the next album i'd wanna listen to.

the killing moon was my introduction to what this album sounds like, since i just did that thing again where i listen to a really popular song off of the album, and it delighted me a lot and made me look forward to what it had to offer. it lured me in with the curious synths and calm drums, the singing rocked, and the whole progression of the song was what made me fall in love with it. after that, it was only really a matter of time before i got to the rest of the album. a couple of days prior, i listened to a few of the cure's songs, including one from their newest album, songs of a lost world. it was really cool to listen to a few more of their songs, especially friday i'm in love which is the one that i know and cherish the most. i don't really know much about popular artists and bands ashamedly, but it was really nice to go through a few of the band's more popular songs and see what so many people like about them so much. i definitely would like to listen to one of their albums someday, maybe pornography or wish or their most recent one, i'll decide when i get to them :P

as an album as a whole, at first i didn't really have anything to say about it. i remember listening to it while i was just in my math class doing some work which is something i think helps me concentrate on the music since i'm only really in my head at that moment and it felt like it oozed in and out of my ears really quickly. this isn't necessarily a bad thing, as i do remember it still being a fun and kinda nostalgic experience, but it was hard to remember much of what happened after i finished my first round. the fact that i can't remember much of an album after my first listen might or might not be a bad thing about how i go about critically listening to music as well as just doing it for fun, but i think this is why listening to something more than once is so important and is one of the essential things that i've integrated into my process of looking into different sounds and seeing how i like them. right now, i'm really doing it more so for fun than actually wanting to be critical, but i like writing about and analyzing what i like from the stuff i listen to. i don't really go that deep into it and maybe i should try doing that, but it makes this more fun as well and i kinda wanna prioritize that over anything else. this might b a dumb thing to comment on, but listening to this album also made me realize how apparent it was if a band was from england during this time... i don't listen to many other bands, but bands like the beatles as well as the smiths and the cure all are similar in their accents and i'm not sure if this is actually something that i should even comment on in the first place but it's something i found interesting at the same time soo i just wanted to mention it xP

another thing i liked from the start was of course how similar the album is with other albums that i've listened to from this time period. yeahh i've already mentioned this for a little bit and it’s very obvious but i think it's important since it's a huge, huge part of why the album's formula is what it is and also i’ll take the time to write about it here a bit since i’m not sure if i’ve ever written about it before. there's always a confident beginning, my favorite ones starting with guitars. the use of violins throughout is actually a really cool thing that i haven't really heard much of in the music i listen to a lot. even if they are intermittently used, the thing about that is they are an instrumental part of the album's catalogue, creating this beautiful atmosphere that gives me feelings of isolation but not in a depressive way, more like in an adventurous and focusing on finding yourself kind of way. the music is mixed interestingly as well to further this effect; i found myself continually getting lost during several points for each listen, with the noticeable echo on the vocals while everything else feeling like it’s stretched a little bit to create a broader sound that envelopes you more, and all the parts of the songs flow in parts or individually. of course, there are some things that set the album apart from this "old music formula" i'm talking about here. my favorite part probably is about the aforementioned instruments, how there are so many which all fuse together in the soundscape. i can't really think of many other examples that are this cohesive, where even the most tender and hidden tidbits positively add to the fun of everything.

something i wanna note kinda quickly is that every post-punk release i've listened to so far has been vastly different from the other ones i've listened to. i'm not sure if that's just how the genre is since maybe the foundation of what makes post-punk is particularly broad and so there are tons of different ways to build music around the essential elements of the genre and create vastly different sounds, or if it's something else (i've honestly never really known much about how genres, i guess, work), but i like that a lot about the genre. from the crushing deathconsciousness to the staggering sludgefest - as you can see, not very much lol - these are examples of how apparently versatile the genre is and it's something that'll probably intrigue me even more because of this album.

i think now it’s time to talk about my favorite songs from this album… i realized a bit ago in the shower that this album doesn’t have that many songs (i think 9 is at least an uncommon number) soo i’ll have to just keep it to a few which is fine but honestly each song has their own different quirks that distinguish them from each other that you could talk about them individually for a little while. first, i'll mention silver, ocean rain's opener. the intros of likee every album are supposed to be alluring to get you to want to keep listening and silver is no exception to this. it begins with some beautiful chords, and then there's no time wasted getting into the meat of the whole track where there's a little verse and then the chorus with an assortment of different instruments like flutes, maybe some brass, of course a tonnn more guitar which is probably the most malleable part of the song, the aforementioned violins, different percussion instruments… this is probably one of my favorite examples of what i was talking about earlier where every instrument comes together to create a unified, multifaceted sound that you can just enjoy and indulge in for hours. it’s very uplifting and energized, more so than some of the other songs on the album, which resort more so to beauty. the chorus that you can hear throughout is also another part i find really cool!! they fit so well and it honestly sounds a bit like michael gira tbh...

right after silver is nocturnal me, another highlight from the album. it contrasts the previous song, now diving into more of a dramatic tone, and it does remind me a lot of old music that i can’t really name if i try to think about it ( which it is old ofc xP ), or like something straight out of a drama movie. i really like the lyrics here, they flow really well and the whole song especially sounds like a dance with your lover before you go on the endless journey sailing through the seas... it all moves so smoothly!! this in general is just one of my favorite performances from mccollugh (i probably should've looked his name up earlier lol). the flute that i think is kinda the backbone of the entire song has such a nice melody, supporting everything around it, and it feels like it's in the forefront and the background at the same time, like it's kinda the embodiment and lining of the song... it's really interesting lol xP later down the line, thorn of crowns is another one of my favorites. it's kinda silly, which is something that i definitely realized when i first listened to it, and it did take a little bit to get used to, but now i think it's awesome. i think the best way i can describe the tone throughout the majority of the song is sparkly - there's lots of yelps, vocalizing, alluding to different things like vegetables and ancient civilizations, and other cool things that aren't really seen much if at all in the rest of the record. the song then changes tone and turns into a more calm, peculiar act with the little noises scattered through and more bare-bones instrumentation before the last efforts of the track which start with the descent of mccollugh's "down"s and the yelp to finish it off which just rocks!! it makes for such a cool ending to the song and to the album's first side in what was an otherwise different track in terms of humor while keeping that consistency of quality in the production.

for the last track i'll talk about, i already wrote about the killing moon prior, so i'll talk about the album's closer, the album-titled ocean rain. this five minute epic begins with soft synths, solely accompanying the vocals drenched in echo like they've always been, however it's even more apparent here and it makes for a really nice spotlight kind of effect. from here, the selection of instruments expands a little bit, with careful drums, additional strings and woodwinds along with other things all beginning this crescendo. "all hands on deck at dawn" is such a beautiful line, it sounds like the band's frontman is looking into the distance at the end of his little boat, maybe towards some land or maybe it's nothing and he's lamenting about his new life living in solitary in the middle of nowhere; whatever it is, i'm really fond of that line, and it has probably one of my favorite deliveries on the whole album. the dynamic coalescing of the instruments eventually culminates into something that i just realized could actually be really interesting... the vocals peak and the word "waves" drags, and maybe it could be a cool implication about how strong and destructive waves can be in the ocean, especially during rain, and instead of the boat and mccollugh getting a happy ending, the last lines are about the struggle and perhaps the last moments before succumbing to the vast natural dangers of the ocean. it all adds to the hugely dramatic feeling of the song, which i just love a lot. the drama is conveyed so well on the songs where you can actually tell it has that tone (nocturnal me and this one especially, as i've talked about both lol), and it also kinda ties into how it feels like a movie or maybe part of a novela or something... it kinda makes me wish that it was more of a norm on here rather than something i just notice on both of the aforementioned songs, although maybe i'm just looking at it through the wrong lens and all of these fit in their own ways into this sort of novela theme which would definitely be plausible.

whenever i mentioned the hints of adventure that i feel throughout listening to the album, i think it ties in a lot with the theme of the album itself. i don't think i've properly thought about the actual theme of the story, just, i guess, the way it could be told, but if i had to think off the spot of one then maybe you could say it's all about sailing the seas, being seasick, thinking about your relationships in the past as a cacophony of thoughts stirs in your head as you only really have yourself and your boat, and your mind sticks out more than ever before. i think it's both a beautiful piece of art and especially time capsule as this does especially feel like older music, which isn't something that i normally look at since even though i did start getting into music with a-ha, most of the music i was into for a long time was actually the opposite of old with me just listening to digicore and the occasional popular pop and hip hop stuff :P i'm happy to have had looked into this album and i think this is something that everyone can find enjoyment in!! happy to have finally gotten to write this too since yeahhh i took a while... it is a common thing at this point but i wish it wasn't. i've been working on writing this entry since the beginning of this week since i finally haven't had any homework for the first time in likee weeks soo i decided to seize the opportunity since i've been wanting to move on from this xP alsoo i just realized this is only my twelth entry of the year soo i kinda wanna pump that number up at least a good bit by next year... i think i've been doing good with staying somewhat committed to this diary, even though the writing is slowww i haven't forgotten about it and i think about it every day which is honestly really good. it gives me something to do and i wanna keep it going for as long as i can so ya!!

Album Runtime: 37:14 Release M/Y: May 1984
Favorite Tracks: The Killing Moon (85) Full Listens: 17+ (185 streams)
Rating: ★★★½ (7+) first listened 7 November @ 13h, published 21 November @ 01h
2,583 words; 13,852 characters ⁂

My tek lintowe by Tek lintowe: 5 November⁂

my tek lintowe is another one of those albums i've been wanting to listen to for quite some time... as i always say. i first learned about this artist's existence because one of my best online friends followed him on twitter. at first i never really bothered to try his music out or anything but he was sort of in the back of my mind and someone i saw on my twitter timeline every so often cuz of her too. up until this summer, it stayed that way, until when tek released it's been real, a live album comprised of some songs from a bunch of different mixtapes and other singles. after listening for the first time, i distinctly remember i deeply fell in love with the live version of armored core and kept it and a bunch of his other songs constantly in rotation throughout the rest of the summer. it was a really really unique album, managing to transform his songs into orchestral works which breathed new magnitudes of life into them. when you think of the idea, it feels like something that people would joke about likee in a stupid movie or something, but when i listened to his rendition of it, it made so much sense and you could even say it's an eye-opening experience with how innovative it is. meanwhile, i acknowledged the existence of my tek lintowe, however i was too "busy" listening to nuhitz and it's been real among other things and i just postponed giving it a listen for the longest time :P

while i was procrasinating writing my two airships / exploder falls entry, since i was still listening to tek and had accumulated likee close to 1,500 scrobbles by then, i decided that i was gonna listen to the album cuz i was interested in listening to more of his electronic music. i did that thing where i listen to a song before i listen to the full thing to get a taste of what it potentially could be like and this experience made me realize why that might not be such a good idea lol... i first listened to soldiers mainly cause i peeked at the album's comment box and saw a comment about how good the song was and it was really cool!! it felt really overwhelming but in a good way that didn't carry any pain... it disassembles and rematerializes in front of you an impossible amount of times, and you can't bear to look away because it's so dire yet so alluring. it was really addicting and then i listened to the track before it, unlearn, which was pretty much as good as soldiers, composed of so many beautiful synths including the song's powerful climax which is like a serum running through your entire body from your brain to your heart to your feet and it felt like something i had been looking for in music - something that i didn't know that i wanted, but once i found it, it was as familiar and as welcoming as ever. its decrescendo after was so well executed and the fact that it transitions into the track after it excited me a lot, so of course i listened to both unlearn and soldiers in that respective order a bunch!

i remember trying to cram it in whenever i could in the mornings, since my airpods still hadn't gotten here yet (they arrived by the time i started listening to the whole thing). it's really hard for me to want to do when i wake up, and a lot of the time i just sleep for an extra hour after since my morning routine begins 2 hours before my school day even begins and i wanna get some extra sleep since my schedule is honestly kinda unhealthy especially when i sleep later than i want to which has happened basically every day for at least the past few weeks (it's kinda dumb why i do it in the first place but my school is pretty far away from me and if i was responsible i would sleep at like 11 or even before that since i always have to wake up really early in order to make it work for my family's schedule and stuff... i won't get into it too deeply but it's probably a problem for my health and also just an annoyance in general U-_-U).

after a while, i finally listened to the album for the first time, not in a random classroom busy with whatever i had going on at the moment like i had thought i would've, but instead just in my room, the same room that it has been and will be probably for another long while. i wanted to make sure i paid some attention to the music, and so i probably decided to play something less intensive in order to attempt to fulfill that want more, however of course that rarely will be the best way to introduce yourself to new music xP one thing that i really like about the album is that it's segmented into parts, marked by their tracks sort of acting as interludes like ants decayed. it's like it creates this foundation for a book that you can barely even read, where you can only make out the grey smudges of both text and illustration on the damaged pages. i think this could be a way to describe how it felt to listen for the first time. it made me feel tons of different things, but there were a few of these things that stood out from the rest - it was disorienting and it didn't make sense, but it felt like there was solace in it at the same time. i was very conflicted and i had no idea where to go from there. i never hated it - quite the opposite, maybe it's because of my bias or because of whatever else, but i just didn't understand it from the first time. i think from then i realized that this was something that'd grow on me the more i listened to it. you can say this is true for most albums, which is why i always maintain my standard of giving an album a bunch of listens after the first in order to gather my thoughts before i move onto rating it, but the way it made me feel and the way it stuck in my head was super different compared to any other music recently.

from then on i gave it a bunch of additional full listens and this thought became true. something that i like about this little hobby and listening to music in general is that you can do is listen to the same new music in different environments, which provides a whole different plane of experiences and emotion (i feel lik writing it like this makes it seem so much more strange and it feels rly pretentious but i'm not sure how else to write it
U >_< U) with it.

my first takeaway from the project is that it makes for this state of mind that everything is temporary but at the same time it's all linked together, sort of like a cycle. even with the explicit transitions between songs, it feels like they are all so separate, as if they were controlling, pulling different strings in different worlds, from the more friendly and familiar worlds of songs like wires to the more rogue worlds of others like i can tell. however, they're still brought together with how mysterious and unconventional they are. they're all made from a selection of instruments, majorly the same ones which contribute to creating these maybe lush environments which feel like a slight breeze surrounding you, feeling like it could pick you up and take you to another world, figuratively or literally. one thing i adore about this album is how integral synths are in its sound! they are used so often in different ways and feel really comforting. they remind me a lot of some of the older electronic projects i've listened to in the past like frailty where synths are pretty prevalent there too. honestly their presence throughout the whole album is super super important i just can't describe well enough how important they are.

haunted me peachy kinda sounds like a scene from a movie or mayb a visual novel, complete with vignette. my favorite thing that i visualize when i listen is just a single sailboat in the middle of a foggy sea. i really like how the track is built up from the single, droning synth that constantly goes in and out. tek's voice is also really comforting and i think it's one of the calmest songs on the whole album. something that happens on here and throughout the album is another aspect of its worldbuilding, which is the placement of so many different little sounds, probably a lot of them comprised of samples, into the atmosphere. i notice it a lot, even when i listened to it for the first time, and it is such a great way to further immerse yourself in the music!! the songs are so intricate, laden with so many little details that all work so well together. i feel like even if you tried dissecting each song it'd take you a while before you get past the first round of searching, an even then there'd still probably be plenty of more hidden things that seemed to pass you by without you knowing.

i wonder if there's lik any documentation on what the album is about or the meaning of each track and stuff like that. i heard someone say ( not sure if it was on rym or not, i don't fully remember what they said either :< ) that kill you was based on his departure from shed theory and his thoughts about the people who were in it or something like that which i find really interesting despite not know anything about that group and i wonder if there was a concept in mind while he was making this. ofccc the listener can always find their own meaning in whatever music they want, but i always still like looking into what the artist thought about what they made and i keep it in mind a lot whenever after i learn about it whenever i listen. for me, this album really is a trip. maybe you could describe it as an acid trip. maybe you could not describe it that way but instead in another kind of trip like one where you go off the grid and leave everything you have behind except your thoughts which plague you an infinite amount to where you go insane and you start imagining things in a new world you immersed yourself in based on these thoughts; now you're trapped inside and you keep digging yourself deeper and deeper and by the time you become irrecognizable and completely shuffled yet the fragments of your old self are still there, its aftertaste constantly lingering and phasing in and out for however long it's been. whatever way you'd put it, it encompasses so many different feelings, parts of life that pop into your mind like flashbacks as you listen and remember that you maybe look back on with resentment or fondness or whatever else is on your mind. nostalgia i feel is a significant part of the palette of feelings that this album gives, and now that i think of it maybe this album is another one of those inspired by old video games and animes. they can shape sound in so many different ways like the end of evangelion did with the lamb as effigy, a reference i found really cool even though i've never watched any of the anime itself... it feels so related to you yet so distant.

there are a few other songs and track runs i'd wanna write about here. of course, you have unlearn followed by soldiers, which i'd say are probably my favorite couple of songs on the album with how the way they feel simply being unmatched. there is also sleepy (re:scared) / bad life projectory blue bleach jungle / widf*i, which holds another significant thing about the album that i wanna talk about... of course, i've written about the whole album being very surreal and sample-filled, but sleepy (re:scared) is one of the most extreme examples of the latter, being quicker and more hard-hitting than most of the other songs on the album at its loudest. the moments before it went into its little drop with whoever it was crying while the synths especially along with the whole song becoming more panicked actually made me feel a bit uncomfortable at first listen, and i thought that was cool although it kinda contributed to me feeling like i have such little understanding of the album lol xP it was an awesome and unexpected turn of events from then on and it was a great ending before it segued into the next song where it creates this completely different feeling, only maintaining its velocity. it feels a lot more positive and it was an instant hit with me cause it was another welcome change of pace and tek's voice was again probably my favorite part of it. then, widf*i is the last song of this run with more vocals and a kinda poppy composition over these synths that kinda have this grainy and fuzzy sound that somewhat envelope your ears. i really like this a lot and the fuzzy feeling carries to your heart. if i had to compare it to another song or two in order to try to describe it better, i feel like it reminds me a bit of that's that, a song from this artist i listened to at this digital concert i attended a few years ago. this might've been made during the peak and maybe transformation / transition of some digicore artists from the former to another sound and although i know tek didn't go the same route, it is a demonstration of his versatility and his ability to create vastly new sounds using elements from his older ones.

the other run of songs that stood out to me a lot that i'd like to write about would be haunted me peachy / one more / seroquel era. i already wrote a bunch about the first song, and it leads directly into the next which begins in this organic, a bit garden-like intro accompanied some cute ad-libs. the composition of this song is especially cool and even the whole kinda drowning effect you can hear on the vocals for the first part of the song. the exposition of this song is really unique and is a great way to end it; it does feel somewhat unconventional with the off-key vocals in the outro and the background winding backwards, kinda like a passage of time, but i honestly really like it as well. this is then followed by a trumpet and the beginning of seroquel era, a fully instrumental song made along with le0l (who tbhh i hadn't heard about before but i listened to one of their songs and they actually seem really cool!!). i feel like it's a bit hard to tell their influence on this song but i feel like it's definitely there :P the whole song follows this melody that crescendos as it goes on, and it's one of the more simpler songs that i've still come to like a lottt when it comes to tek. the sudden beginning of the gradual speed up was something i really didn't expect and was honestly a bit overwhelming at first, but after listening to it a bunch it was yet another one of those things that just grew on me after a while. another one of these small details i really like is right before the synth fully intensifies when the flute is goes flat (maybe??) on a note, which of course is intentionally off-key too and it is just a cute little thing that still makes a positive difference with the outcome and the suspense of the ending.

(i'm writing this + the second to last paragraph after last night and honestly i feel like i could've written about a couple of other things like putting more emphasis on its division into four parts as i do think that there is a respective change in sound for each part, including part 3 which is comprised of just ode to nothing, which is a nicely drawn out ambient song, but i don't really feel that equipped to coherently keep writing a lot right now...)

i guess the last thing about the album i'd like to mention are the features throughout. i've heard a few of them before, mostly on nuhitz, and they fit so well into the haunting atmosphere. this was something i was expected since i had also listened to mortified a lot before and it is pretty reminiscent to this album as well. out of everyone featured i think jackzebra had my favorite performance but i like woody's voice a lot too and the transition from widf*i to control room as this sort of last effort before part 3 begins is done well. jackzebra also is just someone i wanna listen to more in general... even though it probably really isn't as crazy as it seems the fact that cloud rap in chinese exists is super cool and he just released a massive mixtape with sooo many songs as well i think i might look into him someday since i listened to a few of his songs and i liked them all too :>

my tek lintowe is really difficult to describe, however i think this is intentional to some degree, like when you deal with a paranormal experience and you only have some things to go off of and the rest is left to your interpretation, which at times maybe you can't even come up with anything. it was awesome finally seeing how creative he can become with his array of resources, creating things that honestly i relate to a lot, most prominently with the melodies and the synths that embody them. he is really really skillful and it's amazing to hear more music from yet another person who can produce for genres like cloud rap and plugg which i find super cool and also at the same time create completely different landscapes that i didn't even know was something that i would enjoy, even with the same things that are present in the former. it kinda reminds me a bit of my old online friends or maybe even the times when i'm lonely in bed with nothing except the comfort to remind me i'm still here... it's kinda unconventional but these kinds of albums are still really awesome and i love listening to them. this does feel like it still would grow even more on me, as it was apparent from the beginning, and even though it is a bit hard for me to find the best time to listen to this album since i really insist in listening to it in its entirety with little interruptions, i still would like to listen more and i look forward to doing so!!

Album Runtime: 70:43 Release M/Y: August 2022
Favorite Tracks: Unlearn + Soldiers (92) Full Listens: 13+ (421 streams)
Rating: ★★★★ (8b) first listened 28 October @ 22h, published 5 November @ 22h
3,226 words; 17,288 characters ⁂

Two Airships / Exploder Falls by Candy Claws:
27 October⁂

recently, i've gotten back into rating music for multiple reasons, but one of the things that drives me most is that i've been trying to find more cool new music to listen to more often. i've probably already written about this before but whenever i feel there isn't really much for me to listen to, I just start going down my liked songs repeatedly and play the same things, which as you could probably guess gets old eventually. of course, I could try listening to some of the stuff i've rated in the past that I forget about (and honestly now that I write about it I probably should try that out soon lol...), but where's the fun in that when i can keep experiencing new sounds and expanding my musical knowledge / palette / whatever else?? after I rated 13" frank beltrame Italian stiletto with bison horn grips, I was super lost with what album I wanted to do next, and even with my accumulating backlog I'm still keen on checking albums off from as I go on, I ended up just browsing the website for a little while to see if I could find something that looked interesting enough. honestly, I didn't know what I was looking for, since I wasn't in the mood for anything specifically... instead I just wanted to find something to occupy my ears with, so I figured that anything would work.

after enough browsing around and even making a playlist to listen to a bunch of songs off of different albums to see which one sounded the best, I think I was just looking at some random chart when I remembered this band called candy claws. ceres & calypso in the deep time has this really pretty cover and i've heard people say really good things about it and it's really well received as well, but while looking at their other albums, this one piqued my interest the most. the last thing I remember before listening to the album for the first time was looking at the shout box and seeing how much people liked it and how it was a mind-blowing album and stuff... sooo i guess that made me a lot more confident in this album and then i ended up putting it on to see what it was all about. the first time (and a bunch of other times) i started listening to this, it was on while i was playing minecraft for the first time in likee probably a couple of months on this same world i've been playing on since the middle of summer. i mention it as if it's something significant because i really enjoy listening to albums, those that are instrumental especially, while playing the game cause i'm focusing on it a lot more than i usually do when i'm playing other games and it accompanies the gameplay well too. i'll probably write about / mention this at least another one or two times in future entries (since it is especially more significant for this ambient album i adore)... it's so fascinating to me how it sometimes can even likeee elevate the experience of the album which is definitely not something i can say for every game or every other thing i do ofccc!!

cuz of how many times i've listened to this album over the last couple of weeks it makes it a little harder for me to write about it since i find it easier to write about new music when my thoughts are most ripe in my mind... whenever i listen to new stuff, i always make sure to take note of some things that i rly like and want to write about in my entry, which has been kind of a big help when it comes to writing these things, soo i'll probably just be depending a lot on these more than i usually would like to. to begin, i love the very structure of the album, how it's just comprised of these two expansive songs that take so many different twists and turns during their runtime in order to create this kinda chaotic yet i guess velvety demeanor coated in ample distortion. recently, i've been obsessed with the idea of the creation of such long songs because of their ability to tell such cohesive and rich stories that artist can fully flesh out using the entirety of the large canvas they provide themselves with making songs of this length or even longer. swans' music, of course, is a really good example of a band that takes advantage of the limitless bounds of song creation and excel at being able to depict such beautifully detailed landscapes with emphasis on patience in order for the story to slowly burn into the listener, eventually leaving its mark on them like what happens when you rest your arm on something sharp and it etches the surface a bit into your skin. this is an important part of the album -the exciting and busy atmosphere laden with overpowering drums and guitars which leave maybe a mist full of glitter and confetti that floats in the space that is constantly changing and morphing in coordination with the way the music whirls, writhes, wreathes around you.

i didn't mean to get dramatic there!! xP i feel like listening to it is like taking a pill… its length is perfectly controlled to where you can turn it on and enjoy it whenever you want, feeling its effects while not being too short or too long to provide amazing resolution for how expansive the musical landscape is. now that i think of ittt it kinda reminds me of ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space with its medication theme which i think is rly cute except i feel it a lot more with this album despite it ofc not having that sort of theme… its messiness ( i couldn't think of a better word xP ) commands you to listen and feel the sounds rushing through your eyes and into your mind, and by the end it will finally begin to fully take effect.

it surprised me with how different i would've imagined it sounded compared to dream pop or just the sound of their more well-known album ceres and calypso was. tbh i've never listened to the album other than a couple of the more popular songs while i was looking for something to listen to (probably likeee a few weeks ago by the time i'm writing this part of the entry?? LOL) but even then i recognized how massively different the atmosphere and sound were compared to that and just anything in general really... the only thing that this reminded me of when i listened to it to the first time honestly was hexd (i was contemplating whether or not i should even mention the genre here but now would b the best time to mention it) probably mainly cause of the wild dynamics and tons of distortion which sound kinda reminiscent to bitcrushing as well as ofc the way the drums themselves sound sometimes which remind me of a few hexd songs i think about at times.

the amount of time it took me to write this entry might ruin the rating experience for me but the way the album sounds still just amazes me. its short runtime benefits it a lot just cause the progression is inherently made to be much more rapid and even explosive at times and it makes for this grandiose yet cozy landscape that is great to put on whenever you're focusing on something or playing a game... i think the only time that it might be less good is when you're going with your friends somewhere (it'd probably make things harder for me at least...) but even walking around listening to this by yourself would be awesome!! i bought a pair of airpods since i've been wanting a pair of earbuds that i can call my own for more than like a year by now and also i wanted a rly good pair of them and i decided to just splurge for the first time in forever since i don't like spending that much money cuz i don't have a job yet and stuff... but i think these are awesomeee and i love wearing them around since i can just listen to as much music as i want and i can even talk to people while wearing them cuz of the adaptive noice cancellation and stuff!! i'm really excited to keep using these as you can tell lol...

now that i've finally written my entry for this i already know what i'm looking forward to listen to next and hopefully i can work on finishing my entry faster next time. nooo hopefully it won't be like when i rated flood and then i stopped writing for a few months with the couple of things i've bought to make things easier and remind myself of my diary i probably won't forget at least not as easily!! i don't think i have yet to go a day without thinking of my diary and soo i think it'll continue that way for at least another long while... :P

Album Runtime: 30:06 Release M/Y: August 2008
Favorite Tracks: Exploder Falls - very tough pick... (90) Full Listens: 30 (60 streams)
Rating: ★★★★ (8+) first listened 5 October @ 02h, published 27 October @ 20h
1,545 words; 8,232 characters ⁂

13" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto With Bison Horn Grips by Xiu Xiu: 4 October⁂

i'd probably say xiu xiu have been the band who've affected my music taste the most in a long time... they played a rly big role in helping me love learning about new music. the way they never feared to be as experimental as they are, how their sound was able to effectively morph into the new landscape they envisioned every album they made - it was and still is amazing to me!! i learned about them during summer of 2023, a few months after they released their record ignore grief, and ever since what they would do for whatever they released next remained in the back of my mind while i went on to listen to other music.

fast forward to now and here it is in all its holographic rainbow glory!! before it released i had listened to their first single, common loon, which i thought was pretty good (didn't rly think much of it at the time tbh but it did still sound nice) but i hadn't listened to their other single arp omni / veneficium, shame on me, so i didn't really have much to go off of when it came to my expectations of the album. i was surprised to see how highly praised it has been, and it made me happy since ofc a bunch of their more recent albums haven't been met with such, at least on here. i took a little while to get to this album since i wanted to write my just got back from the discomfort—we're alright entry, and i decided that afterwards i'd listen to this album.

sooo to summarize what i think... i don't really like it that much. it makes me a bit sad cuz of how i mentioned how well it's being received by everyone else and i love this band a lottt but it just kinda makes me feel discontent. the production on here is still really cool... i'd agree that xiu xiu always has had really good production on all of their albums, but it just doesn't really land that well for me. i like the progression throughout the album and everything is made in a way that compliments the atmosphere in a nice way, however i think this is something that's simply not for me. throughout my listens, i liked the first few tracks (common loon is the best song on here by a good margin), but i constantly felt like i was being strained into a tiny space which only got worse as i listened. as i listened each time, i really didn't feel like there was more substance from the last time i listened and the experience felt futile.

i always want to make sure i give an album multiple listens at different times, especially i listened once while i was in a bad mood, which has affected how my initial thoughts several times, but disappointingly, there wasn't really much of a hunger for me to want to listen to it again. even when i listened to my lowest rated albums, i still felt a slight want to listen again to see i had any change of heart, but i didn't feel that after listening to this. still, since i love this band, i went through it as many times as i did (tbh not as many as i wished i had, i'm on break but i haven't been listening to music as much as i'd imagined i would for some reason...) in an attempt to properly gather my thoughts, and there still were some good highlights on the record. of course, we have common loon, but we also have the other two tracks previously released on a single, arp omni and veneficium.

arp omni serves as this intriguing, delicately burning opener that kinda paints this picture in my head as the listener being put into this void - not in a depressive sense, but instead as sort of like a sense where you're thrown into this impossibly empty space, floating while listening to jamie's voice as if they're like some sort of omnipresent being accompanying you in your otherwise lonely stay. it was honestly a bit sweet listening to it every time and even though it's not my favorite xiu xiu opener, it still is really well fleshed out and is in a really good place. the other side of the single, veneficium, is my second favorite song on the album. it has this cool pacing and the synth (i'm not sure what you'd call it) that i'm pretty sure is the melody honestly reminds me of likeee something on a scary movie soundtrack. i don't like all of the vocal performances on the album, but jamie does really well here as the sound becomes a bit more abrasive as multiple different synths come together to kinda just amplify the "haunted" feeling even more. i don't wanna just mention the single tracks since that'd be a bit dumb soo i'd also like to mention t.d.f.t.w. ... i really like how dirty and blaring it sounds, it coats the whole song in this glowing atmosphere that it benefits a lot from!! the end where the vocals echo and the trumpets and everything else begin to sound and warp severely before the cymbal rings is probably my favorite part of the track, and i also like waiting to the end for it, like u do when the song's rewarding to listen until the end for :p i really like the drum work on this album too... even on the weaker songs like pale flower and maestro one chord, it makes it a lot better to listen to and they r rly creatively done throughout!!

to be honestt this album seems a lot like a fusion of some of forget and angel guts: red classroom, with some more of the usual xiu xiu flare added on top to make it even more explosive and fun. even though i don't love this as much as it is being loved by others right now, maybe later on this'll grow more on me as i listen to more of their albums or just other random albums in general. when i started to listen to xiu xiu, i set the goal of rating all 16 of their main LPs, and to no one's surprise, i couldn't achieve my goal, but i still came surprisingly close with being able to rate 12 of them (now 13 out of 17 lol)... the first one that comes to mind for me would be ignore grief; i wonder how it sounds like constantly whenever i think of the band, so that might be my next choice when it comes to listening to my next xiu xiu record. discography order is also an option however, and this album was just kinda an exception when it comes to how i wanna go about rating their discography, so if i wanted to do that, i'd start with unclouded sky (might do that so i can get to their twin peaks cover album next). whatever happens next, i look forward to exploring more of xiu xiu's discography next!! once again, maybe this'll grow some more on me, since i did feel a bit fonder of a couple of songs i relistened to while writing this entry... we'll see!!

Album Runtime: 36:17 Release M/Y: September 2024
Favorite Tracks: Common Loon (78) Full Listens: 6 (64 streams)
Rating: ★★★ (6-) first listened 2 October @ 01h, published 4 October @ 03h
1,221 words; 6,382 characters ⁂

Just Got Back From the Discomfort—We're Alright by The Brave Little Abacus: 1 October⁂

this is another one of those albums that i've been looking forward to rate for some time now. something i wanna passively work towards is rating an album from each state and then expand that into listening to some from a ton of different countries ( i can't say i wanna listen to an album from every country since with my work ethic idk if i could ever get to that point :/ ), and i guess this is my first album rating that i've consciously listened that contributes to that goal. for the longest time, i held back from listening to any songs from this album, i guess in the hopes that it'd entice me enough for me to remember it and listen to it blindly eventually? there's not really much i can say on how i found out about the album other than its obvious popularity - i just started listening to please don't cry, they stopped hours ago. probably around a week ago and since then have accumulated likee 40 scrobbles on it since then... it made me really want to start listening especially because of how beautifully the cascading cymbals sounded towards the end and also just cause of the cheeky ending which held me back from hearing what was next until i actually listened to the album. every time i listened to it it felt like it was calling my name and i answered a ton of times until i had to stop myself so i wouldn't tire myself of it before i actually listened to the album. :P i took so long with this in the first place because last week was soo busy for me that it felt like i couldn't really fit anything else into my standard routine after getting home (playing my dumb games and talking with my friends sometimes, i have sooo much free time but i procrastinate too much to make it seem that way ofccc)...

before i actually go into talking about the album i'd kinda like to just write about something i have a problem with when it comes to rating music in general and it's that i never really remember how songs sound like for a long time... after the first time or even the first few times i listen to an album, i still can barely recall the sound of the progression of a track if at all. maybe this happens often for people (moreso than i'm making it out to be) but it's still kind of a pain in the ass when it comes to rating music cause a lot of what consumes so much time for me is thinking of ways to convey what my thoughts are of what i've listened to into writing and whenever i forget it makes things a lot harder... i guess that's kinda the experience and part of the practice that goes into writing these things. maybe it's something that you deal with better with experience as you get better with building from what you remember or something... to be honest, ever since i've gotten into the habit of writing these extensive entries where i try to capture and analyze more of what i thought of the album i've always felt a bit weird about thinking about what to write about. i'm not sure if i talked about this on my last entry but actually calling these diary entries is part of just trying to make me be more comfortable with writing these and make them more personal as something to just bring my back into the groove of this and not dread wanting to do so in the first place!! i'm not really sure if what i've written about other albums i've rated before, especially in the listening diary i made last year, felt like, but now i think that a conscious move to label them as such and gear my writing to be more like writing in one will make me feel better while doing so.

to start talking about the album, overall, it's the closest thing i've listened to that sounds like an actual movie. i guess this might be what feeling an actual journey in musical form is like, but i find it especially intriguing because it gives me this unique feeling that i rarely feel with even other concept albums i've listened to before. i'm not sure specifically what combination helps sells it so well, whether it be the continuous transitions into the different songs of the album which honestly disorient me more than i have been in a while on where the songs begin and end ( even though it might be easier to tell given how i'm pretty sure there's a significant addition in sound for every song that does so - note the usage of addition, not change :P ), or how it all just kinda reminds me of a drama, or how i think this genre actually fits the soundtrack of the aforementioned drama now that i think of it, or whatever other way this album feels like in my brain, but it just feels so much so that it kinda alters how i think of the album. for most of the album, the progression is actually really well executed - the drums move you in this flow supported by how powerful the vocals are which adds a lot of weight in the consequences of the album's story and is a big part of what compromises the emotion in the album. but, by the time you get to it's not what you think it is, it feels like so little time has passed, and i kinda feel like the resolution of the album is a bit too short for how much is spent in its climax. i guess this might be because of how short the descent is from that and the end of the album - but maybe it's also just cause of how many of the album's i've listened to recently have been like significantly longer than this... might be more so the latter but i'm not really sure!!

pile! no pile! pile! is definitely one of my favs from the album. i really like how diverse the sound palette is, especially the pianos that are like the pattern everything so gracefully forms, like as the crushed synths fall around you early on in the track. they are like cherries on top of the tauntingly grey sundaes that spill over from the intensity of everything that's going on. i also really like adam's (i think that's his name) vocals here, as it's especially diverse in where it goes and where it ends throughout the song. something i like about the record is how consistently he both sings and yells in his songs, accompanying each other as a sort of commonplace instrument throughout its entirety... it further helps make the songs feel more chaotic, but the yelling honestly also makes it more relatable, like you want to feel the album as if it were times and memories felt before. another thing that i'd like to quickly mention is that i admire how, of course, since it's the intro, you'd really wanna make sure that you grab the listener with every ounce of everything that you've got - this is a really strong way of achieving that goal with how passionate and combined this song is!!

can't run away is another one of my favorite songs, which fits as a piece in the whole section of the main part of the whole album. to begin, the selection of instruments here is really nice, with the shakers in the background, delicate strumming, and the soft synths in the background creating this sort of woolly atmosphere that kinda sits a bit in my mind. the bells in the background are really well placed as they serve as a bridge and brings and lightens up the environment a bit. eventually, the strumming and everything else gets louder and more imposing as it continues on. this song as a whole is just another vocal highlight for me, they fit really well with the song and actually kind of materializes this feeling of vulnerability that i'd probably feel way less without them. both this song and pile! no pile! pile! also have something in common which i really like, that being the solemn drones (idk if i can or should call them that tbh, but i'm not sure what else i could call them) that make up the endings of both tracks. i've come to appreciate these kinds of endings more, and even if they don't carry the same grandiose as the endings of other songs on other albums like privilege of being do, they still are really nice to listen to. on this song, it feels like something that strings together a bunch of memories blurred together as you're left alone in one of those moments where everything that annoys and dismays you come rushing back.

untitled (cont.), my favorite song on this album, is something that i'd consider happens directly after the ending of can't run away, as if they were connected like a lot of the rest of it is. everything (with the exception of please don't cry) ends and leads into the next so quickly, so confidently - honestly, i find it really nice and unique to how the record does things. the usage of trumpets on this song is really nice... i'm pretty sure these aren't used throughout the entire album, but i think they really fit this song as it plays a role in the constantly moving canvas this song paints. to me, it just feels like you're in one of those cars that those rich people in cartoons drive that don't have a roof and have this cool structure, maybe with some bumpers and stuff, and the sky is full of stars that rearrange themselves as your feelings intensify. you keep thinking about the marvellous, color-changing skyline as you go on with your life and try to find solace in the other things in life that aren't what you feel most comfortable with, but it never really feels like it works, and everything just comes back to failures and the stars frantically move and contract and expand uncontrollably. my favorite thing about the tracks are the segments where the drums really ramp up and wash everything away to introduce the next part of the song... the bells playing before and the piano that takes the place of the trumpets are really nice too. the latter adds a lot to the song's texture, even though they are definitely in the background of everything, it sort of softens the edges of the song and ties everything in a bit more as it all becomes a bit louder and condensed after the drum part before.

something that i've been wanting to do is trying to be harsher (however much i can reasonably be with myself) with how i rate albums in order to be more representative of how i actually perceive what i listen to and how much i actually like them. i like being positive with most of the albums that i listen to and i don't really try to find albums that don't really interest me, but i've been wanting to make the difference in rating more apparent since i am realizing that even a 7 may be too high for what i think of some albums sometimes (i kinda hate how rym restricts you to just a 10-point / 5-star scale in general, which is why i opted to use aoty exclusively for a while until i just came to like the former more :p ). i guess the thing that turns me off from this album is that it's just probably not something i could turn on at any time and enjoy listening to. of course, there's always times where you wouldn't want to listen to an album, which happens a lot to me as well as my mind just kinda gets overwhelmed or randomly gets tired of a certain sound, so i just look for something else to listen to since music is the thing that most commonly is in the background throughout the entire day. however, this album just feels like i'd get tired of it more quickly, maybe cause of how intense it sounds, amplified by how much adam yells, or maybe how some of the album just kind of sounds too much of the same for my taste? it's something that happens to me fairly often and there's not really a reason i can point to all of the time, but it definitely feels like an album that would do so. about the yelling, it's not that it sounds bad, because that would be stupid of me to say, but something i just remembered while writing is that it doesn't really have this sort of spiritual(?) resonancy that some other (a minute number) emo / screamo album have made me feel. 10 songs is something that comes to my mind first for me. i remember having it on repeat alll the time probably in like january or something, back when i was really sad probably from after my ex stopped talking to me for a month, and i guess it gave me something to fill my head while i was rotting in bed not wanting to do anything else... i'm not sure if it's just cause of the different voices or something, but this doesn't really have the same effect on me. rating for me is a lot more feeling than anything else, and i guess that's one of the reasons why i like doing it so much. another thing i wanna mention that probably goes along a lot with what i’ve been talking about is that it isn’t really that memorable for me. the highs sound really sweet and fun at times, but it mostly blends into this one huge piece where it kinda takes the same approach throughout a majority of the album, take away a few songs. even the interludes feel sort of like breaks or maybe even interruptions that then continue into the same sound that goes on for most of the album. it's not necessarily detrimental to the experience for me, but i just don't feel like this release is something i can rate very highly because of how i feel about it. it sounds great but it just doesn’t really make me feel as much emotion as it maybe should.

just got back from the discomfort—we're alright is an album that, even with my gripes, is a simply great piece of midwest emo history, taking you on this journey that is executed honestly unlike most other album's i've listened to. it's really nice to have finally listened to this album, of course given its popularity, and also because this genre in general is just kinda relatable and brings back memories as you take in how it sounds, and it shapes itself in your world. i grew up (referring to the last few years) majorly on digicore and other heavily electronic music; being able to learn more about new music, even when you've been doing so on and off for the past couple of years as this little hobby that you found out when you wanted something else to do like i was, is one of my favorite things about doing this, and it was cool to listen to this album for the first time and see why it's so well-liked by so many people!! oh yeahhh and i'm looking forward to listening to masked dancers in the future too... of coursee my favorite part of it is the cover... it looks really nice to say the least. i haven't listened to any of the songs from it yet, but i'm not sure if i would do so soon especially since i made another backlog which has a ton of other albums i'd like to get to before i get to it, but it's definitely on my radar!! hopefully i can keep a sort of pace up with how long it takes me to write these entries lol

Album Runtime: 44:53 Release M/Y: May 2010
Favorite Tracks: Untitled (Cont.) (85) Full Listens: 8 (153 streams)
Rating: ★★★½ (7-) first listened 29 September @ 02h, published 1 October @ 21h
2,711 words; 14,345 characters ⁂

Deathconsciousness by Have a Nice Life: 24 September★

i first fully listened to this back during what i'd say was the climax of my last relationship. the album had probably been on my mind for a while, especially since i recognized it from when one of my older online friends showed me the album's intro one day. as with most things back then, i never really thought much of it - i was still passionately obsessed with my favorite hyperpop and digicore music, especially albums like frailty and the much more recent quinn. from what i remember, it felt quite eerily beautiful, and i believe she thought so as well. i remember her telling me that she listened to it in bed staring at the ceiling, but i don't quite remember how it made her feel. to me, it sounds viscerally transcendental, as if the feeling can't be visualized, but is instead uniquely spiritual. the blanketing drones and soft strumming of the guitars heavily contrasted the music i had been listening to and would continue to listen for the better part of two years. so, until then, this album would be just something that became a part of all of the music i had listened to in my life, not being brought up again for a long while just because it was far outside what i was interested in at the time.

i've been interested in rating music for a long while - it's always been very fulfilling to me. to my surprise, my rym account is approaching two and a half years of age, which i've mostly used in short bursts until it dies down again for a while. however, the summer of 2023 was the summer that exponentially elevated my interest in finding new music and resonating with it. bands like invisible and xiu xiu come to mind first, whose influence on my music taste and ways i interact with music and communities about it are still very much part of me. i became more open to trying new music and felt the enrichment of it was rewarding to me. not only did it help me love listening to music again, but it was a medium that allowed me to understand more about the world through the emphasis of different perspectives of artists and enthusiasts that i found interesting. through this, i was able to find many different artists spanning many different sounds and looks, and this album was a part of those, being something i saw rather quickly because of how highly regarded it is. as i've experienced with plenty of other albums i've listened to, the album's cover was the thing that intrigued me the most, as i really like the usage of the painting and how simply depressing it looks. the design of covers and photography in general has been something i've been interested in for a much longer part of my life, and i think it is something that really changes the way i consume music. it sticks with me as i love the visual part of music: how the artists themselves interpret the music they create and how they flesh out and add more to the album's atmosphere and essence, whether it be for a concept album or not. this is a prime example of how a cover can add so much to the album's listening experience; it's a thing that is better experienced by the listener themselves than described by someone else (especially me), as the impact of it is largely driven by their interpretation, affected by the many different experiences people have in their lives. for me, it's more subtle nowadays, but it is still obviously present and i welcome it with open arms as the album continues to be enhanced by the things i visualize and associate the songs with.

this album being able to feel as personal as it does is one of the things that makes it so amazing to me. one of my favorite things i've learned about from this album is about how amateurish its creation process was - for example, how little it cost to make and how it nearly wasn't even released in the first place because of a hard drive failure, which explains its lower audio quality (which tbh i don't notice that much lol). even though the outcome would've been so much different if they actually had more experience and resources while making this project, i think that these factors and more are what makes it so great. it'd be more difficult to be able to produce the sound you're looking for, but that would in turn be to the benefit of the final product just cause it'd be more personal and important to you.

when i first listened to the album, i particularly remember how much it seemed to drag on. i didn't necessarily think it was bad, especially since i was becoming more interested and receptive to listening to longer music, however way the album takes its time to develop and flesh out its progression and sound, most notably with the first four tracks which accumulate a total of 30 minutes of runtime was something that stuck with me while i tried to understand it. before i fully listened to the album for the first time, i remember that it was really difficult for me to stand still and eventually i ended up face down on my bed while listening and sparsely talking to my ex about it. it was then when i decided to just listen to it another time - because i had begun to listen to it so late in the night, i figured that it would be better to listen earlier so that i wasn't so tired. i've gone through the same experience multiple times, and each time i listened to the same music again, it's always been a better experience, so i just decided to give it another chance. i was still probably enthralled in the magic of the lamb as effigy and other music i had been listening to through rating albums as a whole, and this album in specific was something i really wanted to experience and see if it could grow on me because of its prominence in the same online music spaces i had been learning about. even with the first listen being as unsuccessful as it was, it's a bit interesting to me how much i wanted to revisit the album - when i rate music, i always make sure to give it more than one listen (and probably even more than that) in order to properly digest the music and better gather my thoughts on it. but the way i felt about wanting to listen to deathconsciousness again felt different for me... like i really wanted to see if it would click with me or not. it's just something else i find really interesting about this album and my experience with it... :P

after i listened to the album a few times, i did understand it more and i really came to like how it sounded and felt. as i continued to listen more and more, i learned more about the album itself, like how the album was intentionally (i believe) mixed to sound like it's drowning because of when you feel like such when you're depressed. but at this time, it still didn't really have much emotional impact on me like the lamb as effigy was starting to develop at this time. it did sound really good and it'd still be in my rotation throughout the coming months, but i never really found it to be astounding until around january. i'm not gonna go into detail about this cuz i'm gonna publish this and i myself remember what happened (sometimes in my diary i could write more about stuff like this to just expand more on it for more clarity in the future but most of the time i'd leave it up to myself to remember), but this was when my ex and i didn't talk to each other for around a month which broke me more than anything i can remember... that winter break before was probably my fav one ever and that along with just how emotionally dependent i was with that relationship among other things was the tipping point for me. from here, music was something i needed to fill my mind with to stop myself from going crazy. it always has been and still continues to help me with this, but i really just wanted some music that would match how i'm feeling and be something that resembled a friend that i could latch onto. i think at this time, i was starting to get less attached to my irl friend group that was another main thing that kept me sane throughout the past few years - we still talked often then, but it felt like my ability to actually relate and even talk to them was deteriorating quickly because of how increasingly horrible i was feeling. it wasn't just the relationship, but that was the main thing, and the beginning of the radio silence was basically the thing that made everything so much worse for me.

sometime later i decided to try going on a couple of walks to try to help clear my mind. i've known that just walking and doing stuff outside can improve your mental state - it's helped me plenty of times to take my mind off of other stuff i'm worrying about for a little while. not to mention that my winter break comprised of me fueling that aforementioned emotional dependency by staying up until sunrise and then a few hours more every day for two weeks... i just figured it'd be best for me. listening to music on these trips is something i've been fond of ever since i've gotten into it (yeah ofc i haven't been listening to music whole life lol). the way you're left alone with just your music while taking in the views, whether they be stunning, disgusting, or anything in between, enriches the musical experience by an order of magnitude that i doubt i could ever feel while being in the comfort of my chair. this can be felt with just going to other new places or nostalgia in general but walks for me are the most notable of these. i've always been a curious girl who's wanted to explore and learn more about the world around me so obviously i'd do these things!!

so, i prepared myself to do the same with deathconsciousness. the neighborhood i live in i moved into just a year and a half ago at the time, and it was as mysterious yet enthralling as it still is for me today. it's not like it's special or anything; the neighborhood is expansive, and it takes me a while to walk from one end to another, the branches making the coverage even larger. at the end were these simple two-floor (maybe?) brick houses that looked like they were replicated multiple dozens of times along the large loop and road that ended abruptly in front of this factory area i've wanted to go explore. i had walked around a few times prior, like the time i did a little after i had just moved in to see what the rest of it was like. my memory of that in specific is tinted orange and everything just felt so big and strange, like everything feels when i'm somewhere new. my favorite part of the neighborhood was walking into the branches - they had these long paths that had multiple turns that helped me take in just how beautiful the scenery looked, no matter which season i walked around during.

the path i took to get from my house to on the side of the road to begin my walk began from the patio through these tiny woods on the side of our neighbor's house where i had to navigate and hang on the edge to not fall into the little body of water that i always forgot existed. there's this thing which separates the woods from the patio spanning multiple houses i like to just call a tiny river that i walk over, using these rocks that connect the two together. the branches of the trees peeking out from behind reach down enough to make me have to duck down while i cross. the album began to play and as i was making my way to the main road, i heard a quick one before the eternal worm devours connecticut accompany me as i did this and went forward throughout the neighborhood. i (probably) won't go into my experiences with each track and how i remember it making me feel during these walks, but it still would obviously be good to talk about the whole picture.

to preface everything, i became much more immersed in the album's atmosphere. i remember having to wear my shitty mtv hoodie i bought at an h&m recently and feeling the subtle bitter cold on my hands and around my body - it didn't distract me from it, instead enclosing me into the album's space more and more, letting me admire it with more detail as i continued to walk around the often empty streets spare the odd person on alternating branches. i remember hunter was a track that hit me like a truck and helped me compose a more standard theme in how i visualize the album. i looked up the lyrics of multiple songs after i finished my walks in a bout of curiosity as i wanted to make at least an effort to understand the album like i have with multiple others in the past. i visualize a neon god face down on the ground in the middle of a forest on leaves, the neon barrage of arrows falling down, the neon staircase leading up to heaven all on a dark halftone background resembling the album's barren background that is darker than the night sky and consumes you even more so. its length which i so dreaded made it so much better to listen to; i really admire this aspect for the album as a whole because i'd envelope myself for such a long time outside where i could look at other parts of life and think about the people and the insurmountable ways of life i haven't experienced or could even imagine, reveling in how miserable i was feeling at the time and how miserable my life was in general.

waiting for black metal records to come in the mail was another one of the songs i developed more of an emotional connection with by doing this. i remember feeling bewildered listening to the first minute of the track since i guess it never really felt like anything when i had listened to it in my room, but here i was able to observe every detail of the album as if i was in a vaccum and it sounded harsher than i ever could remember it being. then i remember hearing the drums suddenly start playing - one thing i really really love about this album is how the drums sound. i talk about it a lot whenever i talk about albums in general since i'm kind of a drum girl; sometimes i feel like it gets to a point where it's pointless to even mention them cause i'm just gonna say the same things but i truly feel like the drum work on this album is exemplary. they’re ruthless and unforgiving as they crush the sound and in some moments feel like they’re in your face, electrifying the music not in an upbeat way, but in a way that maintains a continuous rugged flow throughout that pulsates through your body, the first thing you've felt in however long it's been. i remember reading somewhere that the drums used on the album are stock (maybe? forgive me if i'm wrong) drums or something of the sort which i find kinda interesting. maybe it's the way they are precariously mixed (which now that i think of it could be one way to describe some of what the album sounds like), but the way they were transformed into what they sound like on the album is just so amazing since they add so much to the sound, making it stand out more so than a lot of other things i've listened to. come to think of it, maybe you could describe deathconsciousness as a raggedy, ancient house that could collapse at any moment, and once it does do so the album's content is the aftermath and each of the owner's memories combined and devastated beyond emotional repair.

to not keep dragging on the amount of time i've already worked on this entry for, i guess the last track i'll talk about in detail is the album's outro, earthmover. to be honest, it's not really more so the walks that changed how i felt about the song, but i still loved how it played as i was returning back home, ready for me to face my harsh reality once again. it's truly beautiful how explosive, abrasive, and overwhelming it is, an amazing way to represent such a contrastingly dull and existentially dreadful concept that the song is about. how it is full of life and something to live for in place of the end of things and something that is as close of a void as you can get without actually being dead. walking can be such a cathartic experience if you listen to the right tracks - i can get lost so easily in music that if i'm not walking by myself anywhere other than outside, then i just can't listen to it because it makes me embarrassingly clumsy. here, it's something that can put my thoughts into music so that it drowns out the thoughts themselves and puts them through a filter where it doesn't feel like it's slowly killing me. i'm not sure if i would consider the vocals on here singing, but they still sound really nice. i love how they do sound like guys that you've talked to before and maybe here you're seeing what he truly feel and have gone through for the first time when all you've seen is his personality in front of others where maybe they act the complete opposite - like he's something he's not. after i get home, the lasting bits that sting you after such an epiphany at the end of the song continue to fade out as i get closer. the feedback ties everything together so nicely and i love the reasoning for its placement and how they kept it in for release, adding yet another layer of human experience to the album while also making it even more horrifying at the same time. maybe these last couple of minutes are just emulating when you see your life flash before your eyes before you fall asleep for the final time. after i walk onto the grassy slope that descends into the little body of water and into the woods once again, which seem even larger than i remembered, a quick one before the eternal worm devours connecticut begins to play again. the first time this happened, it was by accident (there's never really a reason to take off the loop thing anyway lol), but it was even more beautiful than i could ever imagine. as earthmover reaches its end, the intro slowly materializes itself into its place, and it provides as such an amazing transition after earthmover's inconceivable animosity. i've thought of it as a very unique song as in it acts as both an intro and an outro, and a lot of the times i've listened to the album from that point on i've listened to it directly after earthmover, it's just so enchanting and a very little number of tracks are nearly as captivating yet haunting as it is. to elaborate, i guess it feels like the cycle of being reborn has begun again after the ending stage of life where everything goes silent and then everything coalesces and then slowly begins to reform the foundation of your world. the distantly friendly distraction makes you think that next time could be better, but then you remember that the world is as forgiving as it is cruel, and your pessimism begins to slowly swallow you once again as all you can do begrudgingly wait until everything is in its place once again.

the album as a whole is, once again, truly exemplary. i could go on and on for probably another long while about each track and their significance to me; holy fucking shit: 40,000 (absolutely luv the rym song link btw) was the song that actually exposed me and compelled me to look into the album. i remember listening to in before class started last year back when i mostly just sat by myself, or it felt like so a lot of the time anyway. a thing i do to introduce myself to an album or artist in general is listen to one of their most popular songs and try listening to it a few times. it might not be the best strategy since maybe that song isn't a good representation of the album's sound or something else. i get hooked on these songs very easily and honestly, though, i guess it works well given i've been doing the same thing for probably nearly a year now ( it's probably not even like unpopular or weird or something idkk i just feel a bit weird about mentioning it... but i still feel that it's important xP ). it surprises me a bit to think about how many people know about this and how it's probably helped an uncountable number of people, including me. i'm not really someone who feels much emotion or attachment to many albums and instead listens to music a lot just because its sounds are addictive; i still want to enrich myself with learning more about different kinds of music from different places and perspectives but my daily routine mostly consists of listening to songs i'm fixated on at the moment. but, on rare occasions, there are the rare albums that actually make an impact on my stubborn brain - deathconsciousness is one of these. i have no idea how to properly thank or fully comprehend this album and what it has done to be but i guess this entry is gets me at least somewhat closer. maybe i'll write more about it in order to attain more of a sense of clarity in the future, but i wouldn't count on it being anytime soon if it ever happens. it's really nice to finally have written a review about this album since it's been in the making for so long now it's just been a matter of time until i actually write down my thoughts about it. in december of last year, i even jotted down track ratings while i was on a field trip to this small local university downtown. i remember really wanting to show it to my ex only to find myself in disappointment. the idea of continuing to keep track of future albums i rate seems like a cool idea and i think i might try it out more soon as i look into new albums. i adore being able to look through what i've written in the past to observe what my thinking used to be like, no matter how much i cringe or how shitty i felt or used to be, because i like the feeling of nostalgia which is why i wanted to pursue continuing my listening diary as a medium that i use to express my thoughts about one of my favorite things about life. i have no idea if i'm even going to be able to write a review for the next album i listen to for the first time from laziness or feeling overwhelmed or whatever other stupid way my mind drives me away from continuing something so suddenly, but i hope that i do and i'm looking forward to writing and looking back on the stuff i've written in the future.

and with that, i am dead.

Album Runtime: 85:04 Release M/Y: January 2008
Favorite Tracks: Earthmover, but I have multiple 100s (100☆) Full Listens: 30+ (1,036 streams)
Rating: ★★★★★ (10☆) first listened 23 November '23 @ 12h, published 24 September @ 00h
4,064 words; 21,709 characters ⁂

Time 'n' Place by Kero Kero Bonito: 6 June⁂

this might just be the sweetest album i've listened to!! i've listened to this album a good amount of times prior to actually listening to it to review it for the first time again... the reasoning simply being that i saw a friend of mine and a couple of his friends not really liking the album and i wanted to finally get around to rating it! :>

even though time 'n' place admittedly has grown off of me somewhat from the last time i've listened to it, i still like it a lot and admire just how well it encapulates the feeling of fun through its sound. my favorite part of the album is just how good the production is on a lot of these songs - outside, the intro of the album is probably rated as the best track for a lot of people and they would be very valid for doing so! its beginning is definitely very unique from the rest of the tracks that follow it, having these strong guitars and drums which leads into the vocals which i would say probably are some of my favorite pieces of vocal work in the whole album. their progression just sounds really nice - i don't really have the knowledge to musically explain why they work so well for me since i haven't really been doing much musically a while, but it's just something somewhat rare in the music that i listen to that i dig a lot.

while i was relistening, i also realized that make believe is definitely another one of the highlights on the album. this transition is executed super welll... right after dump, which feels like some sort of a long interlude leaing into this next segment of the album, you're greeted with really sweet bells and a very warm bassline that leads into the rest of the song which simply is all about dreaming! i really like how it's about this subject just cause i adore dreaming so much!! U^ ^U it's awesome how you can just go into these worlds that're just in your head and you go on these adventures - that you could even control if you go down the route of lucid dreaming - and you can even remember them sometimes and hold onto these memories for a long time. i do have my fair share of dreams and nightmares that i like to remember from time to time from a few days ago to several years ago that somehow have stuck with me to the present day.

another track that i would say is my favorite highlight of the album just because of how touching it is to me is visiting hours! the track is about gus's experience of his father being admitted to the hospital and is written using actual conversations between gus's mother and her husband. everything that you hear sets this tone of wanting to be optimistic in spite of how bad the situation seems, which, even though i'm not very optimistic myself, still definitely makes me a bit emotional and is done amazingly. whenever i realized how good this track was after i listened to the album a couple of times, it actually gave me chills for a little while afterwards, especially after realizing the actual subject matter of the track which made everything about the track make more sense. initially, i thought the title was just an interesting choice made, which made me want to understand it more. it was already a great song when i had listened to it a few times, but once i started actually looking deeper into the meaning of the song and listening intently, i realized that it was even better than i thought it was, which made me appreciate it as much as i do now!

even though i like this album a lot, there are some aspects of the album that kind of downgrade the experience for me... since the gist of most of these tracks are basically the same, filled with sweet vocals, production, like basically being made from the sweetest candies in the world, ( :P ) some of the longer songs kind of fall a bit out of favor for me, especially tracks like dump and if i'd known. i actually quite liked dump when i first had listened to this album - but for some reason, it just has grown off me in some way. there are also a few other moments on the album that just come off as silly to me - moments such as only acting's strange outro and just the entirety of sometimes, which i feel still is an interesting addition to the album, but how it sounds just really isn't for me and i wouldn't mind if it just didn't exist at all. side note: i feel like the outro of the album executes what the outro of only acting is trying to do many times better, and i would say that it earns such a high rating from me because of that. on the other hand, i feel like the former is just more out of place than the other. i would say that it definitely doesn't detract from the quality of the track or the album as much as some of the other things that i notice throughout, but it is still something kind of rubs me the wrong way.

even with my small amount of gripes i have with the album, time 'n' place is still a lovely album that makes me want to listen to more of this band to see what else they have in store! i've heard that some people do prefer bonito generation to this album, which interests me a lot to be honest. after relistening, i also realized that this album is super easy to listen to and i'd probably appreciate it a lot more if i had listened to it in place of some other albums i've listened to when it hurts to listen to anything else that stimulates my mind more than a little bit :^) i'll definitely keep this album in mind when that time comes again!

Album Runtime: 32:59 Release M/Y: October 2018
Favorite Tracks: Visiting Hours (93) Full Listens: 10 (147 streams)
Rating: ★★★½ (7+) first listened 15 November 2023 @ 12h, published 6 June @ 03h
1,020 words; 5,383 characters ⁂

Bliss by threedimensionsapart: 1 April⁂

here's something i can rate to try to motivate myself to review the behemoth of an album i want to listen to next ( it's a secret :P ) !!

i've probably listened to this so many times - i haven't bothered to check my scrobbles on this yet lol. to be honest, this has grown off of me from when i last was obsessed with it. i have a pretty big sweet spot for it since it was one of the only things i listened to back when i went to pigeon forge in 2023. it felt a lot more relatable and it was just one of those projects that randomly piqued my interest once i listened to it again. tda generally just became a significantly larger part of my rotation around this, and this was the most prominent part of it. i really liked how aggresive one of their older songs, repetition, sounded when i heard it for the first time, and it made me want to check out a few of their other songs which eventually led me to listening to this ep again.

one of my favorite parts of this would be the examples of cool samples (there's probably plenty more i haven't heard yet) that can be heard throughout it. my fav part is on the outro, guts, where i'm pretty sure the track seventeen by jane remover is sampled before the big breakdown at the end. guts is also just my favorite track on here, it is the best emotionally and it also has some of the best production on the album. another part i really like about the album is that it's fun at times, especially on could you care less?, which has this awesome production and flow that makes it a nice change of pace from the previous track.

there are definitely a few gripes that i have with it that i realized when i stopped liking this as much. one, it doesn't really isn't much more than a cool little hyperpop project. sure, it has a few highlights, but other than that i don't really have much reason to listen to it as it there really isn't like a coherent theme going on here. beyond the two aforementioned tracks, the production doesn't interest me much - it's good for if i need something to listen to whenever i feel horrible, but once again, it doesn't really do much for me and there's not much to come back to. of course, i recognize that it really isn't meant to be massive or anything, but that just doesn't cut it for me nearly as much as it used to. i'm a completely different girl now, and even though this will be in my heart forever, i just prefer things with more depth.

bliss is still definitely something nice to come back to once in a while, with it being one of my favorite parts of tda's discography. it's overall a nice representation of the very internet influenced music i used to listened to, but that's why it's not as good as i used to think it was anymore Uu_uU

Album Runtime: 12:45 Release M/Y: December 2021
Favorite Tracks: guts (75) Full Listens: 50+ (403 streams)
Rating: ★★★ (6+) first listened 29 August 2022 @ 01h, published 1 April @ 23h
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Flood by Boris: 26 March⁂

short review for this one and probably a lot more often from now on. i love the concept of writing long reviews to make me think about ways to properly communicate what my thoughts are but it's so daunting that i think i'd rather just stick with simplicity unless i feel like it would do whatever i rate justice. (lies)

anyways, here is another entry in my dive into boris' music! to be honest, i haven't really been listening to much of this band or music in general in the past month. i've barely discovered any new music too, even though i've seen plenty of albums that catch my eye. however, that doesn't detract any brilliance at all from what is flood - a concept album (or song) which is explained with the title and art, following their first well-known drone metal album that is amplifier worship. it just excels in pretty much every quality. the pacing is lovely, even better than feedbacker, which allows the concept of the song to shape in a nice "slow burner" fashion. my only minor gripe with it is that, of course, i wouldn't really mind if the last part had a small part of it cut off, but i actually kind of like it too as it beautifully shows the slow death through drowning. i also appreciate how resoundingly the dynamics are created from the lows to the highs and everywhere in between. i find it odd that flood, pt. 1 is the second-lowest rated part of the album. it really does a great job as being the calm before the storm - it honestly feels welcoming yet frightening in a way. the guitars sound perfect and have a sound that i haven't heard anywhere else, even after i listened to this album. on my first listen, it confused me in a good way because of how unexpected it was to me. i think that this is boris' second best introduction to an album, only behind introduction on akuma no uta. you also can't talk about flood without going into the apex of the album, which is so masterfully crafted and is definitely one of the band's best highs in their early discography. however, it's probably been the subject of talk so much that i won't really delve into it too much - i'd definitely say it's the best part of the album.

flood is yet another masterpiece from boris, whose early discography is full of those. i always think it's nice to think that this album and feedbacker are sisters - they both have the same concept of natural disasters (with my theory of the latter being an album about a dust storm) and they're kind of similar sonically as well!

Album Runtime: 70:30 Release M/Y: December 2000
Favorite Tracks: flood, pt. 3 (99) Full Listens: 12 (48 streams)
Rating: ★★★★½ (9m) first listened 20 January @ 18h, published 26 March @ 12h
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Still-Life by twikipedia: 3 February⁂

after a year-long absence from releasing solo projects, twikipedia returns with an ep composed of scraps from their upcoming album! it does fit how it was described by its own creator. there's not much depth to the project, like their other project throaways that was basically released with the same purpose in mind. i feel that this is especially apparent on friend and understand, although it does somewhat constantly maintain this over the whole project. of course, it does make sense, but it makes it less worthwhile to try to give it more of a chance as a full experience and it's plainly just some songs you come back to every once in a while in a different order each time. but it's still also impressive to hear how twikipedia's progress on completely changing their sound is going. these still sound really nice, and even if there isn't much reason to come back to this project - which i still do, of course, i'm just trying to see it from a more general perspective - at least we have really exciting music to look forward to as they further develop their production and vocal skills.

the highlight of this ep is definitely the opener, i wanna be the guy. i appreciate the lyricism on this project, and this track has some of the best and most relatable lyrics on it. "i love the headache afterwards, i love the e.r. room with you" is really cute and i see myself in that whole line, including the lyrics that precede it. it also has some of the best production and vocal work in the entire project as well; the breakdown at the end of the track is a nice ending, although i'm not sure if i'd prefer another kind of way to end it off or not. i remember watching the ig snippet ( unavailable now :/ ) of this track back in late may and instantly being amazed by how different yet awesome it sounded. i was obsessed, and i was really excited when it got announced to be on the ep's tracklist. the wait was definitely worth it, as it literally just got better when i heard the full thing. i honestly was expecting it to be longer, but i think how long it is now works just fine for me.

my other favorite tracks on this album would probably be sail and hurt. sail is another track with really cute lyrics that i like to look at and sing every time i can. hurt just sounds nice, is the longest song on the project, and is the most emotionally charged song on it to me besides sail. overall, the project is a pleasant listen, and there are moments on here that i hope will be expanded upon in their upcoming album. it's definitely very replayable for me, but that doesn't really mean much coming from a fanatic of their music like me XP there isn't much here to dwell on, but that's okay!! it just means that this is simpler and it doesn't mean it's automatically really bad for being so - far from it U^ ^U

Album Runtime: 14:36 Release M/Y: January 2024
Favorite Tracks: i wanna be the guy (83) Full Listens: 38 (396 streams)
Rating: ★★★ (6-) first listened 1 January @ 01h, published 3 February @ 22h
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あくまのうた (Akuma no Uta) by Boris: 1 February⁂

this album was what introduced me to boris all the way back in 2022, and i couldn't have asked for anything better! before my recent dive into their discography, akuma no uta was one of those albums for me that have undergone the same treatment. when i randomly remember them, i listen to it repeatedly, maybe look into a bit more of their discography for a bit, learn some more about who made it, and then naturally get uninterested, forget about it, and move on to whatever's next. but, every once in a while, an album sticks out to me and it sticks with me longer; my music taste morphs, and i'm a changed girl, as akuma no uta has with me!!
U^ ^U

at its noisiest, this album is super energetic and really grabs my attention in this unique way that only boris has been able to achieve. the production, especially my favorite part, which is the drumming, is truly stellar. i've only really been getting into the kinds of music that have really punchy drums that warp the music surrounding it, and i absolutely love when it's put into practice as often as it is on several points of this album. how fast and hard hitting they are on ibitsu and furi are one of the many things that make them so good. atsuo is so so good with what he does, it's honestly kind of crazy!! i also love how good the guitars sound on these tracks. this album definitely has a lot of the best guitarring from this band, at least from what i've heard. one of my favorite highlights on this album are the shriek near the end of ibitsu and then the transition into furi. i'm not sure whether it is a vocal shriek or a guitar shriek. i initially thought it was just a vocal thing but then i had the thought of it being the latter and now i could see both choices being true :P the small patch of silence between the last moments of ibitsu and then the rapid kick off of furi also make it seem like a continous track to me, which is awesome.

even during the calmer moments, like the track naki kyoku, the longest song on the album which is definitely more drone-like than most of the other tracks on here, they still are produced really well and fit well with the significantly more chaotic and rough parts. it starts very softly, with a calm guitar, synths, and steady drumming. i like how constant and tranquil it is compared to the rest of the album, as it provides a nice contrast compared to the rest of the music on this album. this continues for a good amount of time, until the drums intensify once more and the abrasive guitars return. atsuo's vocals become more triumphant and form the track's resolute ending. although i don't really get exhausted from listening to music as powerful as this, it still is nice to hear a calmer song, as boris is able to pull them off really well, like on the song soft edge, one of my favorites from heavy rocks 2002. it's a nice interlude and is still really really good, even though it definitely has a lot of differences from the rest of the album, even introduction.

speaking of introduction, i absolutely have to talk about it. it is hands down my favorite song to start off any boris album, and is pretty high up there in what i've listened to in general. the way it's drawn out makes it feel like this look into hell that you just can't seem take your eyes off. its length is simply perfect and perfectly sets the tone for the rest of the album. the drones feel like they're surrounding me and slowly burning me, increasing in temperature and reach as the song grows more and more intense. i think that the choice to begin the track with guitars and bass and then introduce the drones a bit later on is really good. the melody that repeats throughout the track is unmatched and reinforces the hell-like picture i visualize whenever i hear it. you can feel the air gradully heat up around you as the guitar keeps repeating and the drones become more intimidating and begin to sound more and more like demonic shrieks. at the end of the track, everything stops and all that can be heard for a second is the feedback that introduces the listener to ibitsu. these transitions are some of the best that i've heard ever!! U^ ^U

akuma no uta is certainly an amazing album that will probably have an everlasting effect on what i want to listen and expose myself more towards when it comes to new music. there is definitely lots of great material here, like another great moment at the end of furi when the breakdown occurs and it comes to a stop, ending the continous track made up from the first three tracks, which keep me coming back to listen to it more and more. it can be really addicting and is just a killer listen every time. the fact that i hadn't bothered to look more into boris and their music until now based on this album is criminal! Uo.oU can't wait to keep listening to more boris records!!

Album Runtime: 39:02 Release M/Y: June 2003
Favorite Tracks: Introduction and Ibitsu (100☆) Full Listens: 22 (179 streams)
Rating: ★★★★½ (9+) first listened 12 January @ 11h, published 1 February @ 22h
899 words; 4,818 characters ⁂

Boris at Last -Feedbacker- by Boris: 1 February⁂

this will be one of several boris ratings i make as i indulge myself more and more with their discography. as of recently, they have been my favorite band to listen to, with my interest being rekindled because of my growing interest in drone / metal music and me listening to amplifier worship. over the past few weeks, i've been listening to more of their music, and even a little bit of the music that influenced their sound like the album bullhead, the album which has the song the band was named after. their early works really interest me because of how well they are able to implement drone elements into their music and make their amazing rock sound shine through their songs. i think the production on these records is super mesmerizing and really has made me want to look more into both kinds of music. they have this really unique way of communicating ideas through their powerful instruments which make even the most repetitive portions of their music interesting to me. the vocals also compliment them really well and add another level of feeling that would otherwise not be felt if they weren't the way they are. this is especially apparent on their more metal-oriented records that i've heard, like heavy rocks (2002), but definitely also present on other albums that don't use vocals as much. this is where boris at last -feedbacker- comes in.

observing how the vocals change throughout a band's discography always has been interesting to me. prior to me getting into boris again, i had only listened to akuma no uta and heavy rocks (2011), being introduced to their music through a mutual of mine, so i didn't know what to expect when it came to this kind of change. i immediately noticed this when i began listening to amplifier worship. hearing how different they sounded a half decade prior to akuma no uta and how differently their vocals were used, since the record did have vocals from all three members and were used in a different way as it was much more drone-oriented compared to akuma no uta, although a bit strange to me at first, was really cool by the time i listened to it again. i definitely feel the same way when it comes to feedbacker as well. on akuma no uta, which was released earlier in the same year, uses a completely different approach when it comes to vocals, with atsuo maintaining a consistenly calmer voice at first, but still gets intense in part 3. i think how the vocals begin and progress throughout parts 2 and 3 are really effective in illustrating this kind of narrative that i have in my head about the concept of this album and goes really well with the production of the album as well. this is one of boris's largely drone-oriented early albums, although it definitely has plenty of metal throughout the record too, and i think that it is high up there with how it implements this during its runtime. the introduction sets the mood pretty well and is only heightened on part 2, with it reaching the musical climax of the album on part 3. then, the overbearing tones and synths on part 4 push this devastating feeling onto the album's landscape and expands around you before calming down again and returning to a similar sound to the second part of the album in the final part. the drawn out progression makes reaching the climax of the album and then experiencing the fallout in parts 4 and 5 significantly more rewarding as this kind of length perfectly suits what i think it is trying to go for in terms of conveying its idea.

to me, i think that flood and this album have various similarities to each other. they both are largely drone oriented, their vocals follow the same structure when it comes to gradually increasing in dynamics, and i think that they are also similar when it comes to the actual concepts they are trying to communicate. based on the album's sound alone, i've come up with the idea that this is an album about a raging dust storm, another natural disaster which makes me think of this album as a continuation, tribute, or whatever of flood. this results in the death of wata, who was pciked up by a dust devil that formed in the storm and whose death is pictured on the cover. i think this is really interesting because the album just strikes me as such. the specific sound of the production on this album really reminds me of more open sounding music, unlike flood. its progression in dynamics and eventual breakdown also remind me a lot of the aftermath of different natural disasters, like tornadoes and dust storms, leaving damage and despair in their paths. this is most apparent to me in part 4, with the painful drones that succede the vocal peak giving me this feeling that you are witnessing utter decimation of everything that gets in the storm's way. you're trying to salvage anything is futile and, eventually, you yourself are picked up in the storm, reducing you to just a single part of debris, becoming its victim and eventually dying to it. this is why i think the cover is what it is. my friend, who i initially gave the idea to at first, actually based his review on the album around this concept of mine, and i find his vision of the album to mirror a lot of how i feel its progression is like.

i am kind of obsessed with this album right now and it is just such an amazing thing to relisten to again and again. listening to it as one track, as it is supposed to be, really makes the whole experience more grandiose and i can understand why it is so highly acclaimed by so many people. i have been waiting for the right time to listen to this for a while now, and i'm glad i'm taking the time now to listen to boris's albums and realize that they are so much better than i thought they were back when i listened to them for the first time. i think this dive into their discography will have a lasting effect on my music taste as i eventually begin to diverge into more music that is built upon repetitiveness as well as lots of metal. feedbacker feels like flood's little sister to me; i think they may be at least related due to how similar they are. i still think flood is better though - but more on that coming soon!! U^ ^U

Album Runtime: 43:49 Release M/Y: December 2003
Favorite Tracks: Pt. 3 and 4 (97) Full Listens: 36 (180 streams)
Rating: ★★★★½ (9-) first listened 26 January @ 21h, published 1 February @ 00h
1,114 words; 6,126 characters ⁂

nav (coming soon...)

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table of contents

Structures From Silence by Steve Roach ★

Ocean Rain by Echo & the Bunnymen

My tek lintowe by Tek lintowe

Two Airships / Exploder Falls by Candy Claws

13" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto With Bison Horn Grips by Xiu Xiu

Just Got Back From the Discomfort—We're Alright by The Brave Little Abacus

Deathconsciousness by Have a Nice Life ★

Time 'n' Place by Kero Kero Bonito

Bliss by threedimensionsapart

Flood by Boris

Still-Life by twikipedia

あくまのうた (Akuma no Uta) by Boris

Boris at Last -Feedbacker- by Boris

map of states rated

all of my rym ratings included

work in progress, last updated ⁂ 14 dec @ 03h ⁂ back to top