Thank god! We're not hearing you anymore Top 10

Today I decided to post a list of musicians who we are not hearing from. They've either ended their musical careers or no one cares about them anymore. One thing they have in common is they make our world a better place to live.

10 - t.A.T.u

They were cute russian girls, what made them popular was not their music but their sexual preferences. They were holding hands and kissing on every performance, I think the world needed something like that at the moment. Then one of them got pregnant somehow and bla bla. Even if they're doing something at the moment no one really cares anymore. "All the Things She Said" was not a bad song but was nothing special. Ten years from now no one will remember them.

9 - Vanilla Ice

I don't really remember what this guy was up to, he stole a sample from Queen's "Under Pressure" and released something like "Ice Ice Baby". The song was absolutely rubbish for any Queen fan, and people who liked the song liked the sample. The only good thing about him was something he hasn't done. It was Jim Carrey's epic dance performance on SNL.

8 - Eamon

I have to admit I kind of liked his song "Fuck It! (Don't Want You Back)". But when I think about it now I ask myself; Do we need him now? The answer is absolutely no! He was just another one hit wonder, he filled a huge gap with this song, he's done his service to the community and then disappeared. Akon & Snoop Dogg released "I Wanna Fuck You" but it was no way near. Thank you Eamon, you've done a great job and destroyed yourself.

7 - Backstreet Boys

I think these guys were offended because no one showed them the meaning of being lonely. It was literally impossible to understand the meaning of being lonely when you are a 5-piece boy band. I think even they didn't like their music, they were only in it for the money. It's not only the thing about Backstreet Boys, we also got rid of Westlife, N'Sync and Blue. In total, they sum like 15 or 20 men and the only thing left from this group is Justin Timberlake. He fills the gap of boy bands individually and as long as he's around I don't think world needs another boy band.

6 - Spice Girls

This is sort of the same story with the Backstreet Boys but Spice Girls were much more dangerous. The world has been through a lot in the last century, the WWI, the WWII and the Spice Girls but we're safe now. If David Beckham has played a tiny little bit part of their break up I thank him a million times. You're not only a great football player, you're also the man who saved the world.

5 - Aqua

I'm a barbie-girl, in the barbie-world.

Life in plastic, It's fantastic!

Yes it was fantastic, no one understood what hit them. Aqua, you are responsible for the brain damage you caused on millions of people and I also think you are the reason of the economical crisis.

4 - Alphaville

There was nothing wrong with Alphaville's music. In fact they released a few classic hits including "Big in Japan", "Forever Young" and "Sounds Like a Melody" but it is very obvious that you don't belong to this world. What you did was great but it was just a phase. When we find life forms in another corner of the universe we may need you. We may send you to that galaxy and maybe they would understand your music. With their clothes, keyboards and that stupid smoke machine they tried to make the music of the future. So here we are, at the future and what you have done doesn't seem to be the music of now and I don't think we'll come across anything like you in the following 50 years.

3 - 50 Cent

I don't wanna talk much about him, ('cos maybe he'll find and kill me) he didn't make a single contribution to the music industry and he isn't around since he was crushed into pieces by Kanye West. The world has enough gangsta rappers, we didn't see you around in a while and I don't think we want to.

2 - Amy Winehouse

Her first and probably the last album was not bad, I listened to it for like a month then I got bored. And presumably she got bored too so she started to do other things. I don't even know wheter she's dead or alive. What she is trying is to die and become a legend but no one told her that you don't get the legend status with only one album. I think you should've gone to rehab when they told you so. I honestly don't think that would make any difference but there was a tiny possibility for us to have a proper musician.

1 - Las Ketchup

These three spanish girls were probably the worst musicians world has ever came across. None of them looked beautiful and their song "Asere Je!" sounded like shit. I still don't know how but it become an instant hit. Then I guess people realised and said; OMG we created a monster! They somehow disappeared and the world is a much better to live now. I still get scared when I remember them, sometimes I see nightmares of them being popular again. Thank god we're not hearing you anymore.

Florence + the Machine - Lungs

It's been quite a while since I have posted an album review, and I decided I should do one. Lungs is the debut album of english soul & indie artist Florence Welch. The spelling is a bit of a confusion, iTunes Store and Amazon.com refer to as "Florence + the Machine" while Last.fm and Wikipedia credit as "Florence and the Machine". Anyway, it seems the spelling of their name is the least of problems.

Florence was making music with her friend Isabelle Summers, they called each other "Florence Robot" and "Isabella Machine". Then she switched the name to "Florence + the Machine", judging by the name it seems like a band but this is her recording name, the Machine is a group of artists who provide backing music for her.

The album contains some good songs and some very good songs. Very good songs catch you at a few listens, remaining songs are at so-so level. There is no doubt that Welch is a magnificent singer, she has a very strong voice. Throughout the album, she doesn't make a single mistake in terms of singing, but seems like the Machine isn't working very well. It's her fault though, you can feel that Florence Welch is the boss of this thing. I think she didn't set her genre in her head yet. Some songs have the proper indie rock sound with great guitar riffs some have lots of strings and no guitars at all. It feels like this album was not produced by a single producer and in fact it really is. Florence knows music and it feels like she's been doing it for a while. I believe this is a compilation of her previous works. 46 minutes is not very long but she kept all the good songs for the first half and you get bored after a while. "Howl" I think is the best of the album and one of the best songs I've heard this year, "Girl With One Eye" is epic, "Kiss With a Fist" has a lot of joy and fun but all these songs were not brought together properly. All songs are individually good but it is very hard to follow. The only binding force is Florence's extraordinary voice but after a while you start to think this is a best-of album of the artist and each song represent different eras of her career.

In conclusion, this is an album with some very good songs performed by a very talented artist but the problem is it doesn't feel like an album at all. I think Florence needs to decide which way she will go in her career, and she has to do some mending to the machine. If Florence Welch takes my advise (I don't see any good reason why she should) she has the capacity to be an all time classic.

New Earphones

I went for a little 3-day holiday and now I'm back for more. I also have a new pair of earbuds. My DealExtreme orders have arrived, including these cheap in-ear earphones. I've had a 54 km bike trip today with these new ones.

For those of you who don't know about DealExtreme, it's a Hong-Kong based web site. It sells China made technology gadgets, they're very low quality but most of the time they do the job. Prices are at "you gotta be joking" level and they ship them free worldwide. Buy a keychain for $ 0.79 and you have it delivered to your door all the way from Hong-Kong without any shipping cost. It's quite safe, it accepts only PayPal.

I think I made quite an advert about the site and now it's time for the earphones. I got them for $ 4.38, it may sound cheap (in fact it is) but it's one of the expensive ones on the site. I read some good reviews and some bad, I decided to give it a try. This is my 4th cheap earphone, previous 2 were also from DealExtreme. I had a pair of fake iPod earphones and a pair of iPod style in-ear earphones. They were both rubbish, and worth $ 3.86 combined, I kept one for back-up and gave other as a gift.

I usually can't get along with in-ears, this one is no exception. Again the middle size pads didn't fit my ears and again the right (I think my right ear canal is wider) one feels a little bit loose. I needed something like this because my Sennheiser earbuds are useless in public transport. This one has better noise isolation, it's not perfect but what you expect from an in-ear. The thing I like about this one is it has more (except Sennheisers, Shures and Koss') treble than the other in-ears on the market, the bass is more balanced, it doesn't blow your ears but doesn't sound very good either. One let down of this thing, and the biggest is it's mids. The mids are terrible and spoils all the fun.

They maybe a good choice for an average music listener but for me it just isn't. I have to admit they sound better than Sony Ericsson Walkman Phone's bundle in-ears and most Sony's or Philips'. Some earphones sound better in time but I don't think I'll like these. Not because they sound bad, I just don't like in-ears, and probably will never do.

Metallica - Death Magnetic

When you have a brother who is seven-year older, you listen to some unusual stuff. While my class-mates were interested in stupid pop songs of the era, I was listening to Pink Floyd, Queen, Nirvana and of course Metallica. I was 8 or 9 years old when I first heard Metallica and loved their music since. Death Magnetic is their 9th studio album and the best among last few.

They had problems with Jason Newsted for a long time, he was a decent bass player but his parts were either cut out or volumed down during mastering. I think James didn't liked this guy at all and Jason stormed off. They recorded the dreadful St. Anger without a bassist, with producer Bob Rock in charge of the instrument. Metallica did not produce a proper album since the legendary self-titled black album. They "Load"ed, they failed, they "Re-Load"ed, they failed again. They screamed their "St. Anger" and the fans were quite sure, a legend has come to an end. They signed Robert Trujillo as the bassist which did not cheer the fans either. Most people believed they were becoming their own tribute band.

James Hetfield and his friends did a proper job this time, they decided to work with Rick Rubin as the producer. He produced Slayer and Audioslave albums before, and he knows the recipe. James was in charge of the band since day one, he pushed himself to the edge this time. His vocals are perfect, riffs are catchy. Lars destroyed the drum kit into pieces. His drums were also good in "St. Anger" but there was nothing else to back him up. I think the drums in this album are at "... And Justice for All" level. Kirk is a bit of a let down of this album, he has a few good solos but instead of going for melodic solos like in the past, he fell in love with the wah pedal. Rob has done a great job with the bass. This is the first album that we hear proper bass since "Master of Puppets". Here's a video released before the album, shows Rob's skills with an acoustic guitar during one of recording sessions.

This is their longest "proper" studio album, it's 74 minutes long and the shortest song is the last one "My Apocalypse" at 5:01. Metallica usually had long songs, "...And Justice for All" had 9 songs, "Master of Puppets" had only 8. This one has 10 songs and despite a few, they are very good ones. "The Day That Never Comes" was released as the first single before the album which I think was a perfect choise. It's a song with proper Metallica sound and changing tempo, which is something we haven't heard from them in the last decade. James has perfect melodic vocals in "Broken, Beat & Scarred" and my favourite "All Nightmare Long". We also have a new unforgiven in this album the "Unforgiven III". I wonder how much unforgivens they have in store for us. It has a piano intro, it's 7:46 long and has a rather slow tempo. This time we don't have "What I've felt, what I've known" lyrics, in fact it doesn't even resemble the first two unforgivens. The album overall has a complete sound. It's seems long but it isn't. You get easily involved with it and never get bored after all, we all missed them so much.

I believe this is the album that all Metallica fans were waiting for since '91. All the world knows they are not super talented musicians. What made them popular was their ability to compose melodic songs. They don't need to prove themselves. They are already legends and I think with this album they realized what they should do. Write good, melodic songs.

Wingsband & The Fab Four

I woke up this morning with the melody of "Mrs. Vandebilt" by Wings' ringing inside my head and when that happens you don't have much choice, you have to listen that song. So I did, and then made some searches on YouTube if anyone has covered it. There was not much and (I don't know how) I soon found myself watching bass covers of another Wings song "Silly Love Songs". Wondered if there is a video of Wings performed it live and what I accidentally found was astonishing.

Video info section said Wingsband at The Grove, April 13, 2008. I was kind of confused because Wings broke up in 1981, former members tried to re-group but Paul McCartney refused. Just a few seconds later I realized the lefty guy who plays a Rickenbacker 4001 bass and sings was not Paul McCartney! He was a musician called Ardy Sarraf and what these guys has done was a perfect Wings tribute band. Ardy is not looking exactly like Paul but he has his 70's outfit, is a lefty, plays his bass and sings. You can't expect more. They even have a Linda! She backs vocals and plays the keyboard. I've also seen "Band on the Run" and "Jet", the performances were truly amazing.

Then I found out same guys also have a tribute band called "The Fab Four". I was excited as hell and quickly started to watch their videos. I came across some tribute bands before on YouTube, I also seen some Beatles tribute bands but they were nothing more than "OK". Most of them even tried to form a Beatles tribute band without a lefty Paul. Wingsband was very good, but The Fab Four was even better. These guys have a perfect attention-to-detail which doesn't only make them the best Beatles tribute band but also one of the best tribute bands ever. They have all the right instruments, the Höfner, the Gretsch, Epiphones, Rickenbackers, Gibsons, the Ludwig drums and Vox amplifiers. It's also same with Wingsband, they use the exact instruments Wings used in the 70's.

It's not only the attention-to-detail, these guys are proper musicians. They perform with out a single mistake. Rolo Sandoval (Ringo) doesn't miss a single beat. Both Ardy Sarraf (Paul) and Ron McNeil (John) can play keyboards, Michael Amador (George) throws perfect guitar solos. And it's not just that, just like the Beatles, all four guys sing. Each of them sing songs belonged to the Beatle they represent. I've spent all my morning listening to these guys with an empty stomach and a smile on my face. For me the most important thing is, they perform late Beatles songs. The Beatles stopped performing live in 1966 and most of their classics were released after they focus on their studio sessions. Paul McCartney performs some songs in his concerts but there isn't any live performances of these songs by the Beatles. They do not record, they only perform live in front of special audiences and they seem to be enjoying themselves. I think they know they can't compete with the giants, and the world really doesn't seem to be needing new Beatles.

I don't know how it feels to be in a Beatles concert, but neither does the rest of the world. The Beatles isn't around for 39 years now and their last succesfull concert was 43 years ago. These guys are trying to fill a huge gap, and I think they're doing it properly.

Kanye West - 808s & Heartbreak

I'm not much of a rap person but when it comes to Kanye West, things change instantly. He is a wonderful producer and in my humble opinion the best rapper of all time. 808s & Heartbreak is his 4th studio album. You can feel this album is different from the previous ones without even listening. The first three albums were titled in a college theme ("The College Dropout", "Late Registration" and "Graduation") and all contained Kanye's famous bear on their cover art.

Almost everyone agrees that the first two albums were hip-hop classics. Graduation was advertised with "Stronger", maybe his best song ever, but the album was a bit of a let down. This album proves he is now successfully graduated and no doubt his heart is broken. The thing I like about Kanye is unlike other rappers, he sings, he doesn't try to prove himself. He doesn't have a very good voice but he can sing. He showed the world that hip-hop is not about saying words that rhyme. In this album he really reflects his emotions to his singing.

The album takes it's name from the Roland TR-808 drum machine, he did most of his production on these machines. Unlike previous albums, this doesn't include much strings, it's more electronic. The sound of 808s are so dominant, giving the album a more complete feel. The first two singles, "Heartless" and "Love Lockdown" stand out but other songs are also really good. "Bad News" and "Coldest Winter" are worth attention. "Amazing" is made popular by NBA but I don't think it's one of the better ones. It's a good song though I think they chose it because it fits with their slogan; Where Amazing Happens. The album closes with a freestyle live performance called "The Pinocchio Story". It is quite touching and if he improvised that on stage, well he is a genius.

For me a good album is made by writing a few good songs, and writing other songs to back them up. This album does that exactly. 52 minutes it's still a bit long but his shortest album up to date. He definitely has better songs in his previous albums but this is the most complete one. This is the best to listen to. Which also makes it the best Kanye West album up-to-date.

Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon

I just came back from a 45 min. walk, had a shower and set for this. It's 4 AM now, and I'm beginning to think that I should do this "walk, listen to an album, take a shower, write a review" thing more often. So here it is, Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" or "The Dark Side of the Moon" or whatever you call it.

First things first, this is not an album that you can listen to on a normal time, you have to be prepared for what you are about to hear. You have to have the right conditions. I've listened to this album many many times and I don't really remember listening it in a morning time. Not because it's titled Dark Side of the Moon, this is a dark album, and to listen to a dark album you have to be in a dark environment. Most albums, you listen and have a good time. This one is an exception though. You listen to it, it rocks your world, changes your life. Every single time.

I've first heard about this album when I was like 14 or 15 years old. We were trading cassettes with friends, and I've got this. I guess I gave him Queen's Greatest Hits II. I wasn't much of a music freak back then but the first thing that got my attention was the recurring melodies in the album. They were stealing their own music, and they were doing it in style. This also helps to give a more complete feel to the album and attracted the listener. It is highly psychedelic and highly progressive. If you don't know what these two words mean don't worry, you'll definitely get it when you listen.

The first two tracks form an epilogue of what's yet to come, and the album actually starts with "Time". The backbone of the album is songs 3, 4 and 5; "Time", "The Great Gig in the Sky" and "Money". Then comes "Us and Them" which is kind of a bridge between the beginning and the end. This album does not contain usual rock songs except "Time" and "Money". Clare Torry perfoms one hell of a vocal in "The Great Gig in the Sky", Dick Parry's saxophone in "Us and Them" is epic. I still believe it's the best ever performance by any session musician.

The album was intended to Syd Barret, their former front man who (decided to) lost his mind. It opens up with quotes from a few mad men. These voices (and sometimes evil laughs) are placed at various points in the album. I later learned that these were not actual mad men, they were friends of the band members. Linda and Paul McCartney were also interviewed but their voices were not used in the album. But another Wings member Henry McCullough says "I don't know, I was really drunk at the time" between "Money and Us and Them". The main idea of the album is to look at life and things from another point-of-view. The closing lyrics of the album is shocking:

and everything under the sun is in tune

but the sun is eclipsed by the moon

This is not an album which consists of songs, you have to think of it as a 45 minutes long song. You definitely don't want any of these songs in your shuffle playlist, any of them will bore you to death, but when you listen to them all together, it is magical. It ties with "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" at the top spot of my best albums of all time chart. There isn't a possible way that anyone can surpass this no matter how hard they try. This is the highest point achieved in writing, executing and producing music.

"There is no dark side of the Moon really... as a matter of fact, it's all dark."

Gerry O'Driscoll