Gangleri – music reviews

The female half of Thorofon / The Musick Wreckers is back. It is only recently that I got to know Geneviève Pasquier (about a year ago) and I have to admit that I pulled her three earlier releases off the internet. I like some of the songs on these albums. Pasquier has a nice mix between oldstyle industrial and electropop, but the result is less predictable than this description suggests. On “Le Cabaret Moi” Pasquier has a little bit more of a ‘cabaretesk’ sound, the lyrics are now mostly in French and Pasquier incorporated a few new sounds. Still the new album is recognisable in song structure and style. Poppy songs with strange distorted industrial sounds or simply rhythmical industrial with Pasquier’s singing, most of the time nicely catchy. Yep, an original style and I happen to like this relatively more accessible current in the extreme electronics scene and this album is a very nice one in this direction.
Links: Geneviève Pasquier, Ant-Zen

As ORE keeps releasing new albums, my interest deminishes, the last Triarii album is a great album though and the “Roses For Rome” song that these two did together is very nice too. So what would an entire album of a combination of these two projects sound like? Besides the first and last track, it seems that ORE had a lot more influence on the sound as Triarii. The songs are tranquil, ORE-like and only on the background are some martial industrial or orchestral sounds. It is funny to hear the similarities of the sounds of both projects and “Three Hours” sounds better than ORE alone, but I would have like a bit more Triarii sound in here. I must say that like with Triarii the simple melodies start to work better after a few rounds in the player, so maybe this album will grow on me a bit more.
Links: Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio, Triarii, Cold Meat Industry, Eternal Soul Records

When I saw this album on a distribution list I did not realise that I knew this band from some online compilation (“Honi Soit Qui Mal Y Pense” 2006). Apparently they released an earlier album called “Tomber en Heroés” (2006 forart.it). I heard it and it is a not too good martial album. When I listed the new tracks on the band’s Myspace I figured I might get the album. Well, “Les Voix…” actually is another not too good or professional bombastic martial release. Digital copper and orchestrations and of course a lot of drumming make this entirely instrumental album into an average album in a genre that apparently sounds about the same as 10 years ago. Sometimes the melodies are catching and the atmosphere good, but as a whole I find this album not particularly good.
Links: l’Effet c’est Moi, Midnight Productions

There is this Dutch project called Distel that makes “angstpop”. Indeed this sounds like Haus Arafna / Galakthorrö and the few tracks that I heard are not all that bad. Supposedly there is an album on the way so every once in a while I check if it is already available. Then I noticed that the band has a few live shows, under which a “Gifgrond” party with an “Enfant Terrible” label night in Tilburg coming Saturday. Gifgrond? Enfant Terrible? The latter turns out to be a label with quite a few releases out, the last of which is this compilation cd. “With Radio Resistencia we give another overview of independent music as we see it… and this time not strictly limited to electronic music.” So: “angtpop”, “elektro chansons”, “dada synth punk”, “obscure 80′ies”, a good place to pick up new genre-names! Most of the music on this compilation sounds quite a bit like 80′ies wave and more modern electropop to me. Some tracks are completely electronic, some more rock-oriented. Most tracks are just nice, some are not my thing and a few are quite enjoyable. Different music from what I play usually, but that is a good thing, right?
Link: Enfant Terrible Productions