Darkwave act, NEONPOCALYPSE, brings a smile to the end of days with new EP, '-ish'
NEONPOCALYPSE, the first ever solo project by Then Comes Silence frontman Alex Svenson, releases its first EP, -ish.
Svenson explains that the six-track NEONPOCALYPSE EP fulfils a personal as much as a musical need: "I needed to fix my mind on something else. The band takes up a lot of my time and this is just a side project to find a new input... and a new output.”
The music by NEONPOCALYPSE is the end of days to a swell tune with a zippy beat. If the world is going under, enjoy the beautiful scenery and suck carefully on the last joyful moments... with a smile on your lips.
Tracks like, "Broken Circles' blend sounds similar to John Foxx and Simple Minds, yet with an unmistakably modern twist, thanks as much to Svenson’s familiar velvety croon and strong sense of melody. Others like "Game Over" and "Lips And The Light" pay homage to early industrial and 80s synth scene artists.
-ish is available now on limited edition CD and digital formats via the Swiss Dark Nights label.
Siren Song” is the fourth EP and X-IMG debut of Argentine producer & DJ Dominique Slva. With a background in classical music and violin she fuses a sophisticated blend of broken beats, supernatural textures, crystalline melodies, ethereal vocal cut-ups and intricate percussion to create a dream like work consisting of 5 original tracks. As she explains: “Siren Song is an attempt to distance myself a bit from the dancefloor tracks, the idea was to make something more mysterious and not rigidly grounded into reality or the typical club format.” It also includes is a remix of the track “Lovers Cannot See” by SARIN.
Release is planned in the beginning of March 2022.
On INTO THE ANCIENT, Grammy-nominated recording artist Peter Phippen explores the gleaming mystical sonorities of ancient and modern flutes. Within a 12-track album of haunting new age world music, Phippen and co-producer / synthesist Ivar Lunde Jr. offer a captivating collage of the flutes’ translucent chimerical whisper and subtle electronic sound images. It's a shimmering panorama illustrating the gauzy veil of perception that separates our present state from the airy world of the spirits.
This month it’s been 26 years since Ministry released their cover version of Bob Dylan’s ‘Lay Lady Lay’!
This month it’s been 26 years since American industrial metal band Ministry released their cover version of Bob Dylan’s ‘Lay Lady Lay’ (February 1996).
The song was performed earlier during a charity concert in October 1994, with Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam performing the backing vocals. Later the studio version of the song was recorded and released as a 4 track CD single from Ministry’s sixth studio album, Filth Pig. The song also appears on the 2008 Ministry cover album, Cover Up.
In the Rolling Stone magazine’s review of Filth Pig, critic Jon Wiederhorn wrote that the cover "amalgamates a deep distorted bass line, clicking electronic percussion, jangling acoustic guitars, ominous curls of feedback and Ministry frontman Al Jourgensen's trademark howls”.
Lay Lady Lay (CD) Tracklist
| Lay Lady Lay (Edit) | 5:10 |
| Lay Lady Lay (Album Version) | 5:45 |
| Paisley | 4:50 |
| Scarecrow (Live) | 8:18 |
Lyrics
Lay lady lay
Lay across my big brass bed
Lay lady lay
Lay across my big brass bed
Stay lady stay
Stay while the night is still ahead
Stay lady stay
Heaven's fills our head
Whatever colors that you have in your mind
I show them on to you and you see them shine
Stay lady stay
Stay with your man a while
Till the break of day
Then you're gonna see him smile
His clothes are dirty but his hands are clean
And you're the best thing, he's ever seen
Why wait any longer for the world to begin?
You can have your cake and eat it too
Why wait any longer for the one you love
When he's standing over you?
Lay lady lay
Lay across my big brass bed
Stay lady stay
We're gonna build the whole night ahead
I long to see you in the morning light
I long to reach for you all night
Lay lady lay
Lay lady lay
Lay lady lay
Lay lady lay
Lay lady lay
Songwriter: Bob Dylan
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
The Stooges classic 'Raw Power' was released on the seventh of February 1973. The game-changer. In 1997 Iggy Pop remixed the album, making it sound like a war of noise and aggression.
Some said there was no need to overhaul the original Bowie mix of this incendiary album, after all, it was that which caused such a huge influence on Punk in the 70s. Probably Pop did do a remix at the request of CBS, more than likely to stop anyone else from doing it.
'Raw Power' is a beautiful album of destruction.
Recorded in the autumn of '72 in London, with a new guitarist in James Williamson. He brought the extra cutting guitar licks into all this. When a suitable rhythm section could not be found, the Asheton brothers were brought back into the frame. Ron, being the original guitarist and core songwriter for the first two Stooges albums, this time switched to bass and the line-up was complete.
Pop produced and mixed the original sessions, but Bowie took the masters to remix them again. Several of the tracks were remixed in one day, another reason why Iggy may have felt in 1997 that he wanted to leave his stamp on it. Willamson and the late Ron Asheton had both publicly stated they preferred Bowie's mix of the album.
All this talk of remixes, does it really make a difference? In this case yes! On Iggy Pop's version, there is a lot more distortion in the mix, especially on the guitar lines, probably down to Pop keeping all the levels in the red and turning them up full for the remix. The noticeable difference is that the Asheton brothers are much more prevalent in the mix, unlike before. Ron proved he was handy enough with the bass, this seems closer to Pop's original vision for the album. Feedback and distortion over the loud mixes are the hallmark of Iggy Pop and The Stooges.
Ironically it was Bowie who pushed to get Pop back on the scene in the early 70s, due to Iggys spiralling heroin problem. What happened with the two gentlemen and their relocation to Berlin in the years that followed makes that effort by Bowie seem a slight contradiction.
Distortion and feedback and talk of remixes to one side, it is Iggy Pop at his finest. His vocal delivery is faultless, snarling, convincing and perhaps his best, from the 'Search And Destroy' opening line:
"I'm a streetwalking cheetah with a heart full of napalm
I'm a runaway son of the nuclear A-bomb"
to the closer -‘Death Trip', all is remarkably well delivered, like the collision of two nuclear warheads.
The argument will always be there surrounding this album. Which is the better version, the true version? That is whichever you personally like the most. The argument is there for both sides, but don't turn the attention away from the fine album it is and what it did for punk- rock, not only in the 70s but in general.
Raw Power (1973 LP Tracklist)
| Search And Destroy | 3:26 |
| Gimme Danger | 3:28 |
| Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell (Originally Titled "Hard To Beat") | 4:52 |
| Penetration | 3:35 |
| Raw Power | 4:22 |
| I Need Somebody | 4:50 |
| Shake Appeal | 3:00 |
| Death Trip | 5:53 |
[KB+FG]
