Tag: avant garde

  • Chip Kinman – The Great Confrontation 2LP

    Chip Kinman – The Great Confrontation 2LP

    Chip Kinman The Great Confrontation 2LP (In The Red Records) I confess that I had forgotten about The Dils until the opportunity to review the band’s Live! reissue came up. Not that I was unfamiliar with the band before (I remember discovering the band at the same time I came upon The Weirdos, The Bags,…

  • Virgin Black – Requiem Pianissimo

    Virgin Black – Requiem Pianissimo

    Requiem – Pianissimo is both opening and resolution. This long-awaited release presents the first section of Virgin Black’s three-part requiem but it also brings the trilogy to a close, completing the two-hour and thirty-three-minute masterpiece more than a decade after it began. Although Pianissimo opens the requiem series, to me this album begins in what…

  • Magma @ The Mod Club in Toronto, 20 August 2017

    Magma @ The Mod Club in Toronto, 20 August 2017

    Sometimes progressive rock feels too limiting a label for an infinitely innovative collective credited with introducing unorthodox and challenging elements to music. One such act is cult legend Magma, formed in France in 1969 by the ambitious Christian Vander. Vander took Magma one step beyond other musicians at the time by creating his own language for…

  • The Visit – Through Darkness Into Light

    The Visit – Through Darkness Into Light

    Shiver-inducing.  If that isn’t a qualifier of “metal” status then what is? Through Darkness Into Light is a release of goosebumpy highs and deep rumbling lows from The Visit, Ottawa duo Raphael Weinroth Browne (cello) and Heather Sita Black (voice). Listening to the album repeatedly lends newfound appreciation of the emotional wallop packed into this seemingly…

  • Triptykon – Eparistera Daimones

    Could it be that after three decades as metal musician Fischer has found his voice after playing with so many different styles? Eparistera Daimones is not that different from Monotheist, but that’s not a detriment when following an album that revived your career and reputation. Triptykon’s debut is a worthy piece in Fischer’s enigmatic but…