Warm Ghost - Uncut Diamond

Warm Ghost is made up of Paul Duncan: songwriter and singer and Oliver Chapoy: composer and all round facilitator.

You could say, 'like band name, like music'. Warm Ghost is a 'synth pop' DJ duo from New York, yet their tracks lack the cold, mechanical nature which other 'hip' DJ partnerships, such as 'Crystal Castles' could be accused of. It is also eerie and mysterious, sometimes even as frightening as a spectre.

The first track on the EP, 'Open The Wormhole In Your Heart' is accompanied with an 'arty', extremely revealing video (not included with the EP), which shows naked flesh writhing around on a lubricated surface. Maybe that's where the 'uncut' comes from. If I was to make a metaphor to describe the feeling at the heart of this track, I would say it's a bud in a forest, sprouting, growing a stem and leaves and growing and growing until its leaves reach the sunlight or it's like waking up to a brand new day, feeling optimistic and ready to attack the rest of your life. Paul Duncan's celestial, god-like singing gives this image - a fantastic way to start a day and an EP then.

'Without A Dancer' continues with the otherworldly and upbeat feel of The Wormhole In Your Heart and we are introduced to a warm, eccentric chorus of keyboarderie. It sounds like we're being invaded by little, friendly ET's who just want to contribute to the Uncut Diamond EP. Aside from the little green men, the track is extremely chilled out, the slow introductory beat mimics a slow heart beat and will comatose anyone who listens to it - you've been warned. I like the simplicity of Without A Dancer; we hear the same line, 'without a dancer, my love, it wanders and crawls', repeatedly, in a morose tone and we know what the track is about immediately.

'Claws Overhead' continues the synthy sound and we're treated to more extravagant vocals. Paul Duncan, the man who writes the songs, says that he is inspired by The Cure, Depeche Mode and OMD, however, this third track has the essence of The Shins, the main similarity coming between the two enigmatic voices. It is also very '80's pop' and it benefits from the uplifting torrent of the music of that care-free decade. It's almost impossible to gauge what Paul Duncan is singing in Claws Overhead and I'm left wondering if the EP would benefit from the vocals being more forthright. You could say that it is the mysterious nature of the vocals that gives the song its appeal. Maybe I'm just going deaf but lowering the volume of the synths and boosting the vocal, I believe, could make this track even more kind to the ears.

Paul Duncan has a history of song writing; this isn't just some futuristic sounding chords played on a digital keyboard. In fact, the more you listen to Uncut Diamond, the more it seems that these songs are almost all about the lyrics. The synths are just there to create an atmosphere.

I will allow you all to discover the three remaining tracks, the eponymously named 'Uncut Diamond', 'Resignation Rights' and 'Let My Angst Unfold In The Water Like A Hounds Tongue' for yourselves. I will hint that the 80's sound does continue and the tracks might become even more hypnotic. The EP will be available to buy from Partisan Records on February 15^th 2011.

WARM GHOST // OPEN THE WORMHOLE IN YOUR HEART from HOLY COW COLLECTIVE on Vimeo.

Help, I'm alive, my heart keeps beating like a hammer.

I'm not gonna thank myself for this tomorrow but I need to write something so here's a review of Metric's album, Fantasies. It was actually released on April 7, 2009, which for some reason amazes me, because it's now 2011 of course. So much has happened in that time. I guess all time is is what happens during it.

Firstly, I'll say that Fantasies has to be my favourite album ever. I feel/ felt so connected to it and connected to Metric's music when I first listened to it. I had recently come to know Metric's music. Their 'Live It Out' album is nothing short of brilliant as well. After Live It Out, I was sceptical as to whether Metric could produce anything close again but it seems that they did. At the time of writing Fantasies, Emily Haines, Metric's iconic lead singer, had became scared about the future and she now admits that she was contemplating never writing again and quitting Metric. She did actually 'go solo' for a time before she wrote Fantasies. She created a new one-person act which went by the name of 'Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton' and released an album interestingly named: 'Knives Don't Have Your Back'. It is actually pretty good itself so I would recommend checking it out. I think it's fair to say she has enough talent to put Elvis to shame.

Fantasies received good reviews from almost every publication but, personally, anything less than a five out of five for the album is a bit churlish. On most albums, there are a few songs it seems are shoved in just to make the album seem like better value for money but that isn't the case here. I would almost stretch to saying that all ten songs would make it in to my favourite 100 songs list, almost anyway. It's hard to pick out the highlights but if my life depended on it, I'd say the three supreme tracks are: 'Blindness', 'Help, I'm Alive', and 'Collect Call'.

During Emily's difficult time where she struggled for artistic creativity, she travelled to Buenos Aires and stayed for a while. She said: 'I went there because it was the one place I felt that I could discover for myself, and I didn't know a single person, which was important. The songs that I wrote here were the simplest and clearest writing that I've done in my life'.



I think Metric have always been fairly difficult to define. They are obviously a rock band but they have often dabbled with digital keyboards, making them more of a 'new wave' group. I'd suggest that if you're the type of 'muso' (as the Aussies say) who likes bands who write good lyrics and play knife-sharp, skin-piercing guitar riffs, then Metric could be a band for you.

Blindness lyrics:

Send us a blindfold, send us a blade
Tell the survivors help is on the way
 
I was a blindfold, never complained
All the survivors singing in the rain
I was the one with the world at my feet

Got us a battle, leave it up to me

Find us a trap door, find us a plane
Tell the survivors help is on the way

I was a blindfold never complained
All the survivors singing in the rain
I was the one with the world at my feet
Got us a battle, leave it up to me

What it is and where it stops nobody knows
You gave me a life I never chose

I wanna leave but the world won't let me go
I wanna leave but the world won't let me go

What it is and where it stops nobody knows
You gave me a life I never chose

I was the one with the world at my feet
Got us a battle, leave it up to me

Are you a Belieber?

I have been looking at America's Billboard charts on www.billboard.com and decided to finally voice my thoughts on Justin Bieber's seemingly astronomic rise to approval, fame and fortune. According to Wiki, he was discovered on Youtube in 2008 and now he must be the most famous and iconic teenager since Macauley Culkin (comment if you disagree). In America, they have the 'American Dream' philosophy. People who believe in it believe that in America, anyone can be anything they want. It's also about working your way up from being poor to having a nice house and a loving family but that the more old-fashioned, maybe heart-warming, philosophy. Anyway, it seems that Justin is taking full advantage of the opportunities the American Dream brings.

You look at Justin Bieber and listen to his music and wonder why he has done so well. Of course, he's cute and his songs are sometimes fairly catchy. I think it says more about his fans than his own limited talent. Young girls desperately need a boy to dream of, one they can imagine making their own, especially girls who might not be very popular with boys who they know in their everyday lives. There was obviously a gap in the market for a cute, young singer. It's not really the same with boys though, is it? Young boys don't fantasize about girls their age. If they have fantasy girls, they usually dote over women in their twenties, like Megan Fox, for example, which seems more of an issue of approaching sexual maturity.

Notwithstanding, there are so many artists with limited talent, doing well in America especially, but also in Europe, that it seems any sly promoter with an eye for potential, could strike gold in music today. It should be the most talented who become the most successful but we all know that isn't the case and the argument about manufactured bands and singers became boring a long time ago. Having said that, the talent will usually still get through and Amen to that.