Appollonia - Among Wolves

Appollonia are a three piece currently based out of Bourdeaux, France that have just self-released their first album titled Among Wolves. The album follows up a five song demo that the band recorded in 2006, and to their credit for being such a young and relatively new band Among Wolves is a pretty solid record. This is coming from someone who generally is a bit picky when it comes to bands that are molded around the post-rock/metal deal. However Appollonia, who have only been around roughly a couple or so years, are already pretty well ahead of the game.

On Among Wolves the band does an admirable job in avoiding some of the genres largest clichés by mixing in some hardcore elements that ultimately keeps the songs concise and the listeners on their toes. One of the things that makes Among Wolves stand on its own against the number of similarly styled releases out there right now is Appollonia’s refreshing dynamics throughout the record, which as mentioned before keeps things from falling victim to repetitiveness. For a debut, Among Wolves doesn’t fail to impress and there is definitely reason to believe that the best is ahead for the band. Fans of Year of No Light, Overmars, Cult of Luna, etc should and will likely find something to like about Appollonia’s debut.

Appollonia – Sunset Boulevard [MP3]

For those looking to pick up Among Wolves, head on over to the bands MySpace to do that and to check out some more tunes from the band. Enjoy!

Under Pressure - Come Clean

Hope everyone had a good Memorial Day weekend. I did what I imagine a lot of people did, that being attending a BBQ either with friends or family. The only downer was the fact that it remained a bit too cool for me to take advantage of the swimming pool that was available at ours. However, I imagine it was a blessing in disguise for most others in attendance as they didn’t have to witness my blindingly pale skinny self get into the water. They remain safe for now…

For those interested, the monthly mix is right around the corner. I plan on posting that up on Thursday, if not Thursday then definitely Friday. Either way, it will be up this week so keep an eye out.

Coming out of Winnipeg, Canada is the band Under Pressure whom I wasn’t familiar with before hearing their latest record Come Clean released on Escape Artist for the North American market. Originally the album had come out in 2006 on the German label Yellow Dog Records specifically for their European tour. Well, thankfully it’s getting the proper treatment here in the US because this is exactly what fans of hardcore need to hear. Granted, anymore I don’t listen to as much hardcore music as I used too. In my late teens I was pretty big into it and every once and awhile a record will come through still and revive my interest in the genre all over again. Under Pressure’s record Come Clean is exactly the type of record to do just that. With the current state of hardcore music, which is becoming increasingly blurred by tight pants, spiked bracelets, and high dollar haircuts it’s hard to really keep with it anymore. Such a thing is what makes it even more of a delight to hear something like Come Clean when a genre like hardcore music is currently in sort of stagnation. Under Pressure’s music here comes off with a complete “no bullshit” type of vibe that puts a nice big smile on my face. From the opener title track “Come Clean” it’s pretty evident from beginning that Under Pressure are serious about bringing back the spirit and pulse to hardcore music. Practically every song on Come Clean comes at you with riffs that will instantly grab you and won’t let go. This is what it’s all about. I’m pretty impressed with vocals too, which remain consistent and ring true to more classic sounding hardcore. The band receives a lot of comparisons to Poison Idea, which after listening to this I’d say is pretty accurate. In a small way it reminds me of older Revelation bands, but with a bit of a modern flair attached to it, which is by no means a slight in any way. It works well. Anyway, I highly suggest checking out the tracks below. Enjoy!

Under Pressure – Come Clean [MP3]
Under Pressure – Sick/Sinful [MP3]

For those interested in this fantastic release, head on over to Escape Artist Records and pick this up. This is some great stuff folks, don’t miss out.

Some Random Small Treats...

Boy I wish this song would been released a lot sooner or had been used on possibly Jupiter? I ask that because I have no clue as to when this song was actually recorded, however it sounds like it could of went along with the Jupiter era Cave In pretty easily. It could also be recently recorded too, like I said, I have no clue. However, finally finding it's way to the good old Internet is the long time unreleased song "Inflatable Dream" from genre hoppers Cave In. The song is excellent and begs the question, why not sooner? However, I am sure there is a good reason. The guitars are something reminiscent to the bombastic qualities that were found on Jupiter and at times dwells into space rock/prog territory. Despite that, It's still hard to tell when this song was written and even recorded. If anyone knows, it would be awesome to know. Anyway, check out the song. It's one of their better post Until Your Heart Stops tracks if you ask me.

Cave In - Inflatable Dream [MP3]

In between the time when Helmet was on hiatus and then reformed with a bunch of new people, Page Hamilton had started a little project dubbed Gandhi. Hearing about that made me all sorts of excited, due to me being such a nerdy Helmet fan boy. However Gandhi would probably only make it a few months and a handful of shows before being scrapped in favor of a Helmet reunion of sorts. I am still not sold on that. However, during that time some Gandhi tracks trickled out here and there and in time would see them as re-worked Helmet songs for their album Size Matters. Some time afterwards I stumbled across two or three more recorded songs from Gandhi that I had never heard before, which I found interesting. One of those songs was titled "All the Accidents", which was the best of the group. The rest were fairly disposable, but this one wasn't to bad. So in turn, here is that track, which finds Hamilton once again messing around with a bit of a more ambient electronic touch.

Gandhi/Page Hamilton - All the Accidents [MP3]