Various Artists - Raising Steam Volume I - 3 (Cd Review)

Various Artists – Raising Steam

Volume I

01. Miss Von Trapp - Have A Pie: Modern Mrs Lovett

02. Helicopter Quartet - Where Have All The Aliens Gone?

03. Thy Last Drop – Gravedigger

04. Birthrite - Loving You (Ain't So Easy)

05. The Mysterious Freakshow - Hedge Witch

06. Crimson Clocks – Red Violin

07. Montague Jacques Fromage - Merde! Mon Dieu! (Absinthe! Sacre Bleu!)

08. Gladstone – Night Creatures

09. Tom Slatter - Mother's Been Talking To Ghosts Again

10. Metropolis – Sirens

11. The Mechanisms - Riddle of the Sphinx

Volume II

01. The Dark Design - Haggard Rider

02. Gurdybird - Raggle Taggle Gypsy (video edit)

03. Venus de Vilo - It's My Party - I'll Die If I Want To!

04. Ague - Fifteen Leagues to Providence

05. Violent Sky - Frances (In the Gallery of Stars)

06. The Wattingers - Evil Driving Rain

07. Under A Banner – Steam

08. Ghostfire - Griminsky's Soul

09. BB BlackDog - Steam Punk Junkie

10. New Jacobin Club - Angel MMXVI

Volume III

01. Kiss Like Ether – End Game

02. Gordon Midgley - The Tell Tale Heart

03. Victor & the Bully - Every Fight Is A Food Fight For A Cannibal

04. Nathan Jon Tillett – Eternaeon

05. Heathen StrangeFellow & the VaudeVille Vagabonds – Masquerade

06. LM Cooke – Poor Jenny

07. The Filthy Spectacula - Flying Dutchman

08. Dark Sinfonia - A Murderous Breath 

09. Jessica Law - The Mermaid's Revenge

10. The Hare And The Moon - Come Unto The Corn

11. Napier's Bones - Hand of Glory

12. Feline & Strange - The City

13. Valentine Wolfe – Corvidae

14. Krankschaft - Come Fly With Us

15. Nathaniel Johnstone - Seven Veils

What we have here are three limited edition CD-R samplers of the Raising Steam download albums.

Each of these comes in a DVD box with a limited edition pin badge, only available through one of these purchases.

For your money you also get the code to get the entire downloadable versions through Bandcamp, giving you access to another ten or so songs per volume.

ALL monies raised go to the New Futures Nepal charity.

Now you may of course be wondering what the hell is Steampunk music?

The short answer is there is no such thing as steampunk music, not as a specific genre anyway.

What these samplers show is that anything is possible from classic rock to pop, dark and twisted gothic horror, folk music and even traditional British music hall.

So why is it called Steampunk? I hear you shout; my own opinion is that the “Alternative” approach allows for such freedom that many talented artists are simply drawn to something which is not locked down in a specific genre.

I would urge you to investigate if like me you have a wide variety of interests when it comes to music, perhaps the very name of Steampunk has made you avoid the music, something which to its shame the wider music press has been guilty of, thus failing to introduce their readers to some amazing classic rock music!

A few examples:

From Volume I, we have some horror tinged music hall comedy from Miss Von Trapp.  The Helicopter Quartet are clearly emulating one of Karlheinz Stockhausen many experimental compositions.

The track by Tom Slatter is quite stunning, a mix of light modern progressive rock with a vocal delivery that seems to mix David Byrne and Syd Barrett.

Finally Metropolis have a modern Hawkwind vibe with some Tubeway Army thrown in for good measure.

Up next a few from Volume II, how about Gurdybird who has mixed tribal drum rhythms with playing an actual hurdy gurdy!

Venus de Vilo brings a smile with her incredible dark and twisted mix of Nina Hagan and Alannis Morrisette.

A superb mix of seventies hard rock and proto doom Violent Sky are one of the stand outs here.

Ghostfire perform some fantastic female fronted acid folk, followed by some bass driven stoner rock from BB Blackdog.

Last one is New Jacobin Club, providing some folk tinged acoustic music with a very powerful vocal.

What does Volume III kick off with? Kiss Like Ether with some darkwave meets early industrial and perfectly mixed and delivered.

Up next is some weird space synth and then Gordon Midgley treats us to seven minutes of mesmerizing narration of Poe’s classic tale.

Dishing up some folk horror in the style of Marc Wilkinson (Blood On Satan’s Claw) and Magnet (The Wicker Man) comes The Hare & The Moon.

Valentine Wolfe are pure Symphonic Metal and keeping it heavy are Krankschaft (Hawkwind’s Robert Calvert former backing band) blending Amon Duul II with Hawklords.

Last up is Nathaniel Johnson whose take on folk rock is reminiscent of The Trees meeting All About Eve.

Well I have picked out a few, there really is much more on offer, almost every genre is represented here.

For more information, order details and a chance to preview the music go to the Raising Steam Bandcamp page.

Official Bandcamp Page

TOP 14 ALBUMS OF 2015

STATEMENT ABOUT STU'S REVIEWS

There have been no reviews posted since October 6th, that is due to serious health problems which have left me in constant physical pain and resulting in a fair amount of depression, this is still ongoing.

All review copies sent to me since that date have been deleted and no further promos have been downloaded, this will remain the situation until my health returns, i have already spoken with a numer of record company pr people on this subject.

So until i can sort myself out, there will be no more posts after this one.

TOP 14 ALBUMS OF 2015

So been a good year for music, quite a lot of interesting and original albums being produced, these are my personal choices from what has landed in my inbox or been sent to me.

STU

01.GALLEY BEGGAR - SILENCE & TEARS

02.PYOGENESIS - A CENTURY IN THE CURSE OF TIME

03.WITH THE DEAD - WITH THE DEAD

04.THE DAY OF LOCUSTS - FROM THE GUTTER TO THE GODS

05.THE DEEP - PREMONITION

06.NORSE - PEST

07.LUCIFER - LUCIFER 1

08.VALENTINE WOLFE - THE NIGHTINGALE: A GOTHIC FAIRYTALE

09.SOLDIER - DEFIANT

10,AGUE - POWERED BY EFFLUVIA

11.AL B DAMNED - FOR OLD TIMES STAKE

12.DESERT - NEVER REGRET

13.MEKIGAH - LITLOST

14.ALBATROSS - FEAR FROM THE SKIES

Valentine Wolfe - The Nightingale- A Gothic Fairytale (CD Review)

01.Black Feathers
02.Dark Desire
03.The Place Where Evil Grows
04.Inside My Nightmare
05.Devil's Bane
06.Darkling, Listen
07.Twisted Melody
08.Precious Moments
09.Moonlight Prayer
10.Belladonna, Deadly Nightshade
11.You Could Never Have My Heart
12.Ghost Of Her Self


Sarah Black (Vocals/Piano/Harpsichord/keyboards)
Braxton Ballew (Bass/Programming/Electronics)

Hailing from South Carolina, Braxton Ballew and Sarah Black have been composing and performing music together as Valentine Wolfe since 2006.
Both coming from a classical background, with qualifications to back it up and hold graduate degrees from the University of Georgia, where they studied electronic composition, Ballew is also the Education Director of the Greenville Symphony Orchestra.

Perhaps it is no surprise that their scores have been heard in theatre productions of The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, The Winter’s Tale and Twelfth Night.What may be a surprise is their love of Metal, Goth and Industrial music and the very clever way that they put all their influences and styles together.

What surprised me after the first listen was how they put their music together to sound like a full band complete with drums and guitar, when in fact neither are on the album!
As they said when i aksed them; "Just us, Sarah and Braxton, no guitars all the distortion parts are double bass and we program the drum loops ourselves."

Time now i think to hit play and listen to some of this self styled 'Victorian Chamber Metal'.

'Black Feathers' has a moody and atmospheric
 opening before turning into a solid commercial sounding symphonic rock song, really love the live sounding drum sound that drives this piece, great distortion riffs and harmonic keyboards, now over this is a
beautiful operatic soprano vocal and as the song progresses we are treated to some amazing double bass playing, sounds more like a cello to me (but what do i know?).

Now 'Dark Desire' is a hybrid of gothic rock and classical, but this one has a rock opera feel as well, reminiscent of Sarah Brightman's songs in the film Repo! The Genetic Opera, again driving drum patterns and that double bass make for a perfect mix to both move you emotionally and in a bang your head kinda way.

Moving into slightly different territory with 'The Place Where Evil Grows' as this uses more electronic samples and effects on the vocals, this time the double bass sounds like a violin as well.

Somehow on the song 'Inside My Nightmare' Braxton manages to get that double bass to sound like Simon House circa 1974, dont know how he can create so many amazing sounds from guitar to violin on it, but he does!


'Devils Bane' may have a solid rock sound but the vocal style whilst still operatic has a neo-folk feel to it, this helps create an intresting blend, the same can be said of 'Darkling, Listen' though this track has some more of that awesome drum and double bass playing set into some timing changes.

By far the heaviest song so far is 'Twisted Melody' for underneath that harmonic vocal lurks some evil heavy metal riffs.

After more of the same with 'Precious Moments' complete with some frantic drumming towards the end (yes i know its not real, but they have nailed the sound to perfection).

Heavy Metal meets Industrial on 'Moonlight Prayer' and once again it is that double bass playing that continues to astound me, so many different sounds!
This song has a lot going on it, different timing changes and lots of backing vocals and for some reason parts of this remind me of Rocket From The Crypt's 'On A Rope'.


So can Industrial influenced metal, operatic singing and Harpsicord go together?
'Belladonna, Deadly Nightshade' proves that the answer is "yes" and clearly anything is possible with these two talented and inventive musicians.

More drum driven power with 'You Could Never Have My Heart' and more outstanding double bass playing.

Finally 'Ghost Of Her Self', a slow and dark goth/opera piece, great vocal double tracking, solid as ever musical backing, more great distorted riffs and (yes i'm gonna say this again) the drum and double bass playing is just perfect.


Rating 9/10
For Fans Of: Epica, Emilie Autumn, Rasputina, Angtoria, Mr Doctor's Devil Doll , Apocalyptica

Facebook: Valentine Wolfe