Album Review: “Unusual” by Marian Hill

Today, I will be talking about a very fun and unique duo’s second album. American artists, Jeremy Lloyd and Samantha Gongol, who make up Marian Hill have finally put out their new record, called Unusual!

The album was released on May 11th, and consists of ten songs total. I’m actually very excited but also a little nervous because I’ve only really listened to their singles, and unfortunately I never did hear Act One (2016) all the way through, but after I saw this on Spotify’s new music, I knew I wanted to hear it and review it on here!

Marian Hill is kind of known for their electronica beats, mixed in with a very chill vibe to it, and their first song off the album called “Subtle Thing” and its everything you know of MH, however, it’s a little edgier, and I really love the seductive, whisper way of Sam’s voice. Despite the fact that it has a mellow sound to it, you can still dance to it! I really like it. Second is “Differently” and this has an urban feel to it. I didn’t necessarily like the introduction, I didn’t think it meshed well together, the booping sounds with Samantha’s low voice, she was fine though. If it didn’t have that sound, I don’t think I would have had any care about it. Once the song continues, that element starts to intertwine with the rest of it, but by itself isn’t good. Next is “All Night Long” and this features Steve Davit, all three has made it into a modern jazz-y sound. That’s actually the best way to describe their music in the first place. They have a very light approach to electric music, so it honestly sounds more like a modern take to jazz and blues. I think this is the perfect track to showcase that type of subgenre, because it has that horn solo, like regular jazz music would, but it’s a totally different sound then what you’re used to hearing.

Fourth is “Don’t Miss You” and this has a darker sound, kind of sassy in a way. It has more of a pop element to it towards the end, so I really like it! Next is “Wish You Would” and to show you their quirkiness, you can hear these obsessive snapping sound and a mixture of computer sounds throughout that make a whole beat around Samantha’s words. It’s really cool.  If their song “Down” had a part two, sound wise, this would be that song! Afterwards is “Don’t Do It” and I really like Sam’s high pitched voice in the beginning of the verses, usually I don’t like it, because I think it’s too much, but I thought it was very pretty. This has another ominous, almost hip hop-y beat behind her lyrics, I can hear a small exotic taste in it too! It’s very interesting!

“Sideways” is next and finally we have a slower track. This could be the perfect song to put in a sad scene of a television show or movie. If you need something to calm you down, this is your song to listen to on those gloomy days! This will probably become a favorite of mine. We have “No Hesitation” now and and we’re back on the eccentric train with this one, but I don’t hate it. It’s not so outlandish like the other one, so it’s very mild and has a nice chill vibe. It’s good with me. Steve Davit makes another appearance with this next track, “Listening” and we have that urban feel to it, but gives me an old school pop vibe too. And lastly we have “Go Quietly” and its a straight up ballad. Yay! I love the dreamscape-y beat, it’s absolutely beautiful!

I thought this album was really great! I’m always to listen to different kinds of music, because I don’t want to hear the same stuff over and over again, and I think with Marian Hill, since they’re so out there, as they don’t necessarily fit the general pop and electric dance music standards, they are really unusual to what we’re used to hearing on the radio on a daily basis! You kind of have to train your mind to look beyond your normal tastes, and see for the smoothness of the music!

Have you listened to Marian Hill’s second album yet? If you have, what were your favorite(s) so far? Let me know below!

Album Review: “Awake” by Alison Wonderland

I found today’s artist back in the summer of 2016, I really wanted to find more female DJs, as I was getting to the bottom of Krewella’s music library on Spotify and I basically made it my mission to find more female based music, and with that I found Jes, Brooklyn, Helena, NERVO, Anna Lunoe, Magda, Gina Turner and finally Alison Wonderland. Apparently Australia has a fairly large selection of female DJs because half of that list above, is made up of Australian women!

Alison Wonderland, whose real name is Alex, released her debut album “Run” back in 2015. I’ve been loving the crap out of it since I discovered it, truth be told, out of all the albums I put into my female DJs playlist on Spotify, it’s the most played and no, I’m not joking! So when I found out that she was releasing a new album, I was so excited! It’s hard to describe her music in general. I’d say it’s trap mixed in with some chill music too. It’s been a nice balance so hopefully this album, titled “Awake” will be somewhat of the same of her last record, but I’m also hoping for something different too.

We start off with “Good Enough” and already we have this like circus-y type of sound in the introduction, and then we have this very orchestral element added on top of it. If you didn’t know, she was trained playing the cello, so this could very well be her in these moments. I actually love it, because for one it’s short and sweet, but it keeps you entertained and wondering else is coming. Second is “No” and something else you’ll notice with her music is that these are sung by her unless told otherwise. This song is very different, besides sounding like a regular EDM song, I kind of get this vibe that it’s ideal for the summer that’s fast approaching here! It’s fairly mellow and surprisingly, I really like it too.

“Okay” is the third track and we have a totally different sound, it has this out of the box quality that I’m always looking for, but it’s also quiet in a way. The beat and lyrics don’t sound too crazy, you still get a nice groove and it’s well-balanced. It’s good. We move onto “Easy” and without playing into the actual word too much, it’s a nice easy going type of song. I like the fact that you can actually hear the lyrics in this song, because the beat itself is very laid back, more like pop oriented. I’d consider that a good thing to all of my hardcore EDM fans out there! If it’s released as a single, it could do well on mainstream radio stations. Next we have “High” and it features Trippie Redd. I vaguely remember listening to this once when it first came out, but I quickly turned it off because I wanted to save it for this review! This is a little cukoo, and I say that in the nicest way possible! It’s very chill, synthpop-ish too. It’s very bass-y though and I really enjoy that, everybody loves a good bass drop and this has it, but the entire track has this ominous vibe that adds an edger element that I also love too.

Next we move on to our first of a matchup with another fellow DJ, this one is “Here 4 U” and it has BLESSUS in it. Honestly, I thought it was “High” because in the beginning of this track, it continues that same chill beat, so I thought we were still going but then I noticed that the male vocals had changed and I realized we had really moved onto another track entirely! I really like this one, it’s more upbeat and has this trance-like sound to it, which is interesting because this isn’t her style at all, so maybe this is BLESSUS added twist to it. It’s really good though. We now have the song that signaled that she was releasing new music, “Church” and at first, I didn’t like it because of the light sound she was going for with this track, but as I’ve been listening to the others, I actually like it a little bit more. Since the beat is so dimmed, you can really hear the lyrics and possibly the meaning behind it, so I’m glad I’ve changed my mind about it.

The eigth track is “Cry” and again, I am loving the lyrics and I have to say there’s nothing wrong with men crying! Anyways, this has summer-y based vibe, at least when we entered the choruses, it was the first thing that popped into my head. I don’t usually like music that is released close to or in the middle of summer that sounds like the season, that was one of the reasons why I didn’t really like Imagine Dragons’s new album! Since this is like the second track that is giving me that type of vibe, I don’t necessarily hate it too much! Now we go into one of my favorite tracks ever! “Happy Place” is next and weirdly enough, I’ve been listening to it so much that I think it’s inspiring me to write about my happy place on here. This track is everything that got me interested in Alison Wonderland in the first place. The bass, air-y vocals, and just fun atmosphere while listening to it. It’s awesome!

Tenth is “Good Girls Bad Boys” and when I saw this title, I was very intrigued on what this would sound like, especially after such a banger like the last one. I actually like the pop-y beginning and the slow build to the actual beat itself. It kind of has this urban feel to it, with the usage of record scratches, to be quite honest, it just brought me back to what dance music used to sound like, which was a little weird at first, because it actually starts off sort of modern, and then ends in this backspin of elements of hip hop and techno. I thought it was cool! Next we have “Dreamy Dragon” – I love how DJs title their songs. You can never really know what you’re getting after reading something like that, but this features rapper Chief Keef in it. Again, we have a very modern, light take to this track. I had a hard time not dancing to it, that’s all I can say about it!

We’re almost done, we’ve entered the last three songs, while one being an interlude called “Hope” and the best way I can explain interludes is that they can be an extra introduction to the next song or a short track in general; they’re usually under a minute long. Next we have another matchup track called, “Sometimes Love” this has SLUMBERJACK on it. This one is kind of milder compared to the other one. The bass drops are nice and it keeps me dancing and in a good mood all throughout, so that’s a plus! I didn’t really mesh with it the first time I heard it, but the second time around was better! Lastly, there’s “Awake” and this starts off very chill and I thought this would be a good idea to end the album like this, but then I started to realize in a way I was eating my words in a way because usually I enjoy bangers in the beginning and ending, but maybe my tastes are changing the longer I do this? I don’t know, but I really liked the gentleness of this song.

So now that we’re finished, I have to say I was fairly surprised with this record. It wasn’t anything that I thought it would, but honestly I liked being proved wrong. I like surprises when it comes to some of my favorite artists and bands. I will admit though, I actually haven’t listened to “Run” all the way through, I’ve always made plans of doing it, but something was there to distract me so thankfully I decided to put it on review list so I can finally say I’ve listened to an Alison Wonderland album! I know I’m a sad individual, but it’s a proud moment for me!

Have you listened to Alison Wonderland’s new album “Awake” yet? What did you initially think about the record as a whole? If you enjoyed it, do you have any favorite songs yet?

April Playlist + ANNOUNCEMENT!

Howdy!

I’m starting with the special announcement.

So we’re about to start May, which is the basically start of summer for a lot of people. If you have been reading my blog for a couple of years now, you know what I do during the summers. I write up different music posts talking about artists and bands from all over the world! It’s been a growing favorite which makes me very happy because around August or September, I start to feel like it drags on and on. This theme will go from May to October, which isn’t too bad. Everything will literally take off next Tuesday!

Now that I have that out of the way, we can discuss this past month’s playlist and how crazy it got in just one week! I have been adding songs onto this playlist like crazy! There was definitely a theme for April and it was anything mellow. I have a lot of Celtic Woman, Josh Groban, Plumb. It is full of everything that made me happy this past month. I didn’t care what I put in it this time around. I did add “Little April Shower” from the Bambi soundtrack as I could not include it into the playlist.

Last week one of the greats passed away, Prince. I grew up on his music. My mom grew up in the 80’s so she passed down her kind of music to my sister and I. We got a whole range of different music, covering rap and pop. I remember watching Purple Rain as a young kid and my dad basically freaking out about the sexual content in it. Nowadays, I can watch it two or three times a month and no, I am not joking either! On the day, it was announced he had died, FOX News and BET played a both of his music videos and my mom and I basically had a jam session throughout the whole afternoon! It was beautiful! I was going to add a couple of songs onto this post but I guess YouTube doesn’t have any official ones!

The song of the month was really difficult, which was weird since I was adding so many songs into it throughout the first couple of weeks. I figured it would be easy if I couldn’t stop listening to one, but as the month kept going it was more difficult to narrow it down. At one point I thought I would have about four songs because I could not decide on the winner, but I was wrong! The song of the month is “Bring Back The Summer” by Rainman featuring OLY. It’s a good song and I love it so much!

There may not be a monthly playlist post for a while. Since I can’t use my Spotify for the time being, so you might want to be happy I’m doing these Tune Tuesday posts! I’ll try to figure out something to fill up for Thursday’s review day though! It just might only be song and music video reviews for the time being!

What was your song of the month?

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EP Review: “Mine” by Phoebe Ryan

This has been a long time coming honestly. I’ve been back and forth if I really wanted to do a review but I ultimately decided to do it. This has to be one of the shortest reviews I’ve ever done!

Phoebe Ryan is a new artist from Los Angles. I’d put her in the pop genre category. I first her song “Mine” while listening to Sirius XM Hits 1 a few months back. I generally loved the fact that the song was so chill in the beat and her voice. For her first single, it has that good poppy sound. It’s nice enough where you can dance to it and it has catchy lyrics too! Perfect way to start out and on the EP itself, there’s a remix included of the song by Michael Keenan featuring Skizzy Mars. I don’t usually say this, but I actually like the original version better!

The second track is called “Dead” and despite having such a morbid title, it doesn’t have a sad sound or meaning to it like you’d think it would. It’s more chill and quiet than you’d think, but it’s not bad. It’s more like a love song. It’s actually pretty good to sway back and forth by yourself or with somebody else. Third track is called “Homie” and I am hooked to these slow introductions to the songs. Phoebe has a great voice for these chill sounds! It’s not overwhelming in any way, but you kind of wish there was something else to it. I think that’s what I was searching for the most in this song. There’s nothing really special about it like the last one. However, it would make the perfect “friend zone” song though! Is that too mean to say? Last song is two covers in one, called “Ignition/Do You” the first song is by R.Kelly and everybody should remember that song from what 2004? It was a big song back in the day, however I don’t remember the second song “Do You” by Miguel but just shows you how much I no longer listen to hip hop/R&B anymore.

What do you think of Phoebe Ryan? What do you like about her first single “Mine” and have you heard her new EP yet?