Monthly Archives: March 2018

Misc Reviews

Diveyede – Pale Moonlight

diveyede

Alternative hip hop artist Diveyede’s latest single, Pale Moonlight, is taken from his upcoming EP There is no cure//They will be the death of me. The production is pretty solid, but not so great that it takes away from the raw, organic feel of the recording. If production is too good, sometimes it can commercializes out the avant-garde authenticity. Diveyede’s style is somewhat unorthodox in that it blends spoken word slam poetry with conventional hip hop musicality. There are even some emo elements here. Pale Moonlight is filled with angst and displays a willingness on the part of the artist to confront his own sanity and vulnerability. There is a kind of madness to it all (“This is my Van Gogh!” he shouts despairingly.) More importantly, Diveyede displays a self awareness that is uncommon in these genres. The end result is that Pale Moonlight avoids the trappings of superficial posturing and hip hop cliches, managing to be something genuinely experimental.

For more info:
https://soundcloud.com/diveyede
https://www.facebook.com/diveyede

Articles, Reviews

Life in Plastic, It’s Fantastic.

aquabarbiegirl2

Ahh yes, I’m driving down Scottsdale Rd in the fall of 1998 in my ’93 Saturn (soon to be totaled while parked in Santa Monica less than 2 years later.) I’m wearing a yellow button down shirt from The Gap and sporting frosted tips. Or maybe I’m wearing a blue Tommy Hilfiger windbreaker semi-ironically. What song is playing on the radio? Well, it could be one of many songs actually. Perhaps it’s Harvey Danger’s Flagpole Sitta. Maybe it’s Barenaked Ladies’ One Week or if I’m lucky, Aqua’s Barbie Girl.

barbiegirllene

Yes I admit it, I loved this song. I was first alerted to it by friends that said it reminded them of my recordings, not that I ever made anything remotely as good as this, but I used to increase the pitch on my cassettes on 4 track to make my voice sound more indie and alternative, which my friends jokingly said made it sound like “that Barbie Girl song.” It brings back so many memories from a great time in the 90s. I used to think pop music was so shitty at the time, but we didn’t know how good we had it! Aqua’s Barbie Girl is actually a masterpiece, artistically, cinematically, aesthetically, musically, you name it.

seahorse

One of my favorite parts of the video is when Lene is getting her hair done and reading a cool looking (but fake) book titled My Little Sea Horse. Whenever I watch the video, I always think about how I wish that book actually existed and I could read it.

Life in plastic, it’s fantastic! Yes it was.

Reviews

Good Boy Daisy – Too Hard to Love

goodboydaisy

I never heard of the (fairly well known) band, Good Boy Daisy, until I saw them featured on the cover of a local community college publication that I happened to pick up out of curiosity/boredom. Good Boy Daisy features the easily likable and charismatic sisters, Hallie and Dylinn Hayes. Other members include Molly Mashal, Jonathan Henderson and Seth Person. They claim to be influenced by a lot of 90’s grunge. My first impression of their sound was that while the female vocal style is similar to that of The Cranberries. It just has that 90’s alternative, subtly fluctuating pitch that one who lived through that era of music would instantly recognize. However, in this context, the actual backing music is much harder (especially as it breaks into the chorus,) almost more in line with Nirvana and Rage Against the Machine. They’re not a retro or throwback band though by any means. Their music ultimately is of a contemporary, post-grunge nature and will appeal to many different types of people.

The band apparently took its name from a line in the movie Guy Richie movie Snatch, a film I vaguely remember seeing at the then state-of-the-art but now sorta ghetto Arizona Mills movie theater in 2001. Good Boy Daisy is one of those bands that has an aura about them where they are hitting all the right marks, and you just know if they don’t manage to self destruct, get pregnant or get bored that they will succeed.

For more info:
http://www.goodboydaisy.com/
https://www.instagram.com/good_boy_daisy/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9C0_X0k64II