The Ruptured Sessions / volume 1
(By Karma Tohmé)
Ziad Nawfal’s eclectic music tastes and his deep knowledge of a wide array of musical genres have made him one of the best DJ’s in town for over 2 decades now, and his name has been tied to the most mythical underground places of post-war Beirut. His [...]
Archive for the ‘Album Reviews’ Category
The Ruptured Sessions / volume 1
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged Charbel Haber, Cristobal, Nadine Khoury, The Incompetents, Youmna Saba on August 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
TRASH INC: ULTRAMIND
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged electronic music, grapheme, gui boratto, munma, Nabil Saliba, radioactive man, Trash Inc, ultramind, vintage on March 12, 2009 | 2 Comments »
TRASH INC: ULTRAMIND (Incognito, 2009)
Ultramind is the first full-length release from former rock drummer-turned electronic composer Nabil Saliba, aka Trash Inc. The album is a highly entertaining collection of modern dance-floor electronic sounds, spiced with vintage, funky keyboard riffs.
The inspiration for the album’s sound came to Saliba during the summer of 2008, as he played [...]
Scrambled Eggs: Dedicated to Foes Celebrating Friends
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged abrasive, Charbel Haber, frantic, Malek Rizkallah, Marc Codsi, punk, scrambled eggs, Tony Elieh, Tunefork on January 5, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
SCRAMBLED EGGS:
Dedicated To Foes Celebrating Friends (Incognito, 2009)
Hot on the heels of the haunted soundtrack they’ve created for the Joreige/Hadjithomas film ‘Je Veux Voir’, Lebanese punk icons Scrambled Eggs end their busy year with this “modest” 2-song release, which does however hold a host of surprises.
The year 2008 saw the Eggs part ways with [...]
MUNMA: UNHOLY REPUBLIC
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged ambient landscapes, dancefloor, Jawad Nawfal, munma, Murcof, Nabil Saliba, radio noise, samples, static, Trash Inc, trilogy on January 3, 2009 | 2 Comments »
MUNMA: UNHOLY REPUBLIC (Incognito, 2009)
The third official release by Lebanese electronic artist Jawad Nawfal sees him revisiting familiar themes and musical landscapes, while displaying the possibility for some radical departures in the near future. ‘Unholy Republic’ is the third installment of what is commonly referred to as the “Fate trilogy”, one that saw the day [...]
Scrambled Eggs: Je Veux Voir
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged Charbel Haber, experimental, Fadi Tabbal, Hadjithomas, Je Veux Voir, Joe Ghosn, Joreige, Marc Codsi, scrambled eggs on October 27, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Scrambled Eggs: Je Veux Voir OST (Incognito, 2008)
The Scrambled Eggs are no strangers to movie atmospheres. They contributed several outstanding tracks to filmmakers Joreige and Hadjithomas’ previous outing, ‘A Perfect Day’, and the soundtrack went on to win a prestigious European award. ‘Je Veux Voir’ (Joreige and Hadjithomas’ latest ) is however an altogether different [...]
The Incompetents: More Songs… (2008)
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged British 60’s psychedelia, live extravaganza, multi-instrumentalist, out-of-tune melodies, raucous, vaudevillesque sing-along tunes on October 12, 2008 | 1 Comment »
The Incompetents: More Songs From The Victorious City (Tunefork, 2008)
THE INCOMPETENTS is the result of the unusual collaboration between songwriter Serge Yared and producer/multi instrumentalist/arranger/sound engineer Fadi “Fe” Tabbal.
Living and working in Beirut, those two music enthusiasts, who are constantly touring the world in search of new musical adventures, finally decided to team up and [...]
XEFM: XEFM (Incognito, 2008)
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged ambient electronica, electric guitars, foggy, folksy rock, outlandish noise, percussion, tapestry of sounds, voice treatments on July 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
On the surface of things, and upon repeated listens, this record sounds like the product of four musicians entirely in tune with each other’s possibilities and musical scope(s). What makes this venture supremely interesting, paradoxically, is that this statement is not exactly true. The four musical minds at work on this, the XEFM’s first recorded [...]
Charbel Haber: From the Canaries in the Coalmines Comes an Endless Stream of Reveries (Incognito, 2008)
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged ambient sound-scapes, atmospheric, effects, found sounds, glitches, singer/songwriter, solo on July 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Not content with his regular duties as singer/songwriter and guitar player with famed local rock band Scrambled Eggs, Charbel Haber branches out on his own for this, his first solo outing under his own name. The album marks a considerable change of direction from the Eggs’ latest punk-oriented releases, but one that Haber’s devotees could [...]
The New Government: Party Animals (Incognito, 2008)
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged angular guitar lines, British pop and psychedelia, dubby, eruption, modern alternative, staccato drumming on March 8, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Whether it’s the chemistry behind these otherwise vastly dissimilar young men, or the time at which the songs were recorded (most of them saw the day in the immediate aftermath of the Israeli-Lebanese conflict of July 2006), or the studio wizardry of Tunefork’s sound engineer Fadi ‘Fe’ Tabbal, the end result is quite impressive; an [...]
Katibe 5: Ahla fik bil Moukhayyamat (Incognito, 2008)
Posted in Album Reviews, tagged beats and rhythms, geopolitical surroundings, hard-edged beats, incendiary prose, Lebanese street, rap on March 8, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
These newcomers on the Lebanese rap scene hail in actual fact from Palestine, but have spent their young existence in the refugee camps of Borj el Barajneh. Their incendiary prose and hard-edged beats, however, do not confine themselves to their geopolitical surroundings; quite the opposite, these five (as their ‘street’ moniker indicates) young men look [...]
