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The following review was written on Monday, August 06, 2007 about an album that was release on May 20, 2007.



When I first laid my ears on this album, all I could think was, "what loveliness!"

Indie bands often fall into the trap of blandness when they take themselves too seriously. I have little patience when it comes to dull tunes. Thankfully, I found no such problem with Donawhale's debut album. Their music is light, dreamy, and slightly eccentric without ever dipping over into the 'boring' category.

The album opens with 'Close Your Eyes,' putting me on an otherworldly high. The gentle female vocals seem to echo from a distance creating a dreamlike ambiance. The second track, 'Hole' starts off slowly but the song escalates and spreads in volume with it's expertly controlled drumming. It's a bit noisier with the heavy drumming and clashing cymbals, but like all their songs, it still maintains a dreamy lightness to it.

Another highlight of this album is track #4 'Echo.' I can't decide whether to crown 'Close Your Eyes' or 'Echo' as my favorite song of the album. It starts with caution, but once the second half of the song kicks in, it's pure love. It's makes me feel as though I'm being transported to a whole different world.

Those who are fans of the Korean pianist, Yiruma will undoubtedly enjoy the instrumental track #5 'Bioneun Bam.' It's simply amazing. The story behind the song is that rainy nights will eventually give way to clear morning skies. The romantic (and never flashy) style of this piece just screams 'Yiruma.' It would be all too easy to trick someone into thinking this was Yiruma piece if they didn't know any better. My only complaint is that it feels more like an interlude than a full-blown track at 2 minutes and 21 seconds long.

I was introduced to Donawhale through the next song, 'Spring Day' which was first released on 'Cracker,' a Korean manhwa soundtrack featuring a huge line up Pastel (label) artists including Misty Blue, Swinging Popsicle (a recent favorite of mine), Bluedawn, and Tearliner, just to name a few. I'm so happy that I gave this album a try because honestly, 'Spring Day' did not catch my attention at all. It's a nice piano lullaby, but that's about it.

I'm gonna make this post shorter by skipping to the good stuff. Track #9 'Akasia,' like 'Hole' is a bit louder than the usual Donawhale song but it maintains a certain airiness that defines the band's sound. There's a lot of tinkering with synthesizers in 'Akasia' that makes me feel like I'm speeding through time and space. Their music is like a mixture of new age sounds with light alternative rock. A large majority of their songs are like that actually.

The album closes with Jelly Boy remix of 'Echo.' The remix doesn't change the original melody too much. Instead, it blends some electronic elements within the original to create a new song. I'm surprised that I like this remix so much because I've tried Jelly Boy and decided that I'm not a big fan. His stuff is either a hit or a miss.

With such a solid debut, Donawhale holds a lot of promise. Give Donawhale a listen if you're into soft pop or indie rock with an otherworldly touch. They're not for everyone because their music will totally escape you at first listen if you don't give it your full attention. This album may take time to appreciate, but with it's calming effect, it's the perfect CD to spin after a long stressful day at school or work.

Yesterday I went to FYE and purchased a couple of albums :D

☆ALBUMS
Elect The Dead / Serj Tankian
Meds / Placebo
Very / Pet Shop Boys
II / Presidents of the United States of America
Severe Tire Damage / They Might Be Giants

☆IN MIND
MIDNIGHT LOVER / ROCKET-K
Dog Problems / The Format
The Else / They Might Be Giants
MUSIC VIBE / 少年カミカゼ
Road of Major / Road Of Major
Daydream Anonymous / InMe
FAKEVOX / Plus-Tech Squeeze Box

☆YES-ASIA
毒殺テロリスト
ONE OK ROCK
GARLIC BOYS
SPARTA LOCALS
HEAD PHONES PRESIDENT
Baroque
The イナズマ戦隊
Red Bacteria Vacuum
Kenzi & The Trips
ROACH
ｂｉｓ
downy
Naht
CHARCOAL FILTER
木村カエラ
コブクロ
Bloodly-clown
Яisk un logic
「13」
little by little
No Brain
Misty Blue
BURGER NUDS
C-999
LAST ALLIANCE
ストレイテナー
SLOTH LOVE CHUNKS

First, make a list of your top-20 artists overall. Then, for each of these artists, add the 8 most similar artists to your list. Delete any duplicates, count up the number of entries on your list and this will give you some idea of how eclectic your listening habits are. A score of 9 represents an extremely unvaried musical taste while a 160 represents an extremely varied one.

1)동방신기
2)SE7EN
3)PARAN
4)비
5)Nell
6)Dragon Ash
7)BoA
8)F.T Island
9)Hole
10)Lexy
11)Brand New
12)Bright Eyes
13)George Lopez
14)Big Bang
15)이정현
16)Younha
17)Sanjaya Malakar
18)雅-miyavi-
19)Clazziquai
20)Super Junior

1)Super Junior
2)SE7EN
3)신화
4)Fly to the Sky
5)H.O.T
6)SS501
7)태빈
8)강타
9)이효리
10)Rain
11)Xing
12)Jang Woo Hyuk
13)SMTOWN
14)동방신기
15)Cheon Sang Ji Hee
16)1TYM
17)My Aunt Mary
18)Cherry Filter
19)G.고릴라
20)Deli Spice
21)peppertones
22)IzI
23)델리스파이스
24)Misty Blue
25)BUMP OF CHICKEN
26)Mr.Children
27)ORANGE RANGE
28)ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION
29)SIP SLYME
30)ELLEGARDEN
31)B'z
32)m-flo
33)倖田來未
34)浜崎あゆみ
35)安室奈美恵
36)宇多田ヒカル
37)大塚愛
38)中島美嘉
39)Do As Infinity
40)Every Little Thing
41)Tachyon
42)JaeJoong
43)Lee Jun Ki
44)Super Junior - K.R.Y
45)Courtney Love
46)Nirvana
47)Garbage
48)L7
49)The Smashing Pumpkins
50)Babes in Toyland
51)Veruca Salt
52)Pearl Jam
53)Jinusean
54)Epik High
55)DJ Doc
56)Drunken Tiger
57)MC 몽
58)Taking Back Sunday
59)The Early November
60)Dashboard Confessional
61)Saves the Day
62)Motion City Soundtrack
63)Straylight Run
64)Armor for Sleep
65)Something Corporate
66)Death Cab for Cutie
67)Elliott Smith
68)The Shins
69)The Decemberists
70)Sufjan Stevens
71)Modest Mouse
72)The Arcade Fire
73)Iron & Wine
74)Carlos Mencia
75)Ramon Ayala
76)Vicente Fernández
77)Chingo Bling
78)Gabriel Iglesias
79)Selena
80)Dane Cook
81)Dave Chappelle
82)YUI
83)Rie fu
84)HOME MADE 家族
85)SunSet Swish
86)玉置成実
87)北出菜奈
88)Sowelu
89)BoA
90)Haley Scarnato
91)Phil Stacey
92)Chris Sligh
93)Gina Glocksen
94)LaKisha Jones
95)Chris Richardson
96)Brandon Rogers
97)Melinda Doolittle
98)Super Junior T
99)Miyavi
100)ガゼット
101)PIERROT
102)Dir en grey
103)Kagrra,
104)Plastic Tree
105)Psycho le Cému
106)Gackt
107)Clazziquai Project
108)Humming Urban Stereo
109)Loveholic
110)Casker

110... I guess that's about average.

Bad Boy - Alice In Videoland
Hollaback Boy - Adam & Andrew
Goodnight Boy - The Arcade Fire
fire eyed boy - Broken Social Scene
Playboy - Hot Chip
Condition Boy - Paranoia Agent
Nancy Boy - Placebo
Coin-Operated Boy - Porcelain & The Tramps
Lonely Boy - Sex Pistols
Wonderboy - Tenacious D
Babyboy - Toybox
Beta Boy - Trentemoller
Momma's Boy - Chromeo
Lover Boy - Clazziquai
Skyline Boy - DE DE MOUSE
American Boy (feat. Kanye West) - Estelle
Skeleton Boy - Friendly Fires
The Little Drummer Boy - Misty Blue

Take your top 20 artists. For each of these artists, collect the top 5 similar artists. The resulting number of unique artists is your eclectic score. If the score is small (extreme = 5) your musical preferences are very limited, and if it is large (larger than 80, extreme = 100), then you have an eclectic musical preference. You can compute your own score at http://anthony.liekens.net/pub/scripts/last.fm/eclectic.php

My eclectic score is currently




The 88 related artists for my profile are AC/DC Aerosmith AI Air Al Green Aretha Franklin B.B. King (2) Beck (3) BENNIE K (2) Bill Evans Björk (2) Blur Buddy Guy Chemistry Cherry Filter Chick Corea Coldplay Cornelius Cream Def Tech Elmore James (2) Foo Fighters Franz Ferdinand Gavin DeGraw Gorillaz Green Day Happy Mondays (2) Herbie Hancock Howie Day Howlin' Wolf Humming Urban Stereo Jack Johnson Jeppet Jimi Hendrix John Lee Hooker John Mayer Johnny Winter Kanye West Kasabian Keith Jarrett Led Zeppelin (2) Loveholic m-flo Maroon 5 Marvin Gaye Massive Attack Metallica Michel Camilo mihimaru GT Misty Blue Monkey Majik + m-flo Morrissey Nirvana Orson OutKast Pink Floyd Pizzicato Five Portable Groove 09 Primal Scream (2) Pulp (2) Queen Radiohead (2) Razorlight Red Hot Chili Peppers Robert Johnson Roller Coaster Sly & The Family Stone Stereolab Stevie Wonder Suede System of a Down T-Bone Walker The Automatic The Charlatans (2) The Doors The Fratellis The Kooks The Long Blondes The Pipettes The Smiths The Stone Roses The TRAX The White Stripes Tricky ケツメイシ レミオロメン 서태지 자우림

Humming Urban Stereo (허밍 어번 스테레오)
1집 - Very Very Nice And Short Cake
2집 - Purple Drop
Monochrome

Misty Blue (미스티 블루)
너의 별 이름은 시리우스B
4˚C 유리 호수 아래 잠든 꽃

My Aunt Mary (마이 언트 메리)
3집 - Just Pop

클래지콰이 (클래지콰이)
1집 - Instant Pig
2집 - Color My Soul

러브홀릭 (러브홀릭)
1집 - Florist
2집 - Invisible Things
3집 - Nice Dream

baby v.o.x. (베이비복스)
1집- EQUALIZEHER
2집
4집 - Why
5집 - Boyish Story
6집 - Devotion
7집 - Ride West

BoA (권보아)
1집 - ID : Peace B
2집 - No. 1
3집 - Atlantis Princess
4집 - My Name
5집 - Girls On Top

Lee Jung Hyun (이정현)
1집 - Let's Go To My Star
2집
3집 - Magic To Go To My Star
4집 - I Love Natural
5집 - Passion
6집 - Fantastic Girl
Special Album - Summer Party!

Lee So Eun (이소은)
1집 - 소녀
2집 - 서방님
Song: Mouse Loves Rice (Korean version)

Kim Hyun Jung (김현정)
2집 - A Sea Gull of Dream
4집 - Wild Beauty

Mina (World Cup Girl) (심미나)
3집 - Kiss Kiss


Cello OST (첼로)
My Sassy Girl OST (엽기적인 그녀)
Daisy OST (데이지)
The Scarlet Letter OST (주홍글씨)
My Name is Kim Sam Soon OST vol 1&2 (내 이름은 김삼순)
My Girl OST (마이걸)

Misc Songs:
바보사랑 - Lee Jun Ki (이준기)
Only When I Sleep - Lee Eun Ju (이은주)

It was about a year ago that this guy on UK label Robot! Records thought it would be a cool thing to do something together with Korean label Pastel Music. Towards the end of 2005 a joint project took off and early 2006 they were done. The result: Siamese Flowers. The UK version should be out soon, but I already got the Korean version which was released this summer ^^

Two songs from four artists from each label are featured on here. From Pastel, OldFish, Tearliner, Misty Blue and Jelly Boy participate - all with songs from their first albums so nothing new there (except for a couple of English titles). Robot! paricipates with Former Miss America, tuco, Greenwich Resident and Loufu - all artists I hadn't even heard of before finding this album. I might like just about every artist from Pastel, but I do think some of the other music they distribute isn't all that great. Still, I did not hesitate to get this because there is also a bonus CD.


This bonus CD features two previously unreleased song from each of the four Pastel artists.

OldFish is first with 도둑 고양이 빈센트, a pretty good song that doesn't offer any surprises. 보니2 is pretty much 보니, but more acoustic during the first half and without 황보라. It's probably the acoustic thing but I like this newer version a lot more than the old one.

Then comes is Misty Blue with a typical Misty Blue song called Slow Days. The other track from them is a remix of their 1.5 album track 날씨맑음 done by Jelly Boy. Like what could be expected, this is more electronic. Pretty nice, but I prefer the one and a half minutes shorter original version.

Jelly Boy himself is next up with 춤추는 소녀와 빨간 구두 and Close Encounter . 춤추는 소녀와 빨간 구두 is reminiscent of Deadman Singing from his first album, but this one has more of a "freak circus" feeling to it. Very nice! Close Encounter had me surprised with guitars and a much rougher, almost industrial, sound. Had it not been for the melodic refrain it probably would've taken me a while to acknowledge that this really is Jelly Boy.

Finally, there's Tearliner. The first song is the original version of Dist Rush, that Yoshiya Sato had redone for Letter of Nowhere. I never liked the remade version with all the Japanese talk, so just the "background music" is a major improvement to me. Still, I don't really like the song. I do like the English guide version of Snowbird however. I've never heard the original version of Snowbird (which was featured upon Naomi & Goro's Presente De Natal/Winter Songs for Nostalgia), but this is Tearliner just like I like him.


Back to the original CD. While I already knew what I would hear from the Pastel artists, I was pleasantly surprised by all of the participating artists from Robot!.

Former Miss America I had checked out already before recieving this album, but they still surprised me. Balloon is pretty decent, but too upbeat compared to the rest of the songs on here. Norwegian wouldn't on the other hand is love. When Anthony Carter sings "I'll be your girl tonight" it somehow turns into one of the best lines ever written. Slow paced and beautiful, like early Tiger Lou but more acoustic and with more people.

"If film score style chord changes, hip-hop beats, big electronic noise, frenetic power pop songs with audio warfare guitar shrieks and soft psyche-soul songs with surreal narratives sounds interesting to you, Tuco is the group to hear." That's what Robot! says. I don't know how to describe them myself, but I can't say any of that is off and I do like what I hear. Meckanikal Dialling is pretty nice, but the mellower Can't Tell (the Good from the Bad) is awesome.

Despite sounding like a male singer/songwriter, Greenwich Resident is actually four people. Not quite the actress and a bedroom recording of Silos are featured on here and they're both mellow. And they're both incredibly nice. Not quite the actress even has some strings! After hearing nothing more of theirs than these two songs I'm already expecting their coming debut EP to be one of the best this year.

Last of all comes two songs from Danish Loufu. Louise Fuhr's voice is very nice to these quite laidback songs and my only complaint would be that they're too short. I don't know what it is about it, but Loufu's Wind Blow is a song I've found myself needing to hear every now and then the past few days. Makeover Needed is nice as well and I would've thought that out of the two, this one would stick easier because of the melody and cleverness - "makeover needed in your heart", probably one of the best lyrics about getting a break-up I've heard.


All the illustrations are done by Kim Jiyoon and it goes in the same style as Jiyoon's works for the Misty Blue albums. The actual design is done by z'nbug and it looks great! It's one of those small LP sleeve covers in cardboard (of the same high quality type that so many children's books had when I grew up). The folder features info on all artists in English on one side and lyrics (translations for Misty Blue) all in English on the other. Though I've been something of a fan of both Misty Blue and Tearliner since their first releases I still knew next to nothing about them and it was really nice to finally be able to read something on them I could really understand. The only flaw would be that there's no lyrics or even info on the bonus CD songs, but that matters little.

This is a very nice album, recommended for anybody interested in hearing a few artists from any of these two labels. I'll defintily check out more stuff from these Robot! artists (once I've written about enough CDs to allow myself to buy a few more that is...) and I'll probably try any other Robot! artists as well later on ^^

I've already mentioned mrkwang a lot in my last.fm journals, but he deserves it - he is no doubt the most fantastic store owner I've ever done business with. Not only did he find me a copy of Pastel Music 3th Anniversary Sampler - a limited release that could be bought as an advance ticket for Pastel Music 3th Anniversary Live Party in November last year - he also gave me a very, very good deal on it. Yesterday my latest package from him arrived and I've already been listening to this a lot.

First, take a look at the tracklist below:



Jealous? At least one look at it was enough for me to send a request over to mrkwang right away. It was the first CD with all the Korean Pastel artists I wanted, but I figured the second CD with artists distributed by Pastel in Korea would be a very nice bonus.


CD.1

My main reason for wanting this compilation was of course the new tracks on the first CD.
Beginning with the first track from Misty Blue, it's the same acoustic version of Daisy that was later featured as a hidden track on Misty Blue's 1.5. As I had already heard it it wasn't that exciting, but it is still a very nice version of a great song. The live version of 초콜릿 isn't that different from the actual album version, which I had expected it to be, but the song is still good and the sound quality is better than on most live recordings.

Fifth track is 지랄이 풍년이네 from Bulssazo that released their second album only a couple of weeks ago. This song was not included on the new album so it seems like this is the only CD where it can be found right now. The song starts off with some woman talking solemnly about 불싸조 and then it sounds like something that could've been featured on their first album. Pretty good, but there's plenty of songs on the debut (I still haven't heard the second album) that I like more.

Tearliner should've released a double EP in August that might be the soundtrack for something called 시디 포함. It hasn't come out yet, so perhaps that movie/series/whatever-else-that-might-need-a-soundtrack that is delayed. The demo version of 소프트토크, 나이스크림, which is featured on this sampler, is quite short (1:36) so I'm guessing it will eventually be featured in a "real" version on that soundtrack. It's cheerful and sounds more like the short Lublic from Tearliner's debut than any of the songs I usually think about when contemplating how great he is. The other Tearliner demo song, Only my luck is also short (1:19) and also very soundtrack like, but still more Tearliner. Perhaps this one too should be on one of those EPs. None of the songs are Tearliner like I like him, but they're still pretty nice.

The demo version of adultchild's b tl b tl is the same as featured on the It's Rain demo. Very nice and mellow and remarkably better than the early version on the Monitor demo. A debut album should be expected in September so we can finally get a chance to hear adultchild's true potential in more songs, but seeing as it's already the 27th perhaps this too has been delayed?

"Unreleased track" Hey was actually the first track on OldFish's 1-3 EP. Both versions sounds pretty much the same, but I like Oldfish's sound more on the dreamier official debut, room.ing.

While not marked as a new track, Drive from The Highlights on this album is not the same version as on their second album, Crazy, Drunken Rock n' Roll. This version's got a saxophon and a jazzier sound that I quite like, but with the jazzier vocals on this one I still like the album version more.

As they were featured on the first CD, I thought that perhaps Kite Operations was a new Pastel band I hadn't heard about. They're really from New York and signed on K.O.A. Records, however they all appear to be ethnic Koreans. I liked A Wonder already from the intro because of the guitar "flageoletts" (anybody know what they're called in English?) and it continues into a nice indie rock song with English lyrics. Expect a blogpost of mine on these guys as soon as I shape up and get back to writing them :p


CD.2

Fifteen more or less wellknown artists from Japan, North America, Scandinavia and Germany are featured on the second CD of this sampler. Their styles vary from electropop to shoegazer to folkpop but they all have great songs featured. While I enjoy the variation it reminds me more of a playlist with random good songs than a well composed album, but then it is a sampler CD.

My favorite songs are definitly Strangers When We Meet and He Lay in Reins, but I'd say every song on here is at least good.

Only one exclusive song on this CD: a live version of Maximilian Hecker's Lady Sleep. The music box of the album version is now a piano, but other than that there's no major difference - I think this version is even better!


I am very happy about getting this compilation, but I'd rather listen to the first CD (- Kite Operations) and the second CD (+ Kite Operations) separately than put both on the same playlist. The first CD does make a pretty nice introduction to Korean Pastel artists, but the Cracker soundtrack is even better in that purpose. The second CD provided me with an easy way to listen to many artists I've been meaning to check out for quite some time and I now have a better idea on where to start ^_^