puresinner

puresinner has moved

aenimic — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 19:00:30 +0000

Hey, puresinner has moved to blogspot. If you’re looking for your fix of music reviews and news, click here to visit the new website! See you there!

Please do take note that there will be no more updates made to this website.

Mirror of Retribution Tour: ChthoniC, Live in Singapore Review

Skylar — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 16:01:14 +0000

August 14, Republic Polytechnic – I was to go to a school, on a Saturday evening. Not my school though. I was on my way to see a Taiwanese Black Metal band, ChthoniC. The show was held at the polytechnic’s Cultural Centre Studio.

Click to view slideshow.

I was there an hour earlier before showtime. Entry was delayed until about 7:45pm. I was disappointed to see no tour t-shirts were sold. Only the usual t-shirts which are all SGD$30. MourningSound Records has provided pre-orders online before the day of show.

A Singaporean Gothic metal band, Meltgsnow was the opening band. ChthoniC came on stage soon after and the crowd participated in a mass of headbanging cult. Fans were insane enough to throw Taoist hell bank notes on stage (can be seen in the video below), which I think was suppose to be based on the current album’s concept of Taoist folklore.

The band performed “Rise of the Shadow” as the first track off the Mirror of Retribution album. Other songs off their latest release includes “1947″ and “Sing-Ling Temple”. Most of what I can hear, Freddy sung in their native language despite also having an alternate version in English. Even their setlist was written in Chinese.

The band was nice enough to have a meet & greet session after the show. I was one of the lucky few and the last to be taken pictures with the band until the lights go out. The remaining queue had no choice but to be in the dark. Nonetheless, the show was something I don’t want to miss, even as a casual fan.

Lunarin – Duae Review

aenimic — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 16:08:00 +0000

Release date: August 20, 2010
Label: None, Distributor: Aging Youth Records

Lunarin unleashes their sophomore effort, Duae, 4 years after The Chrysalis. Plenty have changed but does these changes make Duae a better record?

Tracklist:

For Apollo
Midas
Zero Point Red
Saturn
Red
Coralline
Icarus Rising
Serpentine
To Forget
The Sky (Algiers)
Solus Nebula
The Inquisition

For starters, it is quite amazing to know that Duae was mostly recorded and mixed from a home studio set up. Though the quality of some of its tracks does bear its flaws, Lunarin manages to keep it together with their masterful riffing and unique songwriting. Hailing from Singapore, there aren’t many bands that dares to venture out to the more darker side of alternative metal the way Lunarin has tried in Duae.

Duae, starts off with a haunting piano piece, For Apollo, which draws you in for the face crushing intro riff of Midas. Reminiscent of Dry from their debut, Midas slows down to its verse as Linda sings “Touch me, can you taste me? Can you break me down?”. Off-timed breakdowns with otherworldly riff-age from Kah Wye and Linda, Midas leads you Lunarin’s first single, Zero Point Red (which has been reviewed here)

Saturn, the second semi-instrumental track, bridges listeners to the much more complex parts of Duae; Red, Coralline, Icarus Rising and Serpentine brings forth the meat of most of Duae. Red, the second longest track in Duae at 8 mins 39 secs, is probably the most ambitious track in the whole album. With the introduction of Mandala pads, dual vocal layers at the 6 min mark (or whatever it’s called) and an intense off-timed breakdown towards the outro, you may get pretty amazed at what a home studio could do. Coralline is the first track that has a second vocal backing from another member of the band and is a return to the old Lunarin sound from The Chrysalis era. However, the next two tracks, Icarus Rising with its addictive chorus and heavily-chorused guitars and Serpentine’s dual vocal parts are tracks that further cement the fact that Lunarin has definitely grown over time and aren’t releasing Duae based on the same formulae used for The Chrysalis.

As the album nears closure, To Forget, The Sky (Algiers) and Solus Nebula eases the adrenaline jolt from earlier tracks with two of the tracks being instrumentals and The Sky (Algiers) serving as a mellow bridge between the tracks. The Inquisition, the finale track for Duae and the longest track in the whole album, makes sure that the aggression of Duae does not die out by the mellowness of the previous 3 tracks with its intense drumming, and heavily riffed guitar and bass lines.

Loo Eng Teck, Linda Ong, Ho Kah Wye

Ending near the hour mark, Duae is an album that shows alot of the ambitions from Lunarin. Some of them are met, while there are others that fall short of expectation, but overall, Duae is worth listening to if you enjoy music that is outside of the genre-riddled rock/metal spectrum of music. Lunarin manages well with their home recording efforts, but there are certain areas where you could not help but think that the track should have underwent some sort of polishing, notably the sounds of some of the drum parts (crashes,splashes, etc) are pretty fake due to the fact that it was recorded through a digital set and the drowned out guitar parts in some of the tracks when it should have been made to the top of the mix. The latter could have been intentional, but one could not help but wish it would be the other way around.

As far as strengths and flaws are shown, Lunarin has done a great job in Duae and those fans that have been waiting for 4 years for it are definitely in for a treat.

6 out of 7 sins

That Friday The 13th Show @ Home Club (13/08/10)

aenimic — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 04:23:10 +0000

When I received the facebook invite for this show, I almost burst with excitement upon seeing the list of bands that were included. Zero Sequence, In Each Hand A Cutlass and Lunarin. 3 giants of the alternative rock scene in Singapore, 1 location at the price of $15 and with the inclusion of a pre-release of Duae for whoever that attends the gig, I just had to go even if I was pretty tired that night.

Note: I wasn’t able to capture photos that would be decent enough for posting up during this gig and only partial videos were recorded due to depletion of my cam’s battery. Apologies.

Simon Yong

Arriving late to the show, I just managed to catch the last song being played by part of Zero Sequence. Apparently, there was no Zero Sequence set that night, but instead was pleasantly surprised by what seems to be Simon Yong’s (guitarist, Zero Sequence) solo project. With 3 other members from Zero Sequence backing him for this new project on stage, Simon skillfully showcased his guitar prowess. It’s a shame that I had only managed to catch the final song of their set, because I was really enjoying that last piece and I bet that it was quite a good set to begin with, though this depends entirely to the individual.

Roland Lim, Daniel Sassoon

Crowd started to build up when In Each Hand A Cutlass began setting up their equipment on stage. I have only caught In Each Hand A Cutlass twice (one being the Waterfront gig) and both times I was pretty impressed with their brand of Post-Rock. Making her live debut with IEHAC, Amanda Ling was included in the line up as the new keyboardist/programmer. Another thing I’ve noticed is the missing guitarist, Farid. As I’m not really that well-informed on the tracks that were played by IEHAC, I could just notice the difference from what have been played by them in the past as compared to present through the energy and amount of ambience.

Honestly, I preferred the last two shows I’ve seen them performed as compared to this set. Not trying to be a Post-Rock purist or whatever but, IEHAC used to incorporate much more ambience and lesser “raw rock” energy than they had now. Wonder if it has anything with the inclusion of Amanda, but overall, the set boasted loads of riffage and good guitar co-ordination between Roland Lim and leader of the pack, Dan Sassoon that impressed me and made me envious of their prowess.

Next up, the main performer of the night.

Linda, Eng Teck, Kah Wye (Credits to: Tim Tan)

Lunarin, supporting their sophomore release Duae, made sure that their setlist consists mostly of tracks from the new album. It is definitely not the first time that I’ve been to a 2010 Lunarin gig, so the tracks have pretty much been polished out for live performance this time as compared to the previous time (most notably, the Substation gig). Crowd was good, though I would have preferred if the screaming was toned down abit. Yes, support is support, buuuuuut…incessant screaming to draw attention to self and away from the band is a little questionable. Don’t you agree?

So back to the performance, Lunarin was tight. Impressive performance by all members and especially Eng Teck (drummer). Multitasking as a backing vocalist and playing drums and inclusion of Mandala Pads and double pedals this time around, he has definitely outdone himself for Duae. All the videos for this performance have been uploaded on The Oracle’s Youtube Channel. Check it out here.

This was definitely an awesome gig to be at and I would have regretted missing it. A full review of Lunarin’s Duae will be made available here at puresinner closer to the official release date of the album (20th August 2010). Looking forward to catching them again at Baybeats 2010.

Do pardon the excessive Lunarin news on puresinner recently, we will return back to various music news again soon. Thanks for reading.

Filter Live at Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel

aenimic — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 03:11:05 +0000

Richard Patrick

In anticipation to the release of The Trouble With Angels. Here are some live performance videos of Filter playing hits from their previous releases as well as the new single, The Inevitable Relapse.

Lunarin Releases Latest Single Online

aenimic — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 17:03:13 +0000

Gothic/Prog Metallers, Lunarin, releases their latest single from their upcoming album, Duae, online. The full download and stream of the track can be found here.

From my first few listens of the track, I am impressed by the quality of the track as it was recorded from a home studio. The guitar riffs are tight, the drums are clear and deep and the vocals are much better sounding this time. I do have to say that the track feels a little short. When the track ends, it feels like there should be more going on after that final chorus. Another issue that has been rectified in this track, that was quite an obvious issue in The Chrysalis, is the sound of the picking of bass strings.

Eng Teck, Kah Wye, Linda Ong

Duae, the sophomore release from Lunarin will be on sale on the 20th of August. puresinner looks forward to reviewing the full album.

Night Festival: Lunarin at Substation

Skylar — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 07:42:08 +0000

July 17, Substation – The Night Festival, happens two nights-yearly to celebrate Singapore’s arts and heritage district located at the Singapore Art Museum, Singapore Management University, Peranakan Museum and Substation. I took the second night and head to Substation. My mission was to worship the Unholy Trinity, Lunarin.

It has been two years since their last performance at the Waterfront, Esplanade. Now, ready to release their second full length album, Duae, the band gears up for a series of gigs waiting to unleash in the coming months.

Substation has changed their balcony venue to a not so appropriate place for audiences. The band was to play at the theater room without the audience inside. Instead we were made to watch from the alley way looking through a hole in the wall at the side of Substation. The band began playing after midnight. A slight delay from soundcheck and the previous band. All the wait was worthwhile when I could see bassist, Linda Ong and guitarist, Ho Kah Wye. Linda joked about no drummer playing tonight. Just a very cheap and good drum machine. “Bitch” was the response the drum machine made.

Setlist and link to the live videos:
1. The Inquisition – http://youtu.be/Pxpa8P5fSkU
2. Dry – http://youtu.be/1rPJt_luhso
3. Silverpiece – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jNF2DjrFBA
4. Midas – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M78WqHOuAc0
5. Red – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1JO-fuKd7Y
6. The Tower – http://youtu.be/Vo7sNA3xtfA
7. Serpentine – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UcjbEOgLGY

First song, “The Inquisition” wasn’t a familiar song to me. It should be their first time playing it live. The song stretches to a nine-minutes long and the screechy chorus is something new compared to Linda’s feminine vocal style from the previous releases.

The set went on with some old favorites such as “Dry”, “Silverpiece” and “The Tower”. Also new tracks such as “Midas”, Serpentine” and my personal favourite, “Red”. Halfway through “Midas”, a venue crew told us to get into the theater room because of the rain. Finally up close with the band and revealing the man behind the drums. Loo Eng Teck, the well-toned drummer plays with such admiration. It would be a waste if we were stuck outside the whole set without seeing how he played.

Ho Kah Wye, Loo Eng Teck & Linda Ong

At about half passed one in the morning, the band ended. Merchandise of old and new tee shirts were sold and also their debut album, “Chrysalis”. Fans were then able to greet them outside the venue.

The band has improved so much after so many times I have seen them. I have been following them almost every gig they performed since their debut album and it has never been a disappointment let it be acoustic or live. Lunarin is a very well crafted Singaporean band you must experience it yourself. They will be playing their next show at Homeclub on the 13th of August alongside, Zero Sequence and In Each Hand A Cutlass. For more information please visit: myspace.com/lunarin.

puresinner is pleased to be able to record the whole set and hopes to continue the same untill the end of days.

Richard Patrick, why he left Nine Inch Nails

Skylar — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 01:31:20 +0000

Filter singer and former Nine Inch Nails guitarist explain why he left the band more than 10 years ago.

Trent Reznor & Richard Patrick

When asked, “What happened that made you part ways with NIN back in the early ’90s?”

Trent asked me to join for an eight-week tour and it was just kind of playing guitar. He invited me to be creative, but the manager would call me up an hour later saying, “You know you can’t own any of these songs, you can’t have any publishing, you can’t have your name all over it.” It was weird … like, “Wait a minute, then why am I being told to be creative?” So I offered him “Hey Man Nice Shot,” and he was like, “Yeah, it’s really cool, maybe we can do an EP.” I played it to Warner Brothers and they were like, “We’ll give you half a million dollars, you’ll have three videos, we’ll put you with any producer you want, you can pick any studio. We’ll do anything you want to have this and put this out.” It was like, “I can be in Nine Inch Nails and never see the light of day or I could quit and just be in Filter and be the master of my own destiny,” It was the right thing to do. It was a blast! I was in Nihttp://puresinner.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=299&action=edit#ne Inch Nails! We had a great time. It was a lot of fun. Nine Inch Nails is Trent’s thing and that’s the way it should be. I wasn’t trying to infringe on what he was trying to do – it’s just there wasn’t much of a future for me.

Source: whatsuppub.com

Inch Chua Releases Single Online

aenimic — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:53:49 +0000

Inch Chua

Inch Chua releases her first single online. Mt. Epiphany is off her latest album, Wallflower. Wallflower was released on 7 July 2010. Click here to enjoy the online stream and free download of Mt. Epiphany.

Adam Jones Launches Comic Book Series, Featured Artist for Alternative Press Magazine’s 25th Anniversary Exhibit

aenimic — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:26:34 +0000

Adam Jones

I came across this interview with Adam Jones by LA Weekly where he discusses about his new comic book series and his sculpture at Alternative Press’s Anniversary Exhibit. Glad to see him doing some artwork aside from Tool’s music, but I’m getting pretty impatient for new news about the music.

LA Weekly