Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles

After first hearing this weird and elusive electronic duet many moths ago I have since fallen madly in love with Crystal Castles.

There new self titled album is there first full length offering and after many E.P's and demo this is there best work to date.
The band have been gaining recognition recently and even featured on hit teen show "Skins" preforming the now well known "Alice Practise" although this may have some less the reputable characters clamouring after the band.

The album itself is bliss start to finish and with an opener like "Untrust us" you know the next 52 minutes are going to be intense, Untrust us is personally my favourite song on the album with vocals so Eire and painfully sorrowful its hard to imagine that the rest is of this masterpiece is completely different. The following song "Crimewave" is actually a remixed version of a song by the band Health... Crystal Castles have made it there own.
Alice Practise & Xxzcuzx me begin to show Crystal Castles at the finest, Using Atari/Nintendo sounds and heavy simple beats to inflict a digital coma that has you scrambling for your Gameboy.
Other stand out tracks include: Knights, Black Panther & Tell Me What To Swallow.

The whole album varies from theme to theme but stays consistently good, Only the odd song doesn't hit quite as hard as it should do and over all Crystal Castles is an album of epic proportions.

Also try: Justice, Digitalism & MSTRKRFT

8/10

Suicide Silence - The Cleansing

I discovered this band on Last.Fm as a similiar artist to Brighton based band Centurion and decided to check them out.

Suicide Silence are a brutal hardcore/death metal band from California are relatively unknown in the scene at the moment but with an album like "The Cleansing" they are sure to be welcomed with open arms.

Its surreal to imagine an album as unrelentingly severe as this being a debut.

It opens with the ambient track "Revelations" then blasts straight into "Unanswered" which is a hard hitting riot of a track. For the untrained ear the album may sound all the same but with tracks like "The fallen" and "Girl Of Glass" you can definitely see how surprisingly developed these lads are. Blissfully chunky and indulgently dark, Suicide Silence are 0ffering up seismic slabs of brain pumping riffs, fretboard agro and bile soaked breakdowns. The cleansing is nothing amazingly special but its teeth are still sharp enough to deliver a satisfying bite.
Also try Suicide Silence's self titled E.P

For Fans Of: As Blood Runs Black, Centurion and Suffocation.

8/10