That One Album.

[Nevrmore]

I love 'The Wall', I love the (incredible) animations by Gerald Scarfe, I love the message, I love the songs.

So pissed off when "Hey You" was cut from the movie.

[WBAGNR]

Jason Reeves - The Magnificent Adventures of Heartache and Other Frightening Tales

Because I like all the songs, and they connect with me, even if they don't actually reflect my current situation, or situations I have been in.

[epocalypse]

oh, i've got something for you: http: lock up your videos by eclectic method, album length single continuous video mix. check it out. double posting in favorite song. also free video audio album download. hope you've got some time.

[iamafish]

Another brilliant album that i will keep coming back to:

Puzzle - Biffy Clyro

apart from the first minute and a half this album is wall to wall awesome! I could not stop listening to it when i bought it and i can still return to it any time and it is just as good as it was when i first put it on.

Dinner for one - Amity in Fame

complete unknowns. this is a really nice prog rock album, with lots of nice heavy stuff if you're into that. It's available as a free download here, so you have no excuse not to check it out

[Mad Madam Mimm]

Soko- I will Kill her

Heard this song on the radio the other day and had to look her up. She's amazing. Check it out.

[Theremin]

Wow, that IS good.

Thanks guys, I've found my next downloads.

[Mad Madam Mimm]

ANything by Victoria Wood. I am slowly falling in love with this woman.
My Response is just one example of the pure skill with which she handles the english language. An underappreciated gem.

[epocalypse]

i also reccomend checking out eclectic method's stephen colbert remix.

you know, it reminds me of the one thing I hate about radiohead. I made a limited animation video to Bodysnatchers, off In Rainbows, and they knocked it off youtube for supposed unlicensed use, of a song i got legally for free and was not using for teh profit. WTF, Radiohead?

[RAIC]

Death Cab for Cutie - transatlanticism.

This album was the soundtrack of my life for a period of years. It ranges in emotion from a near fantasy-level of contentedness in love (passenger seat) to a deep. Soul crushing sadness (transatlanticism), to a simple, relatable akward inability to achieve ones plans for their life (sound of settling).

The album is haunting, and chillingly beautiful, and the track "We looked like giants" rates easily among my top 5 songs of all time.

The album is great for putting to words the mid-twenties anxiety of a single male, or hopeless romantic, pining for the life he thought he imagined as a child, that he thought he'd have by now, and seeing that for all his romanticism and high hopes life doesn't always work out as planned.

Brilliant album.

-m

Thanks to you I am now pretty much addicted to this album. I alread knew and loved their next album, Plans, but never checked out their other stuff. I see that was a stupid thing to do.

Also I just got Forest by George Winston, and it's very good. Needs a few more good listens before I can actually say anything useful, but first impression is: "it's good".

[Theremin]

So, I just bought a CD called:

"A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Exploding In Your Mind-Volume 2 - Pagan Love Vibrations Compiled and Mixed by The Amorphous Androgynous"

...it's...good.

I took some cues, and listened to Dream Theatre (Thanks Tina) who are awesome, The Dresden Dolls (inferred by Elvor) who I'm liking a lot, and some John Coltrane (thanks to Epoc).

Anyway, Comicopera by Robert Wyatt. Surreality in music is a hard thing to get right, which is why it's so gratifying when someone does. This is a collection of reflective, morose songs with a certain lightness of touch and poetry to them which seperate them from your average 'arty' album. It's hard to define, jazzy in some places, proggish and orchestral in others, and weirdly enough, 25% sung in Italian.

[Ollie, don'tcha know!]

Well,
'Demon Days' by Gorillaz got me into music, and I still love it to this day
'Elephant' by The White Stripes got me into the band, who remain one of my favourite bands and led me onto all kinds of different genres
'Funeral' by Arcade Fire got me into Indie music
'Peaceful, the World Lays Me Down' by Noah and the Whale got me into Folk
'Somethin' Else' by Cannonball Adderly is the only Jazz album I really love

So those are probably the most significant albums to me.

[JoshTheater]

The one album that gets me in every way, shape, and form is one that I to this day still have not found one other person in real life that enjoys it, or anything else by the artist, at all.

The album is The Human Equation by Ayreon. Ayreon is a project by this guy Arjen Lucassen who writes all the music and lyrics and plays all of the guitar, bass, and keyboards on his albums (with minor exceptions). What's unique about it is that all of his albums feature a different group of several (sometimes up to 20) singers, male and female, each of whom usually represent a character in the story. Often there will be several singers on one track, sometimes with back and forth dialogue. The Human Equation features James LaBrie of Dream Theater, Mikael Åkerfeldt of Opeth, Devin Townsend of Strapping Young Lad, Mike Baker of Shadow Gallery, and a bunch of other amazing singers.

The main genre is progressive metal, but the musical style varies greatly. He usually incorporates lots of classical instruments into the mix, to great effect. On The Human Equation he let the classical musicians write many of their own parts (instead of just handing them a score and saying "play this"), and there is some great improvisation on the album on their behalf.

The other thing about Ayreon is all of his albums are concept albums (they tell a story), and not only that, but all of his albums are linked in one big storyline. The Human Equation is about a man who wakes up in a coma not knowing what happened to him, and he's confronted by personifications of his emotions (represented by different singers) as he tries to remember what happened and what he needs to do to wake up.

...I love it.

[Ollie, don'tcha know!]

Sounds... Interesting...

The First Days of Spring by Noah and the Whale is the only concpet album I've ever come across that I like (and hell, do I love it), and even that's only a loosely based 'storyline', which is non-fiction, as well. It's kind of Concept Album Lite. But it's amazing, for sure.

[Unlucky]

The Human Equation features James LaBrie of Dream Theater, Mikael Åkerfeldt of Opeth, Devin Townsend of Strapping Young Lad, Mike Baker of Shadow Gallery, and a bunch of other amazing singers.

The main genre is progressive metal, but the musical style varies greatly. He usually incorporates lots of classical instruments into the mix, to great effect.

These things, especially the bolded, sold me. I will and must listen to this album.

I MUST.

Holy shi-

Current album line-up

Arjen Anthony Lucassen - Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Keyboards (Ambeon, Bodine, Erik Norlander, Freak Neil Inc., Ian Parry, Star One, Stream of Passion, Vengeance (Hol))

And the following guests:


Vocals

James LaBrie (Dream Theater, Mullmuzzler) as Me
Arjen Anthony Lucassen as Best Friend
Heather Findlay (Mostly Autumn) as Love
Mikael Akerfeldt (Opeth) as Fear
Mike Baker (Shadow Gallery) as Father
Marcela Bovio (Elfonia) as Wife
Eric Clayton (Saviour Machine) as Reason
Magnus Ekwall (The Quill) as Pride
Devon Graves (Psychotic Waltz, Deadsoul Tribe) as Agony
Irene Jansen (Karma) as Passion
Devin Townsend (Strapping Young Lad, The Devin Townsend Band) as Rage


Keyboards

Ken Hensley (Uriah Heep)
Martin Orford (IQ)
Joost van den Broek (Sun Caged, After Forever)
Oliver Wakeman

Drums, Percussion

Ed Warby (Gorefest)

Acoustic instruments

Robert Baba - Violin
Jeroen Goossens - Flute (Pater Moeskroen)
Marieke van der Heyden - Cello
John McManus - Flute, Whistle

So many famous\awesome musicians there. I can't wait!

Edit: Oh my God, this is amazing. More at 11.

[JoshTheater]

[sdhonda]

*looks at the line up*

Jesus fucking christ...

[Unlucky]

Quick review of Ayreon:

I am not a huge fan of the story itself, but I can let it pass. Some of the vocals, while I understand why they're like that, I personally don't like much.

Much like I expected, Devin's vocals are used more for the screaming and Jamie's are used for that 'Epic' vibe they all ways have. Instrumentally, some songs are a bit bland in that they have one awesomely catchy riff and then never change, and throw some mismatched vocals over it.

However, now we get to the fact that this has some amazing instrumentals in it. My favourite has got to be 5:30 into Isolation. It reminds me strongly of Pink Floyd, which is an excellent thing.

In fact, I can see influences from all over the joint artist-wise. I can even see influences from Devin Townsend the way the heavier guitar sounds, as the guitarist 'scrapes' the strings rather than hits them dead-on. I can also hear Dream Theatre in quite a lot of this, but I think that just comes from the genre it falls under and the fact the Dream Theatre singer is in it.

The first half of "Pain" Reminds me of a hybrid of Orion by Metallica and Oriental Melody by Joe Satriani, which again, is never a bad thing. It's difficult to talk about the songs specifically without going into essays, as they evolve and change so much, among many of them being so considerably long.

Overall, this is simply stunning. I couldn't listen to the whole thing repeatedly, but I will certainly add a large chunk of this to my playlist.

[JoshTheater]

I'm glad you enjoyed it. You might also enjoy 01011001 by Ayreon, which came after The Human Equation, and also has tons of great singers from the progressive genre.

The stuff before The Human Equation by Ayreon is also fantastic, but it seems like you weren't a fan of all the singing, and the earlier stuff only gets cheesier and cheesier.