DOPPELGANGERS XXII

  Spiral out-progresses itself on Mind Trip in A Minor! With an array of soulfully maneuvered styles; Psychedelic progressive Rock, Space- and copious Post-Rock oeuvres—the album is meant to be absorbed as a cataract-less stream. More than works.

   Omen throbs outwards splinting. Heralds of the un-Black Metal world, Antestor, permeate with a passaged dominance: A slight sympho work halfway through; atmospheric littering ahead, culminating with syncopation; Acoustics; And, violins.

  Featuring the artwork of Zdzisław Beksiński, The Horn Player.

—Art Rock
—Black Metal

 

VOICES FROM THE SKY BY ARTHUR C. CLARKE

  What is more important than science? The obvious answer leads to expositions that have been explored and expounded  in this array of astronomical, astronautical and other essays.

  Reflecting on the dawn of the Space Age and speculating on what the future has in space, Arthur C. Clarke  takes a straightforward in-person approach across various elaborated phenomena. The approachable tone should nonetheless imply a pop-sci advent, as many are wont to note when explanations and analogies are applied on science shows for the dissemination and disentangling of technical inclinations and concepts. On such premise, I'd point out that even Clarke notes fun is essential and without which the shows would be disengaging interested but non technical persons; but more importantly, less people would be ensnared—which should just about be the reason for its existence. Quite different from watering down. 

  Voices from the Sky outlays concepts whose ideas are now a much divers reality today—take for example electrical brain stimulation—whilst others like remotely operating surgeons are yet to be conceived.

  The author warns that with the rapid scientific advancement as from his time, nothing is final. A fine example would be the statement that that the electron was the smallest thing in the universe since discovery down the book's conceivement period. Today it is otherwise with the discovery of the quantum world inhabited by the once labeled as particle zoo. All lay side to side with his and others' contributions to space-faring and portions of the second industrial revolution.

  Acknowledgements of interesting authors of the genre are neither the least as they are weaved along the author's interplay of speculations, narratives, analogies, recollections, experiences and stances. This is the other Clarke hidden to some of his readers. Astro-literature reads something like this—since the fiction ones will not capture as much ideologies at heart.

HORROR VACUI (RETURN TO THE EMPIRE)

  More Post-Punk. Horror Vacui self describe as punker than dark, darker than punk. Kinda chuckle benefiting stuff. Straight Post-Punk/Goth mash stuff you bet. Deathrock once 5000 palpitates into the melee. Chunks of proliferating missives on a mission to darken auditory perceptions. Even a fusion of Post-Punk and Deathrock is nothing to bring out the best in a band, but a mixture of the best of both worlds.

  Clear cut black and  white. Covered in a two-way infusion as the soundscapes shift and trade sides with either. A rocker could be pulled. A punker can take. A goth should commit. It heavily corresponds with The Cure school of Post-Punk. A somehow competent singer at hand, leading the listener along to the rhythm of the riffs, otherwise letting the main sequences of the lead to shine on such a cold seeker of inclines.

  Light of Darkness offers some speed and urgency. Deathrock and Post-Punk really beautifully fuse here, on paced amplitudes. This is a stolid exemplification amid the embueing chaos and effervescence. A melding that perseveres onto the ensuing track. Though this is a much relaxed one. Continuing with the ever minimalist Post-Punk drum work.

  The lyrics revolve around antis and everyday livelihood. Somnolent and belying thoughts fortified in less augur sangfroid to the sing-song extensions. Keeping it coming, keeping it coldish.

MY DARK HOUSE ([DEMO])

  Any serious music listener will tell you they are not always seeking replication. Not especially where they are in the slightest aware what they are after—or looking for in a new and/or different stuff—sounds like. In that regard, Post-Punk is neither a different story. Once one gets a slight indication of what shit presents itself to be, it is better to stick to the best purveyor of the sound in question. Times are few when duplicates conquer their masters.

  Once the Garage squiggles of [Demo] jar in as the first track spans out, My Dark House storm with affection yet the vocals are very reminiscent of Ian Curtis and as becomes expectant—to a scale of six—, the undercurrent of the music is precise Post-Punk bass drum verity. The other off leash is downtuned Shoegaze—almost to black doom levels, propagating the Nu-Gaze—on the third track that gives it a heavy vibe to a gravitating effect. As soft as the vocals could be, a bleeding palette on immense in boire carous to outpour tweeny emotions. Smudged a little, then smoothly flowing.

  The promise here is that once the actual band's sound is grasped effectively, then divulged through a much distorted lens, it wont provide a staler. Actualizations of Joy Division with less syntactic appreciation may eventually pay off. Worthwhile an effort, like the bassists unrelenting pulse.

ESPECTROSTATIC (SKELETACTICAL)

  Firing up in a shimmering way. On pointers with dishevling relationships with radiation bursts. Anticipate a wake of reanimations and impending consternation as the blasted astronauts regain unlife. All those years of inertia that have molten any memory of flesh are gone now as a plague unanticipated enlists itself.

  Unlife refines itself with consequential drums pockmarking the synth loops. Stellar outstretch soundtracks to a dreadful reprise. Gear shifting melody with tosses of Synthwave. So what makes this punk?—if not recalcitrations of electro- and synth-wave polyphonics in a much balanced but out there way. Dangling aside Synthwave's super cine feel. Apart from Fuzgati's electropunk, it's the exact opposite of what Fuzgati does, yet the the name might suggest otherwise. Or what the latter should be emulating.

  Those drum hits. That is what its moments are, amid electro key touches as the EP clashes with closure time. Certainly indecipherable culminations; ponderings that lurk opportunistically among the tints of dystopia. A kind of watch-the-space-explode anticipations and ruminations. Blipping out from the upsurging space sargassso. Communication frozen. Dashing Horrorwave.

DOPPELGANGERS XXI

  So much music, so little time! 1994 and music have always been on a measured breath, once uttered together. For Hip Hop it's the inescapable indispensable Big Apple boom bap—Illmatic. Out of countless imitators is an equal of listless (direct) influences.  This is a by no means exhaustive list.

  Some fun has been had.  And then some. . . . 

.  .  .

.  .  .

.  .  .

.  .  .

 .  .  .

.  .  .

 .  .  .

.  .  .

.  .  .

ANTS VI—WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?

Cultures and races will vanish.
The ants will take over the world.

—Edward Albee

DOPPELGANGERS XX

  This joke was supposed to have been a Folk Metal one. Even Black Metal could have been a closer call—the genre oftenly roots itself  in Mother Nature's aesthetics, sometimes even lyrically and to a huge degree sonically. That is the main idea here, rather than the slightly not-very-similar album art. Nature. Born in a Tomb and the atmospheric tinged Yggdrasil: Journey Throughout the Nine Worlds are both second release full-lengths from one-man outfits.

—Ossadogva

—Darkened Winter

DOPPELGANGERS XIX

  They are hats, but it is how they are worn. Or what kind of hat. The Lady With a Red Hat, fuckin' right Glenn Headly—Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Below are two portrayals of what a woman ought to be, with Vita Sackville-West portrayed on the second item.

—William Strang
—Johannes Vermeer

 

THE CROQUET PLAYER BY H. G. WELLS

  It only takes the first five pages to discern a piece written by Herbert G. Wells. Besides a catalogue that would by  any means appear intimidating given how highly original, perceptive and engaging his work is. They are tales that are ebbed and whiled out  as a first person narrative from the perspective of a third person, with a constant of choice peculiar words.

  Given the brevity of The Croquet Player, it occurs a man's tale into contagious madness. Presented here is an ordinary or everyday man; a key aspect in relegating the intended impact of the story's urgency—amid the ramification of perceived but highly contagious thoughts of two intellectuals. One is a young, sensitive, reasonable, if oblivious of the reality around him. The other man is an inflated promise of redemption—with borderline ruminations to the truth about the current world situations. It is not a big revelation that man is really a beast, and in neither way different from his cave-man ancestor—appointed to psychotherapeutic duties upon the young doctor. 

  The Doctor starts losing his mind to a fear of the unknown at a remote area, once inhabited by Neanderthals. If this place sets everybody setting foot there mad, their reaction on countering the overcast mental entities can work for or against them. Dr. Finchatton narrates his troubles  in a quest for perspective and opinion from an ordinary man: and one who wouldn't care even if his world is falling apart provided the usual needs are met. They must be. Metaphorically delving in the frustrations of two aspects of civilization and their reactions to their not so reassuring world. Ignoring and failing to rise up to the challenges. Placing an engagement to the reader.

Did he repeat my phrase—endemic panic?

   The author aligns and acclaims to Edgar E. Poe, and evokes a similar atmosphere, with certain touches of Howard P. Lovecraft, succeeding to create a formidable power of the unknown. It is the reader that is being confronted, once the croquet player decides to flee, even though his mind has been seeded with the malady of thought. How to be an incorporating presentist, such a way!

POINT DECEPTION BY MARCIA MULLER

  Some stories go on forever. . . . The grips have done part the task and now adrenaline jets the flowing. Others are a waste of readers' time. Ah, the time for different excursions. For the most part, satisfaction and well laid foundation are a Siamese pair. Get the plot inconceivably yet seemingly condensable links and backstories and the unforgiving razor pares this relationship. Severing may be terminal on either or both.

  As far as Point Deception impresses with the writing, it falls somehow badly on its own propulsions. For a mystery story, it dwells heavily on character development at the expense of detection and mystery-solving. An eminent mystery seeker may be put off by the meandering of the story-line across personal issues and pasts  of people that are the knit of the murders that occurred at Point Deception in a new wake of numinous murders. The backlogs render  too much into particular persons to read as biographies, which jeopardizes both length and enjoyability of the book to acclimated mystery seekers.

 

 

You may think you're a hotshot detective, lady, but you're nothing on me.

  The main appeal is largely at the closure. The original murders have been used as a cultivation point and minstrel to one unlikely melody at the brief closure. Bait. Further enmeshed in many unnatural conversations. The upbeat use of slang may try to appeal to a YA audience at a very sickening precedence. Some colloquials are so conventional they do the author some discredit, but the ending was perfect. The book outlines some achievements at the back but my considerations towards the author remain limited. If only all that detail went into polishing the crimes.

THE CONSULTANT: A NOVEL OF COMPUTER CRIME BY JOHN McNEIL

  To hell with being a moralist. To such a seemingly crude society it's befitting at best to be opportunistic and damn be repercussions. What a coarser and broader view t apply to the titilations of everyday. Conclusive, but not wrong. An actuality articulated by many correctly putting.

  A disconcerting life is not to relegate countenance to . . . loophole appropriation. After setting up a software consultancy firm, which encrusts him with the frightening hindsight that it is much worse to own a small portion of a company you work for than to just work for it; the day has come for Webb to neck his way into a tender among six rivals that include a giant firm—which he ordinarily has no chance against. The aging programmer recruits one of his employees to sniff out patches in a new in the market system for a major bank—BANKNET.

   Along teaching his companion the ropes, Webb faces the moralist dilemma that finally ticks to right side of the clock—depending on how one views it. By this streak, he also measures the accentuating action of his younger associates, as he also plays detective, spy, auditor, schemer, and all that jazz in a quest to what everything boils down to—information. Win the tender? Outsmart a shit-hot coder? Deliver required fodder?—information.

Knowledge is the best key, Mr. Webb. Knowledge of weakness.

  The Consultant is first a great story, then literature. It is way too formidable to dwell pretensions—a leaning it constantly disapproves of bearing the frolicking and fun word-tossing. The colour of the whole scheme lies in the cordiality of characters pitted against dishevels and malice. A solitary crime thriller that strikes a frozen pause to the time of digital significance.