Long-time buddy Craig at theoria usually has these Musical Friday things where he somehow manages to find mp3 samples of his favoriate songs and post them with a brief review for our delectation. He hasn't done so yet today, so I thought I'd actually try this out and pre-empt him for once. I do have a bit of an ulterior motive: I received a CD I purchased online and am very happy with that my purchse: The Dawnseeker by Sleepthief.
Sleepthief is an 'ethereal electronica' group that is actually just the work of a Utah lawyer, Justin Elswick. I used to be a bit more snobby in my tastes in music than I am now, and I tended to look down on electronica, but that's just because my friends were listening to electronica I didn't like. It turns out that I do like electronica, particularly the ethereal subgenre. I was introduced to Sleepthief (The Dawnseeker is the debut album) by Pandora, which I blogged about before. Pandora annoys me by the fact that it too often classifies boring dance electronica with ethereal electronica like Delerium, but it did come through for me. My Delerium station on Pandora was what introduced me to Sleepthief.
Anyway, The Dawnseeker is an excellent collection, and even the most mediocre song on it is very good. There's no filler here. It's the magical complex weavings of Justin Elswick's music with one female singer per track. The singers are Americans and Europeans, with three performances by Canada's Jody Quine. Quine's voice is also probably the best on the CD.
Most of the lyrics tend to be of the romantic-melancholy variety, even if the tune itself is upbeat and exciting. So if you don't like that sort of thing and find yourself unable to ignore it, I don't recommend the CD. But if you're like me and either enjoy the poetry or are willing to see it as the musical skeleton around which the electronica background is built, then it's no problem.
Sleepthief has put a couple of the tracks as music videos (romantic-melancholy stuff) on YouTube. This one is "Eurydice", a somewhat modified version of the Greek myth:
This one is called "Tenuous". Both "Tenuous" and "Eurydice" are tracks made with Jody Quine's voice.
This one is "Just Say It", with European singer Kyoko Bartsoen. It's been turned into an anime video and is relatively low-quality, as it comes from a third party. It is the one I first encountered and the background electronica I like best on this CD.
My other two favourite of the approx dozen tracks are "The Chauffeur" and "The Metro". The later is a cover of a European band by an American singer who mispronounces "Seine" but is otherwise alright. I don't regret the $14 or something the CD cost.
I was going to do Sheriff, Frozen Ghost and Alias yesterday, but never got around to looking for the files! I learnt, listening to the radio, that a song I thought was by Frozen Ghost was actually by Sheriff and, when they broke up, they split into rival factions: Frozen Ghost and Alias! I had no idea! Further, I didn't know they were from Toronto! Maybe next week.
Posted by: Craig | February 10, 2007 at 11:48 AM