[Asa, Asa Full Album Zip
Julieann Rohde
Asa is the sixth studio album by the German Viking metal band Falkenbach. It was released in 2013 on Prophecy Productions. The lyrics are written in Limburgish.[1] Tmmers says he chose to use the language as it is the language of his ancestors.[2]
Yvonne Duchateau of Sonic Seducer, Markus Endres of Metal.de and Filip Van Muylem of Peek-a-Boo Magazine commented that the album combines stylistic elements from Falkenbach's entire career.[3][4][5] Duchateau wrote that what is new is the presence of more quiet songs with clear vocals, such as "Eweroun" and "Bluot fur bluot", which gives a more immediate impression;[3] Endres wrote that "[i]n this tension between Nordic folklore with acoustic guitars and clear vocals, Pagan / Black Metal with sawing riffs, melodic keyboards and harsh voice, Asa comes alive".[4] Van Muylem called the combination of different expressions a "successful amalgamation of tradition without any clichs and fiery passion".[5]
I had beamed in to Bristol via Skype for our chat, a diplomatic outreach for both parties, the Electricept Journal, and reclusive Asa. Our exchange had established after an article I wrote detailing his ongoing Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign, which will support the first Asa album project- an expensive endeavor structured around live instrumental recording and performance.
Today, we had finally reconciled the Eastern Standard/Bristol Standard time difference to a reasonable hour and I caught him before he sat down to watch Interstellar with his flatmates. I urged Asa to abandon the notion of appreciating such a trashy film (one starring Mathew McConaughney no less), but he insisted on the viewing, allotting me a few hours of conversation and a follow up to elucidate or expound upon key elements from our discussion.
EC- Just a bit more about on your personal musical background, that is, how did you begin as a musician, when did you discover you were more than just a listener, and what were your first forays into music and recording like?
Trae, i believe ur reviews..... U've been keepin it true since d days of AHH.com. Got d 2 albums last week. M.I2 is overhyped, i aint feelin it lyk am high on anasthetic. Am trying 2 love Asa..... it might work wit me...
Burlington transplant Asa Morris' internet presence suggests that he needs to make art the way the rest of us need to eat and drink water. Morris is a painter, writer and prolific musician. He's known in the upstate New York DIY scene for his rock band Asa Morris and the Mess and noise-rock group Tiki Bats, among other projects. According to a press release, Morris has recorded in bedrooms, motel rooms and backs of cars, like some crazy childbirth. So, while some of us spent our quarantine downtime rewatching "The Office," Morris recorded his 35th solo EP, God Has Entered My Body. A Perfect Body, My Same Size.
When I read that Morris had recorded almost three dozen EPs in the last six years, my first thought was that God Has Entered My Body would be a shining example of self-indulgence and poor editing. After several listens, though, I admit that I judged too hastily.
Morris also throws in a mellow version of "Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)," a 1980 David Bowie number about a woman in the throes of psychosis. This acoustic interpretation replaces the chaos of the original with plodding melancholy.
Morris' fellow New York scenester Matt Hall, of the Plattsburgh-centric web series "TBN" (formerly "TRASHburgh"), jumps in on drums for the Bowie cover. The multifaceted Morris handles vocals, guitar, programming, keys, background atmosphere and bass, as well as production throughout the album. Other pals and former bandmates created and contributed their parts remotely.
God Has Entered My Body. A Perfect Body, My Same Size is available July 14 at asamorris.bandcamp.com. Proceeds benefit the Movement for Black Lives, Color of Change, Survived & Punished, and other organizations.
Artwork promoting Don Broco's latest album, which appears to depict the outline of the Virgin Mary with the face of a snarling dog, has escaped a ban from the advertising watchdog following complaints it could "seriously offend" Christians.
While the regulator acknowledged that the image in the ad was reminiscent of the Black Madonna of Czestochowa, a "revered icon" of the Virgin Mary in the Catholic Christian faith, it said the album artwork wasn't actually an alteration of the specific image.
This isn't the first time album art has come under the scrutiny of the ASA. In 2012, a poster for Steel Panther's Balls Out album featuring a semi-nude woman was banned for being overtly sexual. In 2006, a billboard for 50 Cent's Get Rich or Die Tryin' soundtrack was spiked for showing the rapper naked from the waist up with a gun tucked into his belt and a baby balancing on his shoulder.
Of the Don Broco ruling, the ASA said: "We acknowledged that some members of the Christian faith would object to the use of the image in an ad, and in particular the replacement of the face with a snarling dog."
Furthermore, the ASA said it didn't believe the picture would be seen as "mocking or derogatory" towards the Madonna or Christian faith in general, and that there was nothing else within the ad which gave that impression.
Between the animalistic funk of 2003 single "Dog Days"-- a dance track that cheerfully nuzzled its way into a SXSW/CMJ mindset-- and 2004's Backstroke LP, there was a lot of talk of Matthew Dear's shapeshifting abilities. He'd already proven, both under his own name (recording for Ghostly and its Spectral sublabel) and as False (for Richie Hawtin's Plus 8 and Minus labels) and Jabberjaw (for Perlon), that he could stretch and twist his Slinky-like tracks to traverse any hairpin of techno's staircase. Now, word was, Dear was turning towards even greater accessibility with a record that would bring a new sense of songform to his gritty, agreeable beat structures.
But while six of Backstroke's eight tracks featured vocals (as did "Dog Days") and fell into the occasional verse/chorus structure, the record failed to deliver Dear a wider audience. His voice, even with its odd pitch, put its shoulder to the wheel in the service of pop, but the tires were worn from burning rubber behind a disco stoplight; its tracks felt like retreads-- cracked, wobbly, a little thin. I still enjoy the record, but compared to the staggeringly confident tracks Dear released as Audion in just the last year -- "Mouth to Mouth", "I Gave You Away", remixes for Claude VonStroke, Hot Chip, and Black Strobe, anthems all-- it's difficult to hear Backstroke as the work of the same individual.
With his new album, Asa Breed, Dear finally makes good on his long-awaited metamorphosis. It's not that the record is a straightforward pop romp: It's still anchored in Dear's lumbering beats, its rhythms cobbled together from misfiring drum machines and colored with barely-in-tune keyboards and yellowing room tone. Still, Dear pulls together his widest array of elements yet, not just in terms of instrumentation-- electric and acoustic guitars, live drums, and haphazard percussion all play strong roles-- but also style: Hints of new wave, indie rock, Afropop, and even country enliven Asa Breed. Dear's mercurial approach to genre, however, feels less like dabbling than a kind of shambling dandyism, trying on mismatched styles with a sidelong wink in the mirror.
The most immediate change is that Dear's voice now sits front-and-center in every track. Actually, make that front-and-center and side-to-side: Virtually every song features two- or three-part, multitracked vocals, encompassing his natural baritone, a more idiosyncratic midrange, and finally a warbly falsetto, generally digitally smeared as a sort of pitch-correction. It's not the greatest voice in the world, but he uses it well, sliding into the notes, lingering on his vowels, and greasing the mechanistic clutter of his backing tracks. It's a suggestive and evocative voice, though exactly what's being suggested is often left ambiguous. On the downcast "Deserter" it's impossible to miss the influence of Joy Division's Ian Curtis; on the ruminative "Fleece on Brain", his backing Ooh-oohs sound like a scrap of 1960s pop that's wafted in on some errant, psychedelic gust. Sometimes, the vocals themselves mutate into something approaching pure musicality, more sensibility than sense: On "Will Gravity Win Tonight?" it might take you dozens of listens to realize that the background babble is really the mantra-like repetition, "More work to be done."
Asa Breed is a moody record, thanks in no small part to its affirmational lyrics and plaintive guitars. Some critics have found fault with Dear's way with words, and he does occasionally misstep, but more often than not, his slightly cryptic character sketches work well, allowing ambiguous narratives to sprout from the cracked pavement of his productions. The lyrics invite all manner of questions. Who are "Don and Sherri"? If love is "such a tricky thing/ Can include diamond rings," is that a good or a bad thing? (Dear is married.) And in a record so filled with self-doubt, how much is pure literary invention, and how much points to a crack in the artist's own psyche? It's so rare to get any sense of dance artists' personae that Dear's ambiguous, occasionally confessional lyrics take on extra weight. Part of the pleasure of Asa Breed is its introduction of a character we've never met before; Dear's reluctance to reveal only sends you back into the music looking for answers. (Some of those answers will surprise you: the closing country dirge "Vine to Vine", featuring a Johnny Cash-like spoken word drawl, is about a paternal ancestor of Dear's that was allegedly gunned down by Texas Rangers over a century ago.)
The other thing that keeps me returning to Asa Breed again and again, beyond its individual songs' inventive, engrossing composition and production, is the pacing of the album. It's moody, yes-- even a jaunty track like "Fleece on Brain" feels haunted and fraught with anxiety-- but the record's sequence pinballs from brassy electric bumpers to pensive pits and suspenseful pauses. The first four songs seem to circle a common mood as if poking and prodding from every angle, shining a Maglite in the recesses of a deep funk. (The way he wields phrases suggests the minimalist he's always been, twisting and spinning a few sinewy strands into a rope as tough as woven steel; you can hear Audion's druggy abandon throughout, in slow, grinding synthesizers and tones that change color as gradually as a darkening, stormbound sky.) With "Elementary Lover", Dear abruptly changes course, channeling the Tom Tom Club. "Don and Sherri" plunges back into the murk of a humid dance floor. "Will Gravity Win Tonight?" is bitter black tea as a sort of palate cleanser; "Pom Pom" is a bizarre, Beach Boys-influenced miniature (at 2:39, it's the shortest song on the album, by two seconds); "Death to Feelers" is a kindergarten tale of unrequited love for toy piano and tambourine. And the last four songs usher us out in a kind of extended dream sequence of organs, acoustic guitars, country yelps, the Sea and Cake lounge jazz, and the totally unexpected American Gothic of "Vine to Vine".
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