I would just like to say..

[Shirow]

The three people that rated this 1/5:

http://digitalgunfire.com/musicDb.php?albumId=2548

You suck and I'm not listening.

sorry shirow i just think it sounds bad  that's why i gave it a 1 but that why the review thing is there so people can tell u what they think of it  u could put  more the their  stuff on here so people can get a better idea of what babyland is like but i did not  like it (waits to get banned jk)

I know, in this case, I'm just ignoring it :)

[creepster]

(:

*sues shirow for copyright infringement of left-handed smilies*

[sinaptic]

Can’t say I like Babyland much either. (Braces for the guys to show up wearing gimp masks with a prostrate Ostrich tied up in their windowless cargo van.) It’s not completely terrible, it’s just not my thing. Of course, this is coming from someone who finds people screaming unintelligibly through vocoders high entertainment, so my opinion is largely meaningless.

This is another situation somewhat similar to the Angelspit debacle, where I find myself probably overly curious what the DG silent majority thinks... After all, there’s only a dozen or so people who post in the forums and contribute reviews regularly. I’m assuming the actual listenership is much, much larger.

Guess we’ll never know, but still curious.

[Shirow]

It's hard to know but I suppose you have to extrapolate from the reviews posted that, at a certain point, it probably begins to reflect overall consensus.

Of course, who knows if people who are more into the current 'scene' are more likely to register/post therefore skewing the reviews towards Suicide Commando style bands.

I don't generally use the reviews as a basis for removing bands, I look more at threads - most of the reviews are largely (IMO) worthless as they're either 1 star 'OMG THIS SUCKS' or 5 star 'OMG I LOVE THIS'

The only ones I really read/appreciate are the ones where people have taken to time to share real thoughts about the band/album/individual songs.

That's kinda why I'm contemplating switching to a simpler per song rating system (maybe just thumbs up/thumbs down vs a 1-5 system) as I think it would fit better into the way it's used today.

[Lexus]

I found this video.  I love how they use the angle grinder.

Exactly my point. If he just kept his mouth shut it would sound a lot better. I dont think he has the right voice for the style he plays. His voice is to soft and nice, while the music itself is much harder and faster. Its like listening to a black metal band without any grunting. It just doesnt fit together.


And really, I dont see why everyone is complaining about all the suicide commando clones. I havent heard them yet. Then again, I dont go to clubs or shows. But still, thats only natural and it happens in every genre of music. You got a band/group/singer who is awesome and has an awesome style, and he gets famous and suddenly a lot of imitators pop up. They are generally not successful and natural selection weeds them out after a while. Only those that add something themselves get enough attention, succeed and thats how a genre evolves.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, the theory of evolution doesnt only apply to how lifeforms became the lifeforms of today, it applies to culture and cultural aspects as well.

[Berger Stahl]

Without further explanation of how this ostrich was marinated...


Let me tell you why i think this band IMO is not good,... and not just the simple "1 star - OMG THIS SUCKS" post.

I've been around in the scene for a long long time,...
a time where goth predominated clubs (the L.A. scene mostly)
and of course bands such as Contagion was as hardcore as industrial could be found.
Ever since, the scene has evolved into more modern/mainstream sounds which is quite typical
for musical genres to do, which is adapting to what the masses want since is their input and revenue what keeps the industry going.

But for some F***ING reason, every damn "new school" band out there seems to
have been evolved from HOCICO, (a band which during its best years truly revolutionized the scene
with fast tempos and aggressive vocoder-based vocals) and even Suicide Commando (which i think is better sounding than most Aggrotech bands out there)
Take for example one of the current "popular" bands Herzschlag http://www.myspace.com/herzschlagmusik They are good, they may have talent, but the band brings NOTHING, style or sound wise,...

Same with babyland, I was at their CD release party, and it sounded bad, but i gave them a try because most bands tend to sound horrible when performing live (look up any vnv nation concert in youtube) but when i heard the album, wow .... it was actually worse than their live show...
I see them trying to bring something new by adding a somewhat wimpy voice to washed out snares but i dont think they quite nailed the mixture... and that's why i gave them a one star rating.  

[Shirow]

I understand your opinion.. but they are not a new band trying something new. Their discography goes back to 1991.

This doesn't make them good necessarily.. but they've been doing what they do for a long time.

FWIW, I was listening to 'Cavecraft' last night and my wife said to me 'what is that, it sounds awesome!'

My wife gets to outvote the forum.

[Berger Stahl]

...

My wife gets to outvote the forum.

ah ... Touché !!

[swarmofcats]

Babyland has been my favorite band since about 1995.  This is the most important band of the past decade.  Kudos to those who recognize that fact.

[Shirow]

...

My wife gets to outvote the forum.

ah ... Touché !!

You're in 2nd place for the favicon though, I'm surprised you-know-who hasn't started screaming about it yet, he's only been asking me for 3 years.

[xeno]

The three people that rated this 1/5:

http://digitalgunfire.com/musicDb.php?albumId=2548

You suck and I'm not listening.

Agreed... I think it's a step back from their previous 2 albums... but still it's really great.

Too bad they've called it quits... :/

[Lexus]

But for some F***ING reason, every damn "new school" band out there seems to
have been evolved from HOCICO, (a band which during its best years truly revolutionized the scene
with fast tempos and aggressive vocoder-based vocals) and even Suicide Commando (which i think is better sounding than most Aggrotech bands out there)
Take for example one of the current "popular" bands Herzschlag http://www.myspace.com/herzschlagmusik They are good, they may have talent, but the band brings NOTHING, style or sound wise,...

I have to disagree with you there. Especially on Herzschlag. It doesnt evn sound close to suicide commando or Hoicico. Yeah, al right, they both got distorted vocals and stompy beats. Ok, but thats like saying all metal sounds the same because they all use guitars and most of them either scream or grunt.

Something sounds the same once you cant recognize the difference between 2 bands and think band A did Song A while its actually from band B.
So far, Ive always been able to tell the difference between every major Aggrotech that I heard. Like I said, could be me because all I hear are major [therefor] mainstream bands because I dont go to clubs.

Oh well, guess it just comes down to personal taste. My dad always bugs me with saying that every song made in the 80's is pure gold because its made in the 80's and that the 90's and 00's are a big black pit of musical despair because they are not the 80's. Suppose this is kinda the same....

[Berger Stahl]

I 'm going to give you a brief explanation of why all of them sound so similar, ...i originally wasn't planning on going this technical about it but given the circumstances, i will.

Hocico originally started experimenting with ACCESS VIRUS (the red one)
From there they acquired an M-Audio module which was later combined with Audio Damage 914,
Soon thereafter, they got the spectrasonics suite (not sure if it was trilogy or athmosphere) which combined with izotope alloy gave them most of the agressive sounding vocals. Ever since they been using Native Instruments along with Image Line and Toraverb for vocals.

Herzschlag began very recently with the spectrasonics suite (thanks to VNV who made their synth suite rather popular) and combinations of both DirectWave & DrumSynth (which are part of Image Line) ultimiately acquiring Toraverb for vocals & Prosoniq Orange Vocoder

Then there's Tactical Sekt which began also with Image Line (FL Studio) and various WAVE & Spectrasonics VST plugins, mixed with ReFX Vanguard & SimSynth to finally end up using the same Orange Vocoder (not sure about Toraverb tho)

And finally W.A.S.T.E, which began with the whole Native Instruments Suite (Kontakt, KORE, Reaktor, Massive & Battery) and then moved to Image Line (thus still combining the first) and included DrumSynth, Sakura, Slicex & the very popular FL Studio

You can arguably say they do not sound the same but ultimately all their sounds have derived from the same fundamental pieces of software.

[Neu.Macht]

I have listened to some samples of the album. I hear some good music, but it is drowned out by the vocals. I can appreciate a band wanting their vocals to be heard, but I cannot hear the words, or really any discernible emotion.

I will not ridicule Shirow for him being supportive of this band, I can hear talent behind the overloaded microphone.

[Shirow]

I 'm going to give you a brief explanation of why all of them sound so similar, ...i originally wasn't planning on going this technical about it but given the circumstances, i will.

Hocico originally started experimenting with ACCESS VIRUS (the red one)
From there they acquired an M-Audio module which was later combined with Audio Damage 914,
Soon thereafter, they got the spectrasonics suite (not sure if it was trilogy or athmosphere) which combined with izotope alloy gave them most of the agressive sounding vocals. Ever since they been using Native Instruments along with Image Line and Toraverb for vocals.

Herzschlag began very recently with the spectrasonics suite (thanks to VNV who made their synth suite rather popular) and combinations of both DirectWave & DrumSynth (which are part of Image Line) ultimiately acquiring Toraverb for vocals & Prosoniq Orange Vocoder

Then there's Tactical Sekt which began also with Image Line (FL Studio) and various WAVE & Spectrasonics VST plugins, mixed with ReFX Vanguard & SimSynth to finally end up using the same Orange Vocoder (not sure about Toraverb tho)

And finally W.A.S.T.E, which began with the whole Native Instruments Suite (Kontakt, KORE, Reaktor, Massive & Battery) and then moved to Image Line (thus still combining the first) and included DrumSynth, Sakura, Slicex & the very popular FL Studio

You can arguably say they do not sound the same but ultimately all their sounds have derived from the same fundamental pieces of software.

I'm not sure that's fair though. Not all bands that use guitars sound the same. You can be different even if you're using the same instruments. The similarities are the fault of lack of desire to be different, not lack of opportunity.