review | Our Rising Sound

September 30 2009

Review: Megafaun and Bon Iver at Mesa Arts Center

Tagged Under : Bon Iver, concert, Megafaun, review

Wow. I’ve been to a lot of shows, but for many reasons this show was one of the best I’ve seen. First off we should talk about the venue. Mesa Arts Center is absolutely beautiful and the room sounds incredible…no I mean it, incredible! Not to mention the fact that we were right in front, as in our seats, then the stage, then Bon Iver. The room had all wood floors, wood paneling on the walls, it was just a musician’s dream of a venue. Both bands were extremely grateful for the chance to play there which was cool to hear as they mentioned it several times throughout their respective sets.

I had never heard of Megafaun previous to the show but as soon as they hit the first line of the verse on song 1 I knew I was gonna dig em. 3 piece band which usually stuck to a lineup of drums/percussion, guitar and banjo, but each member played multiple instruments so you had a mix of bass, electric, synths, piano and other goodies. Their 3 part harmonies were rich, on point and almost as majestic as their beards. Their sound is very eclectic, always containing a strong front porch folk element reminiscent of The Avett Brothers, their harmonies would remind you of the Fleet Foxes but then there’s also a subtle rock/experimental element that comes across very Wilco‘ish at times. I don’t think they are confused as much as excited about music and they seem to follow their inspiration no matter what musical alley it leads them. Kudos for that, it was thoroughly enjoyable listening to them take those journeys. Their latest record is “Gather, Form & Fly” and I’m giving it a spin now and loving it.

Then out comes Bon Iver and opens up with Flume, one of my favorites. The band is killing the harmonies, and I mean killing as in nailing them. The textures they create with the keys, guitars and percussion are really incredible. I was afraid they’d come off disorganized and lazy in a live environment but the arrangements are complex and the instrumentation and vocals are layered so richly. I can’t say enough about the quality of the vocals, especially Justin Vernon’s voice. I didn’t know how his falsetto would hold up for an entire show, but wow, I was blown away. He was singing his guts out and sounded incredible all night.

Now for my favorite moments of the night, first was his electrified version of Blood Bank. They rocked that song out and I really hope they consider releasing a live album cause that arrangement was incredible. Second was the insane epic ending, again with an electrified version of The Wolves. Justin had the entire crowd singing “what might have been lost” at the top of their lungs and then all hell broke loose as then entire place just started yelling as they washed out the ending in a giant indie, feedback filled rock fest. Certainly a concert memory I won’t soon forget.

Then as a sweet nightcap, Megafaun came out and joined Bon Iver for an acoustic, gather around the campfire(or a small condenser mic), family song. It was a great way to end the show.

Thank you Bon Iver and Megafaun for one of the best shows I’ve ever been to, you guys were amazing.

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Filed Under (concert, review) by Kyle

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June 25 2009

Can Christians honestly critique each other’s music?

Tagged Under : Bob Kauflin, music, review

I was flipping through some music reviews of some worship albums and I just had to laugh because there’s no such thing as a bad review. Well actually there is, if the review is out of 10 stars, 10 is great and 9.5 is awful, they just don’t get any lower. This same attitude exists in worship bands and church leadership as a whole. Leaders many times have to walk on egg shells cause they feel if they critique the persons gifting or execution that person will get offended and leave.

As leaders we can’t be paralyzed by a fear to critique. The root of this fear is really idolatry in that our gifting is our value in the kingdom and when someone critiques it we feel devalued in the kingdom. I’m not trying to go Dr. Phil on you, but seriously why can’t I love my Christian brother and critique what he’s trying to sell me? How far does this go, am I offending someone because I didn’t buy their album?

On a twitter conversation I was having Fred McKinnon mentioned that many people’s policy is:

“If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all”

I agree with his assessment and know that to be the case, but it’s way off in my estimation. What a bunch of babied, insecure in the gospel, little musicians we are if we have a policy of, “hey if you don’t like every single aspect of my music and aren’t prepared to just rave over it all, then don’t say anything“.

I’d like to point out an example of a honest review I did of a Sovereign Grace Christmas cd. I was worried how it would be received, but I thought it would be a disservice to Bob Kauflin if I didn’t review it honestly. I tried to give encouragement on what I thought was done well and honest, specific critique where I thought it was not done well. I was probably insensitive on some points and could have phrased things better. But even with that, Bob responded incredibly well, responded with grace. I don’t think Bob started questioning his value to the kingdom or thought I should live in eternal damnation. Bob correct me if I’m wrong

Do you feel like you’re sinning against God or injuring your brother if you critique their music/gifting? Are you afraid to do so? Do you think that’s healthy? Am I an insensitive jerk?

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Filed Under (leadership, review) by Kyle

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May 14 2009

Propellerhead “Record” Review: Reason + audio

Tagged Under : gear, Propellerhead, Reason, recording, review

Record is Propellerhead’s latest software release that finally addresses the much requested feature of audio recording inside of Reason. But instead of adding it to Reason they created a new product. The price sounds right at $299 for all the features they’ve thrown in. Create Digital Music has a wonderful in depth review of Record and this video below gives a nice intro to the product as well. You can sign up for beta testing at www.record-you.com

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Filed Under (gear, recording, review) by Kyle

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March 31 2009

Album Review: The Rep “Say No More”

Tagged Under : album, Brandon Kagel, hip hop, rap, review, The Rep

therep Fresh out of the Valley of the Sun, comes Brandon Kagel a.k.a. “The Rep” with his sophomore project- Say No More courtesy of Blood Marked Entertainment. This album is a definite banger with beats by Mustafas Beats and guest appearances by lyrical monster Lee Green as well as vocals by Suzie K and L Sol. This masterpiece contains incredible diversity, tracks that will make you bang ya head till ya neck hurts on tracks like Say No Names, as well as melodious heart hitting tearjerkers on Dear baby which is a letter to his son, and Unborn Child which is a rhyme from the inside of the womb of a pregnant woman.

The Rep is definitely a Phoenix Son and his music reflects the essence of the inner city and cries out for the redemption of our blackout generation. “He was age 5 when the movie Goonies came out, and put 5 on a doobie when the Looniz came out..” If you can relate to that, then this album is definitely for you.

I definitely admire and respect the boldness that is brought forth on this album with straight up no BS truth about struggles that our generation faces today. With hard knock punchlines and similes that you don’t catch until 8 bars later. The Rep is a BEAST on this one and it is a must. Go pick this one up, you can thank me later.

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Filed Under (music, review) by Brett

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March 25 2009

Review: ‘Tempo’ iPhone App – portable click track

Tagged Under : click, iphone, iTunes, software, tips

I recently downloaded the Tempo iPhone App for $0.99. It has quite a few features for a little 99 cent app. When you first launch the app you see this screen:

Tempo iPhon App home screen

First impression is not that pretty of a UI. Color scheme isn’t my favorite, not soft on the eyes. But they do present you with all the basic functionality you’d expect out of a click generator. You can set your time signature, beat type, volume controls and setting the tempo either through tapping or explicitly setting the BPM. The tapping feature seems a little sensitive, but after a while you can get the tempo average to mellow out and give you a decently accurate setting.

The only other screen available is the settings screen:

Tempo iPhone App settings

The Animate Meter Change is kind of a worthless setting. Just turns off a very brief animation when switching time signatures. Play mode is pretty cool. Overlay mode allows you to play a song from your iTunes library and run the App on top of it. So you can tap out a time to a song in your library. That’s pretty darn handy. Sound set just changes the audio that’s played for the click. Digital is the best sound they have I think. The bummer with the drum kit sound set is they don’t offset high-hat and snare based on the time sig. Both high hat and snare just play together on every beat. That’s not really what you want when using a drum kit click track. Tuner feature is kind of nice, just plays the note tone. Maybe in a pinch it could be handy. Would be much better if it read tones from the mic of course.

The biggest annoyance with the app is stability. You can make it crash every time if you start the click track, then navigate into settings and change some setting. So they have some work to do on bugs. Practically I think the best uses I see for it now is tapping out tempos in your library and having a portable click track for rehearsals and laying down scratch ideas. Here’s the final score based on a 5 point score, 5 being the best and 1 being the worst.

Appearance: 3

Features: 4

Usability: 4

Price: 4

Stability: 2

Overall: 3.4 / 5

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Filed Under (review, tips) by Kyle

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March 06 2009

Review: Ryan Delmore “The Spirit, the Water and the Blood”

Tagged Under : music, review, Ryan Delmore, Vineyard, worship

This album has been out for a few months and I’m glad I’ve waited to review until I was really able to dig into it. I’ve known about Ryan for many years, we were both leading worship in the Vineyard in our youth, Ryan was about an hour north of me in the 5 Cities area on the coast of California. We shared many of the same friends but our paths never crossed until recently when I sat down to interview him upon the release of this album.

His music, voice, songwriting has all matured so much from The Burn days. I can’t tell you how blown away I am by this album. Songs like Jesus Name, Sing Like Mary Sang and The World Can’t Take It Away immediately grab you, you don’t need any more listens than 1 to love. Then songs like Sacred, True Religion and Love of God grow in your heart on each listen, the depth to these songs deserves and calls for repeated listens.

Ryan has all the sensibility of Tom Waits and Petty with the grit and country hooks of Ryan Adams. The absolute worst thing about much of the Christian contemporary music is the cheap, cheesy melody hooks. You won’t find any of those here. The richness and sincerity of these songs and production can’t help but make you feel like you just wandered into a basement worship session to hear Ryan’s love songs to Jesus.

If you’re wondering how many of these could be done in church, I pretty much plan on doing every one of them, I’ve never said or done that with any other album. This truly is one of the greatest worship albums I’ve heard. Period. If you don’t like alt-country-folk-rock and are looking for another Hillsong album, well move along, but if you love some twang and soul then by all means this is the album for you. You can and should buy the entire album at Vineyard Music or on iTunes.

If you want to hear Ryan in the flesh, he’s playing with my band at Anthropology Men’s Conference at Life Connection Church this weekend, starting tonight. Get there!

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Filed Under (music, review, worship) by Kyle

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January 06 2009

Listen, download, comment and now RATE loops

Tagged Under : blog, loops, rate, worship

The loops area of this site keeps on growing. I’ve seen a lot of interest from more and more worship leaders, so in an effort to bring more organization and to keep it fresh I’ve added a rating feature. So if you would be so kind as to browse the current catalogue of loops (note there are 2 pages worth) and rate the loops with your honest opinion. I have no guidelines as to your criteria for rating, just look it up in your gut (and ears). Your rating is completely anonymous, so if you think the loop sucks I won’t chase you down, rate with confidence. You can see what it looks like below and no you don’t have to rate 5 out of 5, this is just an example

Once a good number of rating come through I’ll add a widget to the sidebar that shows the Top 5 user rated loops so visitors can quickly see what’s hot, excuse me, hawt…and what’s not. Thank you for your feedback and if you contact me and let me know you rated every loop maybe I’ll give you a prize, like a nice e-card or something.

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Filed Under (review, site) by Kyle

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October 23 2008

FanBand sells your digital music directly to fans…poorly

Tagged Under : band, fanband, live, software, zoho

Fanband aims to allow bands to sell digital copies of their music directly to fans at gigs. Fans enter their email address and myspace user name, select the songs they ‘d like to purchase, pay and the songs are sent to their email address. An additional benefit for the band is now they have collected an email address and myspace account to build their fan base with. No internet access or credit card terminal is required. I see that as a benefit in some situations but it would be much better if it was able to work with card terminals so you could accept credit cards as well as cash.

I think this is a great idea but unfortunately it looks like a bit of a hack. First off it only works on Windows and the design, at least aesthetically, is pretty poor. It looks like a crappy modified Myspace page quite honestly. So while I think it’s a good idea and something a lot of bands would find useful, including mine, it needs a lot of work. The fact that they are charging $39.00 for this is laughable. Spend 5 minutes and you can capture an email database with someone’s desired songs in Zoho and distribute the songs yourself for free.

Anyone used this and disagree?