Records

Music Reviews - The Iraq Issue

ALBUM REVIEWS BY OUR FRIENDS IN IRAQ

OUR RATING SYSTEM:
	Great. Buy it.		Fuck this shit. Don’t buy it.

J DILLA

Ruff Draft
Stones Throw

This is rap, so it might be all about murder and being poor in the black ghetto, but honestly these rhythms make me really happy. On the scale of climbing up a tree in a forest really fast, jumping up and down constantly, and flying, I put these beats at a solid jumping up and down constantly. Still not sure what the words are though.

HAYDER DAFFAR

BEST ALBUM OF THE MONTH

JUKEBOX BUDDHA

WORST ALBUM OF THE MONTH

TYPE O NEGATIVE

BEST COVER OF THE MONTH

OMAR SOULEYMAN

WORST COVER OF THE MONTH

A DATE WITH JOHN WATERS

RJD2
The Third Hand XL Recordings WTF? I’m not sure what to make of this album, and RJD2 himself apparently suffers from the same terrible predicament. Pop tunes, rock-ish melodies, the expected hip-hop, even some really retro synth sounds. Oh, and did i mention RJD2 sings throughout this one? Dude, stick to what you know best. And get some singing lessons. RJD2, FOR SHAME! OMAR FADHIL

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Stones Throw: Ten Years Stones Throw I like this compilation. There’s one track that’s really good with this conversation between a man and a woman. It’s like universal things, they’re using words that anybody can figure out. Good times. HAYDER DAFFAR

RZA
Afro Samurai Koch I don’t usually like hip-hop, I haven’t listened to previous albums by the RZA or the Tang Clan so I don’t have a really good basis of comparison but I’m loving this one. The music’s very rich and the lyrics have purpose. It’s just that the purpose is communicating to you a story about black samurais or some such. FARIS ATTIA

THE PACK
Skateboards 2 Scrapers Jive This is good rap. I like when kids use crazy words like “crunk” and “out the do’ .” HAYDER’S LADY

SEAN PRICE
Jesus Price Superstar Duck Down I like this. It is so sexy. It is so GOOD when you fuck your gal and you have this. GAYDAR HEFFAR

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Hyphy Hitz TVT Oh man, I like all these songs. It’s true “I’m fuuuuuucked” music, you know? Made for bugging out for poor people on the streets. I think it’s the fact that black people, they have a really special mood for listening. They always sing their songs with feeling. And dancing. This isn’t even really my style, but I like it. RAFFAD REDYAH

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Chrome Children Stones Throw I’m hard on all the raps, but this one I think is really special. It’s a bunch of different folks, but this one woman when she comes in and is screaming… I’m already crazy tonight, but this made me really go mad. HAYDER DAFFAR


UNSANE
Visqueen Ipecac I don’t know whether they did this on purpose or not, but the sound quality of a couple songs is very poor even though I’m using a Harman/Kardon stereo! I’d say there are a few songs that I’d listen to when I’m drunk and driving at 100 mph, and I can’t deny there is some good guitar playing. Still, all in all, this album isn’t worth it. OMAR FADHIL

DAS OATH
Mini LP Dim Mak This band is frustrated, listening to them makes me even more frustrated. Ever heard that some music can promote the health of plants and that other kinds of music have the opposite effect? All I’ve got to say to these guys and their fans is enjoy your houses full of dead ferns. FARIS ATTIA

OTEP
Ascension Capitol My humble advice for these men is to stop—chill out for a bit with everyone yelling different things at the same time and stop making this crap. If I wanted to listen to chaos I would have just stuck around in Baghdad, you know? There’s no reason they couldn’t all take turns yelling crap. Or even just have one guy yelling crap—now there’s a thought. HAYDER DAFFAR

ALABAMA THUNDER-PUSSY

Open Fire
Relapse

This kind of metal makes a very good mood for parties, for people dancing. I’m not much of a dancer, but I can dance with waving or with my feet. For example, I can make one dance and then bang you—while dancing. As an added bonus, a lot of the songs have two intervals: One for dancing, and one for relaxing and thinking—thinking about all the dancing and banging of days and songs gone by.

HAYDER DAFFER

BIG BUSINESS

Here Come the Waterworks
Hydrahead

Big Business, Aural Attack! This is every bit as powerful and sludgy as their first album, if just a little more refined—that is if you dare call this kind of dirty, dirty sound refined. Dare you?! The only way to appreciate this album is with the volume cranked all the way up, and then some. If you are a fan of Big Business, REJOICE! If you’re not, this will make you one, and then: REJOICE!

ABDULLAH D

LORDI
The Arokalypse Sony I don’t know what was going on with the first part—it’s fucking weird, just like a conversation between two guys, but then when the music comes in, I feel like I’m sitting in a helicopter and have military orders to hit someone, like a battlefield. LordiiiiIIIIIIII!!! HAYDER DAFFAR

LESBIAN
Power Hor Holy Mountain Boring, extremely boring. They could reduce each piece to 1/4 the length and no one would sense a difference. If you want to convince people to listen to tracks that are a half-hour long each, give them something they can actually chew on. OMAR FADHIL

STRIBORG

Nefaria/A Tragic Journey toward the Light
Displeased

If you’re tired of excessively complex black metal records that pack 50 riffs per minute, you might find a subtle refreshment in the unchanging mud that you have to swim through here. That said, this is not a music album, it’s more like an experiment of annoying as many people as possible—vocals, guitars and keyboards are all submerged way deep inside a lake of frozen fuzz. Occasional riffs try to take place inside, but they’re mere bubbles on the surface of this cauldron of unabashed filth. If this was a Radiohead album, you could probably create a cult dedicated to basing theories about, say, what that sound at 4:37 meant.

IRAQI KONFUSED KID

THE FALL

Reformation: Post TLC
Narnack

Ach, I was looking forward to this because it starts out with this sort of wicked-sounding devil laugh, but then immediately after it’s just like, boredom. Like being hit with the culmination of all boredom at once. It would not surprise me to learn that the Fall made this music with the specific purpose of boring the fucking shit out of me and that its working title was Let’s Rob Nasser of His Will to Live, Vol. 1.

NASSER AL-HAROUN

FU MANCHU

We Must Obey
Century Media

A very good offering from Fu Manchu. Not their absolute best, but damn near close. you’ll find solid thumping rhythms, tight drum patterns, and blistering leads throughout the tracks, which are consistent and well written. Thing is, at times it sounds too raw for its own good. the production values on this thing should have been a little bit higher, I tell you, these guys could easily decimate all if they just cleaned up their act a little. And I mean ALL. Let’s get it together Fu boys!

ABDULLAH D

TYPE O NEGATIVE

Dead Again
Steamhammer

What the fuck!? This style is like battlefield sounds: Soldiers and guns, pumpumpumpumpumpumpum. I’m a fucking Iraqi, I don’t want to sit around listening to bombings and shootings. If I did, I would turn the stereo off. For nine years I have heard nothing but people shooting each other. You might think I can only speak for myself, but I just put this on for company I have over and my two Iraqi friends both agree. My Syrian friend on the other hand, just said, “I’m not understand.”

HAYDER DAFFAR

TRAP THEM
Sleepwell Deconstructor Sound and Culture I expect this band has to be in a good mood to make this kind of music. Listening to it, it’s only about myself… or maybe yourself, you know? Sometimes you are relaxed and sometimes you are angry. This band is good for angry. If you are angry, please hear this band. DARFUR HATER

!!!

Myth Takes
Warp

If they’re trying to say something to other people, it’s Mission Failed: Game Over. I’m not talking about language, I’m talking about feelings. The guys in this band could stay up thinking until morning of things to say, but it still wouldn’t make any sense to other people. Do you know that song “California Hotel” by the Eagles? It’s so famous. Those guys are just singing about some fucking hotel and still, it made a connection with people.

HAYDER DAFFAR


ALBERT HAMMOND JR.
Yours to Keep I have nothing to say about this. I’m not sure if I even like it or not. I asked myself when I was listening, “What’s happening? Do you like this or not?” and I responded, “I’m sorry, I really don’t know. Will you just chill out and give me a second? Seriously, I’m trying to figure it out.” If I had some radio here I feel like I could just make the sounds up on my own, but I don’t know what to think of it coming from someone else. GAYDAR LAFFE

IDLEWILD
Make Another World Sanctuary It’s the kind of stuff that grows on you from the first time. I already rank some tracks among my favorites. You know, spring is just about to arrive here in Baghdad and the smooth energy of this music perfectly fits my definition of “spring melody.” OMAR FADHIL

AMNESTY
Free Your Mind Now-Again I like this. It sounds like some sort of forgotten R&B from the 1970s. It’s really smooth and sad, and all Iraqis love sad music. Maybe not all—but me at least, I really like sad music. I think that’s reality for feelings, you know? Not fake, like forever smiling. Anyways, I feel this, that is what I’m telling you. HAYDER DAFFAR

THE VIEW
Hats Off to the Buskers 1965 Ugh, shit on this. What is going on with this guy’s voice? “Eeeeeoooeeeeeooo.” It sometimes sounds like I’m listening to a woman, but then keeps going back. This kind of sex-change crap might appeal to you immoral ’ulooj, but this doesn’t make touch with my feelings any more than I’d want his dick to make touch with my asshole. HAYDER DAFFAR

CALVIN JOHNSON & THE SONS OF THE SOIL
s/t K If you ride in a car, you need this kind of music. I feel like I could sit in a car for a long way, but the trip would not be a boring trip. Some time ago me and my friend were driving from New York to Austin, Texas, and we had a lot of music like this. Three days of only driving, though if I had these guys, maybe we could have made it in two? He’s got a cool voice. HAYDER DAFFAR

BEAR COLONY
s/t Esperanza Plantation These are some sweet tunes. I could easily see myself with a nice woman, walking between the trees around some kind of forest or something. Good feelings—therefore I like it. HAYDER DAFFAR

TED LEO & THE PHARMACISTS

Living With the Living
Touch and Go

This music’s really hard to deal with. I mean, it’s so heavy above my soul to hear this music and try to sort out what its whole meaning is. I’m sure it is supposed to mean something to different people, but to me it’s like, I can’t use it to imagine something or go somewhere else in my mind. It creates nothing new for me. I can’t say I really like it or dislike it… just… I don’t know, fuck off.

HAYDERADE

LOVE OF DIAGRAMS
Love of Diagrams EP Unstable Ape I don’t know what to make of this shit. It’s weird and there’s a girl singing. Ummm, yeah, so no comment I guess. HEY DERE, FARAHKCHI

AIR

Pocket Symphony
Astralwerks

I’m sorry, the package with the CDs finally got here yesterday morning, but I did not get the pick-up call from FedEx until afternoon curfew had started and today there was shooting on a street close to mine so I haven't been able to leave the house. I’ll try again tomorrow, but maybe you could just describe the music to me and I could guess how it would make me feel?

GHAZI STRIPS


COCOROSIE
The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn Touch and Go What the hell? Cradle songs is the last music I want to listen to. I dabble in soft stuff from time to time but I literally fell asleep by the second track with this one! There should be some sort of warning about playing this on your car stereo on the front, or at least an advertisement for insomniacs. OMAR FADHIL

OMAR SOULEYMAN

Highway To Hassake: Folk and Pop Sounds of Syria
Sublime Frequencies

This is the kind of album people would play on a raucous desert trip, blasting across the sands. Arabic music in general is an acquired taste because of its use of quarter-tones, those weird bendy-sounding notes that instantly set Western teeth on edge. If you’ve been itching to know what kind of tunes Arab kids jam out to when they make party, this will do it for you, but don’t think for a second it’s going to bend to your Western ear.

FARIS ATTIA

PANDA BEAR
Person Pitch Paw Tracks The singing-from-the-other-end-of-the-toilet-drain voice effect is fun to hear on one track of an album, but when the whole album uses it you start thinking of what’s at the other end of the toilet drain. Sounds like a Beach Boys/Beatles experimental gone wrong. FARIS ATTIA

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Jukebox Buddha Staubgold Finding inner peace can sometimes be a little hard in the middle of persistent machine-gun fire and mortars, but this guy definitely helps. Jukebox Buddha is a great compilation album with which to unwind or play gently in the background during a “session.” I don’t know if it helps or hurts that I have no idea who any of these guys are. FARIS ATTIA

VARIOUS ARTISTS

A Date With John Waters
New Line

Apparently this is a bunch of old, weird songs that John Waters, the famous filmmaker and gay, would play for you on a date to get you in the mood for some good old-fashioned man-loving. That’s all well and good if it’s what you’re into (although it would get your throat slit around my area), but I’m a little confused/worried about why “Johnny, Are You Queer” comes so late in the mix. Wouldn’t he want to clear that up right off the bat?

SADDAMITE

AIDS WOLF VS. ATHLETIC AUTOMATION
Clash of the Life-Force Warriors Skingraft OK, this stuff doesn’t even make sense. Do you want to hear some music? Here: [plays first two verses of Afroman’s “Because I Got High”]. You see? The nice drums, the bass? That’s what you should be sending us. That’s what we are wanting to hear. HAYDER DAFFAR