Piano Man - Billy Joel

Music That Can't be Beat

Good ol' Billy Joel, a man who makes music about anything sound amazing. Going over this song reminds me how much I miss musicians who create music, not just produce it, there is a big difference and Billy Joel's music still surpasses the quality of many musician's today.

"Piano Man" is a powerful song to say the least. From the opening piano to the "la-la-de da" chorus, this song is genius all the way through. Let's break it down like normal. The piano, is amazing, creative and entertaining every moment of the song. I could talk about every transition, solo and chord, but it is safe to say this piano is nothing short of perfection in music. The harmonica accompanying the piano through the song is also so wonderfully done, it is hard not to want to go out and buy one to just learn the part from this song. The song is so full of life, the slower more solemn parts are emotionally engaging and the louder sections are easy goosebump givers. 

Joel's voice is fantastic. His lyrics are perfect. They tell a story, just about any person can sing along and they are complex enough on various layers of meaning and sing-ability that the song never gets boring to listen over and over again. Adding a lot of other instruments in the background during the more boisterous moments really fill the song at the right moments.

Easily one of the best songs ever written, and we'll keep listening to it for generations to come.

Originality: 10

Instruments: 10

Vocals: 10

Longevity: 10

Red Score: 10

Evolve (Album) - Imagine Dragons

A Step Forward and Backward

Ooooh Imagine Dragons, how you confuse me. What you could be if only you did what you should. A new Imagine Dragons album is like seeing mystery meat, it probably won't kill you, but don't expect much. I wanted to be able to like Evolve, I enjoyed their first album, but their second was pretty bad and this album is both good and bad in many ways which leaves it mediocre in the end.

Most songs on this album sound just like classic Imagine Dragons, the voice and instruments are totally recognizable. This is good because the style is unique and iconic for them, but it also becomes a little lazy because only in a few songs do they take style risks and challenge themselves. The album in general is better than Smoke and Mirrors, which is progress, and yet, it still lack the creativity and risk to live up or surpass to their first album, Night Visions. 

In their last song "Dancing in the Dark" and "Thunder" were both a little more experimental, I was happy to see some change to their normal sound, however it is pretty similar to most modern alternative and indie music. I want to be able to enjoy their electo-infused rock, but I want more from them, more intensity, more risks and elements to make a real new album. We'll see in a few years, as for now, we have a few "alright" songs from them that get lost in the garble of the rest of their album.

 (a new way to review albums for Red Media Reviews)

I Don't Know Why: 5 ---- Whatever It Takes: 4

Believer: 7 --- Walking the Wire: 5

Rise Up: 6 --- I'll Make It Up to You: 4

Yesterday: 5 --- Mouth of the River: 5

Thunder: 6 --- Start Over: 5

Dancing It the Dark: 6

Track Average: 5.3

Originality: 6

Longevity: 5

Flow: 6

Red Score: 5.6

  

Dig Down - Muse

Getting a New and Familiar Grove

Muse is my favorite band, always has been and will be. Every new album and song so far has made me enjoy them in new ways. "Dig Down" is their newest single leading up to an album down the road. A fun and powerful anthem song that is what I've been wanting all year.

The song starts with the same style bass from the song "Madness" from two albums ago, The 2nd Law. The electronic bass that plays like a synth pad is strong and infectious, and a welcome sound with the EDM influences in most modern music. "Dig Down" is a simple song, not too many different instruments, and even the music is not all that complicated. The drums, the guitar and bass for the most part play the same notes again and again throughout. Eben though this is normally annoying in song, Muse again just makes music that I can't help but enjoy.

Matthew's singing is great as always, the lyrics are a little cheesy to honest, but that would be my only real criticism of the song. I am super cised for the new album in the coming months and am happy to see Muse back in my new music section. 

Originality: 7

Instruments: 8

Vocals: 7

Longevity: 8

Red Score: 7.5

Hungry Like The Wolf - Duran Duran

The Good Hunt

Classic pop and 80s music is something that you can't help but love as soon as they come on Spotify, the radio or your personal playlists. Duran Duran's "Hungry Like The Wolf" is no different, an infectious song that just about everyone loves.

What makes this song really amazing is the combination of excessive 80s sound and instruments. Starting with a laugh and guitar, drums, bass and synth sounds in the background, this song punches with a strong beginning and keeps going for the entire 3 and a half minutes. The guitar riff that continues through verse and changes in chorus to chords is something everyone never gets tired of hearing. The bass is a lot more bouncy and powerful than I remember, which is always a plus to hear. Drums help power the guitar and the pop synth sounds are wonderfully 80s every second of the way.

With all that goodness, possibly the most memorable part of the song is the lyrics that everyone sings along for a few words in the chorus and mumbles nonsense throughout the rest. "I'm on the hunt I'm after you...and I'm hungry like the wolf," are totally unforgettable words, but I can't imagine anyone else really knowing the other lyrics, but that doesn't make the song and vocal work any less totally entertaining.

A seriously fun song that reminds me how much I love 80's music and how much those song are timeless.

Originality: 8

Instruments: 8

Vocals: 8
Instruments: 10

Red Score: 8.5

The Man - The Killers

One That Needs Multiple Listens

The Killers are back! YAY! I know they came out with a song last year, but I wasn't much of a fan of it. This song, however, is a refreshing energy that is much needed to bring back The Killers. Day and Age was fantastic, Battle Born was okay, and last years song was meh, but "The Man" is great.

So the title needs a little explaining. The song wasn't that great the first time I listened to it, parts were really good but the pauses and cuts in the song threw me off a lot. It honestly sounded like the song skipped or just end in the middle of a chorus. After listening a few times, I saw the good in the songs somewhat sudden stops and cuts. ANYWAYS! The rest of the song.

The upbeat electronic ambiance mixed with continuous guitar mixed with the fun and funky bass is really entertaining to the ears. The drums are solid, but a little less creative than what we are used to from the Killers. Honestly though, the electronic samples, the bass line and guitar are so good that the drums can be mediocre with no qualms. Brandon Flowers is great here, a lot of fun like usual, easy to sing to, but not annoying. I would recommend listening to this multiple times if you didn't like it the first time, it does take some getting used to, lyrically and the general sound/organization.   

The album Wonderful Wonderful was announced to come out this year, but this is the only single so far released this year for it. I am super excited for it. New Killers, Gorillaz and Muse album this year? 2017 might be the best year in music this decade.

Originality: 7

Instruments: 7

Vocals: 7

Longevity: 7

Red Score: 7

Lone Digger - Caravan Palace

Fantastically Entertaining and Addicting

First of all, don't look up the official video, it is very not "PG." But now, straight into the review. Caravan Palace falls into this fairly interesting sound using a number of differing techniques modern and classic. This combinations of swing and jazz raw instruments like saxophone, violin and trombones mixed with electronic samples and a more modern beat is called Electro Swing.

This isn't super new stuff though, it has been around since as early as the 1990's. I found this song a few months ago while listening to Miike Snow, and now this genre is open to me and I'm having a lot of fun with it. "Long Digger" caught my attention for a number of reasons, I was just blown away with the combination of styles and sounds. From the amazing pace that you can really only find in swing music to the EDM sound of voice changing and looping, I am still surprised every time listening to it how the combination works together.

The live instruments (which are played live), saxophone, violin and trombone, are extremely well preformed. The style is very jazz and swing authentic and well written. Not to criticize, but the drums are totally electronic, played on a drum pad in live concerts. This is not as much as a bad thing, it is amazing to see how we have come as a musical generation and we can see how well mixing genres can be. The singing and back up vocals sound great (but the live performances do show that this is a heavily "in house" produced song).

All in all, I hope you guys can enjoy this genre breaking song and dance along with it because it is almost impossible to not let the beat get to you.

Originality: 8

Instruments: 9

Vocals: 7

Longevity: 7

Red Music: 7.75

I've Got A Woman - Ray Charles

A Tune Worth Reworking Over and Over

Do you guys ever find yourselves rabbit holing into the internet finding all sorts of crazy information about one specific thing? While I was researching this song, I learned a lot, so let me give you a quick history lesson. From gospel tunes to Kanye West, this song has made quite the journey.

In 1954, "It Must Be Jesus" was a gospel song by the band The Southern Tones, a popular tune that everyone loved. Ray Charles and a few others re-worked it to be more upbeat song and sound about a woman. Elvis covered it and changed it up a little. The Beatles then covered Elvis' version years later. Jumping to the 21st century, Jamie Foxx was in a biographical movie called Ray and covered a number of Charles' other songs too in the film. Lastly, in this journey of the song, Kanye West took the song ans switched up the words a little with Jamie Foxx to create the popular song, "Gold Digger." 

Crazy right?! I love finding how music evolves, anyways, back to the review of Charles' version of "I've Got A Woman." This song is amazing for a few reasons, but the main reason is the man himself, Ray. Ray's voice is undeniably wonderful, rich and powerful. His control over his voice, authenticity and sincerity can be heard in in every word of the song, it is really what makes his version so perfect. The music in the background and saxophone solo is good and keep the fast tempo refreshing, but it does fall in the background as Ray sings, which isn't a terrible thing.

With all this said, I'm glad to have stumbled onto this song recently, and it is now an eternal part of my music collection.

Originality: 9

Instruments: 7

Vocals: 10

Longevity: 9

Red Score: 8.75

Wolves (Album) - Rise Against

A Formula That Works

Rise Against has been one of my favorite bands for years, their first albums shaped my teenage angst and I have many stories of intense energy involving their music. However, lately I've found their music to be less impressive and just more of the same songs over and over again.

This isn't so bad though, it is nice to here the same power throughout their newest album as previous years. This is the double edged sword that most bands have to face, do they stay the same, producing good music that follows the same sound and design? Or do they change things up? Rise Against chose to keep things the same, the guitar, bass, drums and vocals are all good for sure, although it is basically what we have heard before (except the last song).

Rise Against's Wolves is a good album, every time I listen to it, I am enjoying it more and more. Song like "House on Fire," "Politics of Love," and "Miracle" stand out as my favorites so far on the album. "The Violence" and "Welcome to The Breakdown" are also great, but the rest of the album more or less fades into the largely similar library of Rise Against music.

My verdict for Wolves would be as follows, it's good, but not nearly as good as their other albums. Pick it up if you want some new lyrics to learn and love this genre with an undying passion, otherwise just check out their earlier albums The Sufferer and The Witness, Appeal To Reason or The Black Market. 

Originality: 6

Instruments: 7

Vocals: 8

Longevity: 5

Red Score: 6.5

Run - Foo Fighters

GUEST REVIEW

Hey my RMR family, instead of one of my favorites for this Friday, my friend Tommy Williams from Poor Man Pedals is here to review the newest Foo Fighters song. Let me know what you think and check out his awesome channel here, he does great reviews of pedals that sound amazing without breaking the bank. Without further delay, here is the review!

A Great Run

The Foos are back! Foo Fighters have been my favorite band for several years now, so it is always exciting to see new music come from them. What made this one a real treat is the surprise factor. No one knew (or at least I didn’t see any hints) that they were going to drop a new track and they’ve been on hiatus since November 2015. Anyways, let’s get to the song!

When I first started playing the song I noticed it was very melodic, pretty and soft. I was ready to be disappointed by them just as other bands I enjoy have let me down with their latest releases. Then the song started to grow and become more anthemic. I became more interested and my hopes began to rise. Finally, the heavy guitars came in, this is the Foo Fighters I was expecting. Not to say anthems and soft songs are bad, nor to say the Foo Fighters can’t do them (they totally can); I just always expect the first single off a record (hopefully there’s a whole record coming to follow this) to feature the core sound of the band. This song has it all, melodic intro, heavy riffs, screaming vocals, calmer breakdowns. It is very much a Foo Fighters song and that is great. Also, the music video is hilarious to watch!

The intro has a nice shimmer to it that makes me believe there’s a bit of chorus involved. If you like that sound, check out the FAB Chorus pedal from Danelectro. When the heavy parts hit, I’m pretty sure a heavy distortion pedal kicks in on top of overdriven amps. The Boss DS-1 may get you close if you have your settings right. If you need some overdrive under the distortion, consider the Behringer OD400 or Joyo Ultimate Drive.

Originality: 8

Instruments: 9

Vocals: 9

Longevity: 8

Overall: 8.5

Ra Ra Rasputin - Boney M.

Historical Groove

What an odd subject matter, seriously, I don't know exactly why Boney M. decided to write a song about Grigori Rasputin, however, this song is amazing so why not write it about him?

This song is so good in so many ways, it is hard not to write essays about it. The first thing to address is the wonderfully infectious beat, no being with a soul could resist dancing to this song, especially as it enters its second half. The mixtures of claps and rolling drums that coordinates masterfully with the specifically Russian sounding balalaika create something truly inspired by the rhythm driven music of Mother Russia. Also that seriously funky bass line is hidden but totally wonderful.

The next thing to focus on is the call and response between the vocals, taking turns in verse and chorus while harmonizing wonderfully makes this song be better and better every moment.

Lastly, for this blog post, the sheer tenacity to write a disco in the 70's about a Russian man from the 1800's is mind boggling. I have no idea who came up with this and why, but I sure am glad they did because from Just Dance to throw back dance night, this song is always a beloved entry.

Originality: 9

Instruments: 9

Vocals: 8

Longevity: 10

Red Score: 9

hopeless fountain kingdom (Deluxe) - Halsey

The Child Of Modern Pop Culture Music

Reviews are back in full force! Let us get started with the now nationally recognized artist, Halsey. If you still don't know who this is, she is the one featured in the ridiculously overplayed "Closer" by The Chainsmokers.

Now let's look at her new album hopeless fountain kingdom (Deluxe). In reality? It isn't horrible, it is just totally uninspired, it sounds exactly like every other generic pop song possible created by lazy producers and singers from the last two years. I know I'll get a lot of hate because everyone on Youtube loves it apparently, but I'm sticking by my guns. However, there are songs like "Alone" and "Devil In Me" which step a little bit out of mediocrity and are actually alright, but the rest of the album is just a blur.

To start on the specifics, her vocals are almost identical throughout the album. The music that accompanies her vocals do just that, accompany her. For most songs, there are fairly similar sound percussion, synths and other random noises which end up being only somewhat interesting background noise. 

Another notable thing is that Halsey's tone and tempo are almost impossible to differ from song to song. If you were to play the album in the background of a party, I'm sure some people will ask if the music is on repeat because of how repetitive it is from start to finish. The music isn't horrible or annoying, it is just dull and goes nowhere, the album is 16 tracks long for some reason, it could have been only four tracks and had the exact same deliverable altogether.

So my recommendations are to genuinely listen to the tracks "Alone" and "Devil In Me" and then go to her previous album BADLANDS which is far more interesting.

Originality: 3

Instruments: 5

Vocals: 3

Longevity: 4

Red Score: 3.7