Album: Moving Mountains - Waves

Band: Moving Mountains
Album: Waves
Label: Triple Crown Records
Year: 2011







Tracklist
01. My Life Is Like a Chase Dream (And I'm Still Having Chase Dreams)
02. Where Two Bodies Lie
03. Tired Tiger
04. The Cascade
05. Once Rendering
06. Always Only For Me
07. Alleviate
08. Parts In Different Places
09. Furnace Woods
10. Full Circle
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Moving Mountains is a New York-based indie rock band. Combining emotional vocals with elements of post-rock and emo, the band has often been compared to The Appleseed Cast.

The band was formed in Westchester, New York in 2005 by Gregory Dunn (guitar/vocals) and Nicholas Pizzolato (drums). A self-titled demo EP was leaked to the public in early 2006 and their debut album Pneuma was released independently in early 2007. Later that year, Frank Graniero (guitar/vocals) and Mitchell Lee (bass) completed the band’s line-up. In 2008, Pneuma was reissued by Deep Elm.

Moving Mountains self released the EP “Foreword” in Fall 2008.

“Waves”, the band’s second full length album, is due out May 10th, 2011.

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Album: The Matador - Descent Into The Maelstrom

Band: The Matador
Album: Descent Into The Maelstrom
Label: Self Released
Year: 2011






Tracklist
01. Kingdom Of Glass
02. Parallax Error
03. Eclipse
04. The Woman Clothed In The Sun With The Moon Under Her Feet
05. Vurt
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The Matador have recently independently released our Debut EP 'Descent Into The Maelstrom', which they launched with USA's finest noisecore titans, The Chariot, on Thursday April 21 in Brisbane.

The Matador are a 5 piece progressive post-metal outfit from South East Queensland, Australia. They cast themselves apart from the mainstream of Australian heavy music by creating a sound that ranges from down-tempo, complex ambient arrangements to epic, driving walls of earth-crushingly slabs of sludge. With influences ranging from Cult Of Luna, Isis, Thrice and Deftones to Radiohead, Interpol and The National, The Matador have consciously avoided the cliché of breakdowns, blast beats and death growls that currently saturate the heavy music scene.

Recorded between May - December 2010, Descent Into The Maelstrom is inspired by Edgar Allen Poe in both concept and content, aiming to take the listener to the same dark depths that the influential poet transports his readers to. The EP was released worldwide on April 21, and with this release and plans to tour Australia to promote it, The Matador are aiming to bring something fresh and exciting to the heavy music scene in 2011.

As a live act The Matador are building a strong reputation as a force to be reckoned with, with comments such as:
‘The band utilizes experimental melodic sections which help create a landscape of atmosphere, and serve as progression to a later chaotic climax of sounds…’ - newnoize.blogspot.com
‘Their sound reveals many harmonic layers buried within the post-metal exterior. It’s bleak yet hypnotic, desolate yet enchanting’ - Timeoff Street Press

They are already planning our next recording/release for later in the year with some big ideas in regards to merch tie-ins and promo materials.

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Album: Gates - The Sun Will Rise And Lead Me Home EP

Band: Gates
Album: The Sun Will Rise And Lead Me Home EP
Label: Self Released
Year: 2011







Tracklist
01. A Vague Ambition
02. Walls
03. Burned Us Alive
04. In The Morning
05. At The End Of All Things
06. Sleepwalker
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Gates is an ambient/indie rock band from New Brunswick, New Jersey. The band includes former members of Lydia and Bears & Bright Lights. Their debut EP, The Sun Will Rise and Lead Me Home, was released on January 25th, 2011. For fans of Moving Mountains!

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Album: Dirge - Elysian Magnetic Fields

Band: Dirge
Album: Elysian Magnetic Fields
Label: Blight Records/Division Records
Year: 2011







Tracklist
01. Morphée Rouge
02. Obsidian
03. Cocoon
04. Sandstorm
05. Elysian Magnetic Fields
06. Narconaut
07. Falling
08. Apogee
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Dirge was born in Paris, France in 1994. The original core was formed by Marc T. (guitar, programming) and by ex-Damage Done, Laurent P. (voice, programming). In the industrial-metal genre of bands like Godflesh or Pitchshifter, the music generated by the duet presents harsh guitar riffs, robotic rhythms, aggressive frequenced samples and pitched voices. Three demo-tapes will be released during this first era. After this, Dirge took a more alternative course and started exploring post-metal, while holding on to their industrial sound.

At the same time, Marc T. begins to work on his new solo electronica project Dither. 7 albums and EP’s will be released from 98 to 2004.

After the leaving of Laurent P., bass player David K. and ex-Astral Rising’s guitarist Franck T. join the band. This first change in the line-up coincides with a noisier and less electronic curve; around the torn-downed voice of Marc T., the music goes darker, tortured, dissonant. The first album Down, Last Level is released in 1998.

1999, Alain B. (drums) and ex-Agmen Christophe [Zomb] D. (machines, percussion and voice) strengthen the band. Thus humanized, the music of Dirge goes much more heavy and stifling, guitars becoming the center of gravity of the second album Blight and Vision Below a Faded Sun (released in 2000 on the own band’s label, Blight Records).

Replacing Franck T. and David K., gone to their own projects Dub Wiser and Wide Open Cage, ex-Agmen Christian M. (bass) then guitarist Stéphane L. join Dirge in 2001. Three years later, the third record And Shall the Sky Descend is released and introduces a more hypnotic aspect of the band’s music. If heavy guitars stay in the center of the four long pieces that build ASTSD, the extremely slow-downed tempos, creeping samples, minimal parts, violin, didgeridoo and female vocals of Von Magnet’s Flore Magnet present the result of four years of musical evolution.

From 2004 to 2006, the band gives several concerts (with Unsane, Kill the Thrill, Cult of Luna, Nasum or Zatokrev) then goes back to studio in Switzerland in November 2006 to record its fourth album Wings Of Lead Over Dormant Seas. Released one year later as a double CD set, it features Kill The Thrill’s singer Nicolas Dick on two tracks.

Autumn 2009, Dirge starts the recording of its new album.

Winter 2010, the bands signs a new deal with the Switzerland-based label Division Records . The fifth record Elysian Magnetic Fields is released for the beginning in April 2011.

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Album: And So I Watch You From Afar - Gangs

Band: And So I Watch You From Afar
Album: Gangs
Label: The Richter Collective
Year: 2011







Tracklist
01. BEAUTIFULUNIVERSEMASTERCHAMPION
02. Gang (Starting Never Stopping)
03. Search:Party:Animal
04. 7 Billion People All Alive At Once
05. Think:Breathe:Destroy
06. Homes - Ghost Parlor KA -6 To...
07. Homes - ...Samara To Belfast
08. Lifeproof
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When the curiously monikered And So I Watch You From Afar dropped their debut record on an unsuspecting rock world they more than blew the doors off the poor little Mini Cooper, they blew it to kingdom come...and then some. You see what this band did with their self-titled debut was to release a post-rock album that was a hardcore punk album at the same time. Tracks like the blistering 'Set Guitars to kill' saw post-rock played at hardcore intensity as if that was the way the genre was born to be. Refreshing in its unique approach to what is all too often a stale genre these days, 'And So I Watch You From Afar' was rightly lavished with lashings of critical praise upon its release back in 2009. Now the band has responded to the challenge of providing a suitably monolithic second album in typically confident fashion.

'Gangs', it will no doubt disappoint some to say, is not quite ‘part 2’ to their debut record. There is an undoubted progression that has been made here. Whilst the likes of 'BEAUTIFULUNIVERSEMASTERCHAMPION' and the stunningly mental 'Search:Party:Animal' are clearly cut from the same cloth as the most up-tempo moments from their debut, the majority of the material on 'Gangs' is a little more restrained but still with more than enough ferocity to whip audiences into a wild frenzy wherever the band choose to play.

Although some moments fail to work quite as one would like, especially the somewhat underwhelming 'Think:Breathe:Destroy', this is pretty accomplished stuff. What the band have done here is to subtly move their material across into a slightly more expansive realm without losing their unique nature of being a post-rock band that is more focused on the ‘rock’ than the ‘post’. They have also added a slightly more pronounced math rock element as well that is similar to the likes of Adebisi Shank. Even on the twelve minute two-parter that is 'Homes', And So I Watch You From Afar stay far away from the pretentiousness that many instrumental bands are accused of. Not for them an over reliance on the peaks and the troughs, but instead a pleasing ability to blend riffs that are desperate to bust your front teeth in and soundscapes that make you feel like it’s a good time to go out and have a beer...or six.

See, while most post-rock bands are all about the beautiful and the melancholic, And So I Watch You From Afar are about having a bloody good time and they more than provide a good time with this record. It is not perfect but, unless you are deaf or don’t like anything that’s loud and kicking, it is destined to become one of your favorite records of 2011. From the breakneck pace of 'BEAUTIFULUNIVERSEMASTERCHAMPION' through the buoyant anthem that is highlight '7 Billion People all Alive at Once' to the samba outro to closer 'Lifeproof', 'Gangs' is a concoction of great joy distilled into instrumental riff-based rock goodness. You have to love them, you just have to. Surely it is just too much effort not to. - stereoboard.com

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Video: The Ocean - The Grand Inquisitor II: Roots & Locusts

Album: Sioum - I Am Mortal, But Was Fiend

Band: Sioum
Album: I Am Mortal, But Was Fiend
Label: Endless Field Studios
Year: 2010






Tracklist
01. Upon Awakening
02. Pillars
03. Pillars (Among Us)
04. Shift
05. Drifting Away
06. Chambers
07. Lapse
08. Continuum
09. Fields
10. Fields (Ocean Of Silence)
11. Pulse
12. Collapse
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Sioum is an instrumental/progressive/post-rock/post-metal trio(guitar, keyboard, drums) from Chicago, IL. The band often draws inspiration from dreams, movies, video games, and most frequently, emotion itself. Post-metal/rock, as well as progressive influence are often noted, although occasionally, many broad (and unusual) influences, such as classical and chip-tune, can be heard.

Sioum’s recent full-length, I Am Mortal, But Was Fiend, was self recorded, mixed, and produced in their basement over a span of 8 months, with help of Endless Field Studio front-man Paul Petrosyan. The album consists of three songs split into movements, like classical music, with artwork shadowing the untold stories of the music. It was released on July 16, 2010.

Alongside local live shows, the band has already begun writing new material, and are currently organizing tours for the US.

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