The Advantage was formed in 1998 under the name Generic. The band consists of Robby Moncrieff (guitar), Ben Milner (guitar), Carson McWhirter (bass) and Spencer Seim (drums) of experimental rock band Hella. These dudes are playing something like progressive rock with complex instrument parts based on… melodies from old NES video games.
Most of the people on this planet consider cabaret to be forgotten and possibly too retro to be interesting. But not this duo from the US.
Amanda Palmer (piano/vocals) and Brian Viglione(guitar/drums/bass/vocals) are the Dresden Dolls or one of the unique band that are still keeping up the flag of the cabarets. Their music is like Vertinsky meeting The White Stripes, music of the 20th and 30th clashing into modern indie. The result is awesome! Amandas voice and piano provide the old and gloomy part, while Brian is making the rest of the music with his very interesting drumming and arrangements.
Combine that with almost theatrical performance on the live shows and you’ll get a really unique band. Their two albums “The Dresden Dolls” (2003) and “Yes, Virginia” (2006) can be surely considered gems of modern music.
School Of Emotional Engineering is a project by Australian electronic musician Ben Frost. After the release of first two ambient albums that were critically acclaimed by the press Frost focused on a bit more different sound switching from ambient to post-rock. As a result the album “School Of Emotional Engineering” was released in 2005.
He is awesome at creating amazing soundscapes but this work is like watching a small slow-motion movie. The music is very gentle with mostly a piano leading the melody, sometimes supported by violin guitar, bass and drums. But mostly it is melted with Frost’s trade mark gentle electronic ambient. Two songs have vocal lines but as for me it was not necessary.
In one of the interviews Frost said that the instrumental part was recorded in few days but he spent a year with his notebook deepening the sound and giving this plate more feeling.
Well the only thing that I can say, this year was worth it!
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