UMT

(7 votes, average: 4.71 out of 5)

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Counter-World Experience - Leaving Lotus
2007
@320 kbps (lame 3.92, stereo, 44100)
Links: iFolder: part1, part2
RapidShare: part1, part2
tnx to kavriga

(7 votes, average: 4.57 out of 5)

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Counter-World Experience - Fraktal
2005
@320 kbps (lame 3.92, stereo, 44100)
Links: iFolder || RapidShare

official site || myspace

Progressive Jazz Metal

(8 votes, average: 4.13 out of 5)

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Heavy Metal/Melodic Hard Rock "Opera"
Germany
mp3@320 Kbps, EAC CD-rip - lame 3.93.1,stereo
Size - 146 Mb
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Началом творческого пути шведского квинтета Andromeda можно считать подписание контракта с War Music в 1999 году. В 2000 году группа приступила к записи дебютного альбома на Dug-Out Studio при поддержке продюсера Даниэля Бергштранда. Вокальные партии были записаны сессионным вокалистом Лоренсом Макрори, а состав был окончательно укомплектован в августе 2000-го после прихода Дэвида Фремберга. Extension of the Wish увидел свет в феврале 2001 года и сразу захватил интерес фэнов, журналов и интернет-порталов смесью тяжелого и мелодичного прогрессивного звучания.

Весной 2000 года группа отправилась в тур по Швеции в поддержку альбома и была приглашена на ProgPower festival в Нидерландах, где имела немалый успех. В августе 2001 года для Extension Дэвидом был переписан вокал, а в альбом вошли новые треки. Extension был выпущен на французском лейбле NTS, и группа отправилась в тур по Франции с Evergrey. Параллельно Andromeda готовила материал для второго альбома — II=I. Обязанности продюсера взял на себя клавишник группы Мартин Хедин. II=I оказался очень разноплановым и показал, что у группы огромный потенциал.

В 2003 году басиста Герта сменил Фабиан Густавссон, который стал финальным компонентом «Андромеды». После мирового релиза II=I, туров и фестивалей Andromeda приступила к записи третьего альбома Chimera. Эта работа стала большим шагом вперед и вобрала в себя весь опыт, накопленный музыкантами за все предыдущие годы музицирования. Коллектив, наконец, обрел свой фирменный звук — запоминающиеся мелодии, инструментальные навороты, глубокую атмосферу.

В европейском туре 2006 года были записаны живые выступления, впоследствии вошедшие в первый live DVD — Playing off the Board (апрель 2007). Этот DVD — превосходная иллюстрация того, на что Andromeda способна на концертах.
Добро пожаловать в галактику Andromeda! Будьте готовы к тому, что она поразит вас!
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(9 votes, average: 5 out of 5)

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The Dilliger Escape Plan create maniacally intense, crushingly metallic, and decidedly hardcore punk-infused jazz-time-signature-invoking compositions displaying an unparalleled musical bravery, precision musicianship, meticulously thought-out, and complex structuring, and rigorous physical endurance. The band's guitarists and drummer are regular features in publications geared toward the guitar- and drum-playing set. The depth of extremity and mental challenge presented by their music virtually defies description, at once recalling the mind-wandering spirit of the Mahavishnu Orchestra, the complex heavy metal of latter-day Death, Cynic's solitary death metal achievement, and the progressive hard rock of Rush. Their performances bring to mind the anarchic charge of early Guns N' Roses shows, and the sophistication that drives their craft should awe fans of classy art rock bands like Radiohead.

The beginning of the Dillinger Escape Plan can be traced back to a relatively average hardcore band called Arcane, which during its last performance featured vocalist Dimitri Minakakis, guitarists Ben Wienman and Derrick Brantley, drummer Chris Pennie, and then fill-in bassist Adam Doll. The band played two shows with this lineup under the name Dillinger Escape Plan before Brantley exited the group. They next recorded a demo, which a then-new label called Now or Never Records offered to release on CD. New guitarist John Fulton was recruited shortly before the band's first tour. The Dillinger Escape Plan's frenetic, intense, and sometimes violently spastic performances became the talk of the hardcore scene. Relapse Records representatives heard about a particularly engaging performance at Philadelphia's Stalag 13 and went to see them at another PA gig. Soon after, a multi-record deal was inked.

Fulton left the band shortly before the 1998 release of the band's debut EP for the label Under the Running Board, on which Weinman handled all guitar duties. The three-song teaser built up anticipation for their 1999 debut full-length record, Calculating Infinity, a jaw-droppingly intense, mathematical, and inspired opus of immense technical proportion. Before the record was made, Doll was involved in a serious car accident that resulted in him being partially paralyzed and unable to continue recording or performing with the band. Around the same time, Jesuit guitarist Brian Benoit joined the band, replacing Fulton. The album was a smash success in the underground, igniting a succession of imitators and accolades from the underground and more mainstream press alike. Calculating Infinity also garnered the attention of former Faith No More vocalist Mike Patton, who, after seeing a videotape of the band in action, invited them to come out on the road supporting his avant-garde act Mr. Bungle. The band enlisted former M.O.D. bassist and fellow New Jersey native Jeff Wood as temporary touring help.

Following the Mr. Bungle tour, the Dillinger Escape Plan embarked upon a long string of headlining dates and co-headlining shows with Candiria, trekking back and forth around the United States. Their live shows became increasingly intense, incorporating samples, a light show, fireworks, and, at one time, a fire breather. After several months of heavy-duty road work, including notable festival appearances on the Warped Tour and March Metal Meltdown, the group relieved Wood -- who continued to front his own Shat project -- of his duties, enlisting a more permanent replacement for Doll in the form of a Philly resident named Liam. In 2000 Now or Never re-released the band's self-titled record with bonus tracks. Sometime after a trip to Europe with their friends in Botch, the Dillinger Escape Plan parted ways with Minakakis. They played a few shows as an instrumental act and a couple of final shows with Minakakis, one as part of Japan's Beast Feast Festival and another near their hometown. After that, they embarked on a nationwide search for the singer's replacement via their website, putting up a vocal-less version of the song "43% Burnt" and asking prospective hopefuls to download it, record their own singing, and send it to the group. While collecting CD-Rs from fans and wannabe singers, the Dillingers stayed busy, recording two songs for a Black Flag tribute album, a new EP's worth of material (which Patton agreed to sing on), and playing Krazy Fest in Louisville, KY, with friend and Coalesce vocalist Sean Ingram guesting.

In late 2001, the group met with a singer named Greg Puciato who had greatly impressed them with his CD-R submission. After two practices, they offered him the job and he graciously accepted. He made his debut appearance with the band at the 2001 CMJ Music Festival in New York City. His hulking physical presence and spot-on screaming won over fans as they embarked upon a national headlining tour, which was cut short when System of a Down offered to bring the group over to Europe in spring 2002. In March 2002, the Dillinger Escape Plan announced that they would be releasing their Mike Patton-fronted EP Irony Is a Dead Scene via California punk label Epitaph. Puciato made his full-length debut on 2004's Miss Machine. In June 2006 the group released an EP of cover songs exclusively on iTunes titled Plagiarism, and the following year marked the departure of drummer Chris Pennie. He was replaced by Gil Sharone of Stolen Babies, who took the drum stool for the especially innovative follow-up, Ire Works, released in November 2007.

Mathcore/Experimental
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(12 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)

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Being the only musicians at their neighborhood elementary school, Sean Reinert and Paul Masvidal first met in Miami, when they were 12 years old, and immediately started writing songs and rehearsing together in what would become an obsessive aural journey from classical to pop to metal to Jazz and back within a ten-year period. By their late teens they were playing everything from Mahavishnu Orchestra to Miles Davis, and learning the songs of the Real/Fake book. Proficiency and perseverance saw their band, the progressive-rock/metal outfit Cynic, propelled to indie bestseller status. After the excitement of world tours and international kudos, the band quietly dissolved. Shortly after, Paul and Sean relocated to Los Angeles and formed Aeon Spoke with Evo.
"We're okay with art taking itself seriously and approaching it with the weight of the world. Lightness doesn't appeal to us. We want to get down and dirty with human experience and allow our art to reflect that. We're a messy species with minds that complicate everything. The spiritual investigation in our work is not about preaching, as much as it is about healing oneself. Like everyone, we're just trying to get through life the best we know how. Music is a tool and a language. If people can relate to our songs, then perhaps we've done our job." --Aeon Spoke
"Atmospheric and hypnotic...beautifully tender." --Hit Sheet
"Most beguiling...gets inside your head and stays." --Record of the Day
"Superior songwriting and thoroughly classy...immaculate." --Unpeeled
"Beautiful, exquisite...destined for greatness." --Janice Long, BBC Radio 2
"The album's strength lies in the band's ability to excavate beauty from pain, hope from despair, and also to remind everyone that life's failures and successes are memorial and precious, and go beyond mortality." --Michael Casano, Buzz Music
"Absolutely fantastic...haunting and lovely." --Paul Ross, LBC Radio 97.3FM, London
Aeon Spoke has 2 members from the cult fusion-death-metal band Cynic, but their music isn't anything like Cynic was. This is mellow, almost acoustic, beautiful alt-rock, especially songs like "Emmanuel" and "Yellow man".
Healing & EasyListening / Down-tempo / Metal (from their own tags at myspace)
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SIGUR ROS was formed back in 1994 by three Icelandic young men: Jonsi Birgisson (guitar, vocals), Georg Holm (bass) and Agust (drums). Later joined by Kjartan Sveinsson on keyboards they began their recording career in 1997 with the album "Von" which was not released outside of Iceland until the late 2004. "Von" was followed by a remix album "Von Brig?i" in 1998 and their first masterpiece "Ag?tis Byrjun" in 1999. After the recording of "Ag?tis Byrjun", which was received with praising reviews all around the world, the drummer Agust left the band and was replaced by Orri Pall Dyrason. The fourth album, untitled and often referred to as "( )", was released in 2002 and was received with love and acclaim both by critics and fans. The production of the much anticipated fifth album is under way and waiting to be released some time in 2005.

With "Ag?tis Byrjun" and "( )" SIGUR ROS have really perfected their unique sound full of space and atmosphere. Jonsi Birgisson's falsetto and the use of a cello bow to to play his guitar are the most distinct factors in creating that sound incomparable to anything any band has ever come up with. The groups closest to SIGUR ROS in terms of feeling and atmosphere are probably GODSPEED YOU! BLACK EMPEROR and MAGYAR POSSE. "Ag?tis Byrjun" is a collection of very orchestated songs with Birgisson's voice and cello-bow-played guitar flying high and far across the horizon creating a place of beauty and tranquillity. "( )" is divided into two halves, the light and the dark, the summer and the winter, or however you like to describe it. The songs are much rawer and more straight forwardly arranged than on "Ag?tis Byrjun" creating a more solid but a little narrower, yet equally as exciting experience.

The biography on the official site says it well: "It's impossible to justify it with words, you have to listen to it to understand." Go to the official site linked to on the left and download the full songs offered there. You will love it.
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