Rise
by
Trip Throughout Rise, Trip challenges you and I to remember our identity in Christ, that we have been raised with him and are called to live for him, and serve him in everything. He finds joy in the word, and...
Honestly
by
Rachael Honestly is authentic and real, as it speaks about life’s lessons and what she has been through over the past decade. If you are looking for a female who can sing and rap this is your women. She is great....
God City USA
by
Canton If you are looking for an album that is the up and worship then this is your album. There are more worship songs than turn up type songs but it's still a nice mix. If you're looking strictly for the Canton...
Ellie’s new album is a beautifully rendered musical portrait of a soul desperately pursuing God, and then running headlong into Him, face-to-face, in the pages of His Word. The imagery of light triumphing over darkness also has a constant presence: besides the title track, for example, the celebratory song “Marvelous Light” shakes the earth with pure joy and gives you the sense of finally escaping a pitch black dungeon and walking into a wide open space on a sunny day — and then, like a kid on the first day of summer, dancing and jumping up and down with abandon.
There is great joy and victory on this album.
But it’s the real kind. The costly kind — the kind that only comes from dark nights of the soul that force a person to cling to God because He has truly become their only hope. And, honestly, that is the safest place we could ever be on this earth, even though it often comes through great sorrow. If I were to give that place a name, it would be At-The-End-Of-Ourselves. Once we reach the end of our rope and finally lean on Him with our full weight, it is then we suddenly experience freedom — as Ellie describes in the soulful closing track “I Wanna Be Free.”
And then there’s “My Portion and My Strength.” I could easily put this song on repeat and just let it run — or soar, more accurately, as the melody takes flight so effortlessly. The production, songwriting, and performance on this track is a perfect example of the adage “Less is more”: the sparse pitter patter brushes on the drums, the delicate acoustic guitar weaving major seventh chords with a sort of restrained urgency, the secondary guitar tracks quietly plucking harmonics, and Ellie’s voice floating and hovering over all of it with words like: “Help me to stand on the promise that You’re holding my right hand, / Help me to know that even when I lose my grip You won’t let go, / Help me believe that You will be my portion and my strength.”
That line of lyric captures another prominent theme on this album, and it adds an addendum to my opening description. Yes, the album captures the journey of a soul chasing after God and “apprehending Him” with joy as Tozer has written elsewhere, but the album is also about standing on a solid foundation of God’s promises by faith — even when the emotions or warm fuzzies of sensing God near are not present in the seasons of great trial. As Ellie so candidly and earnestly shared in her interview with me a few days ago, sometimes our emotions and our heart’s ability to believe don’t always comply with what we know to be true. Sometimes we doubt. Sometimes we forget. Any saint who is honest will admit having experienced those moments where we lift our eyes to our Good Shepherd and whisper, “help my unbelief.” Sometimes no matter how hard we try, the darkness is still getting to us and we’re not feeling God’s presence. Saint John of the Cross wrote about that journey in his classic Dark Night of the Soul. Tracks like “The Valley” and “Only Hope I’ve Got” further explore these themes with pristine melodies and songwriting — always ending with a conclusion of hope even after the sorrow and doubt, just as David did whenever he reached the end of a psalm.
The opening track “As Sure as the Sun” — a solo piano prayer that haunts and swells with brokenness and child-like trust — expresses that tipping point, that moment of breakthrough in the “dark, in the doubting, when you can’t feel anything” when suddenly a light breaks through and your heart finally realizes that “Oh His love remains the same, as sure as the sun will rise” — as the song says.
In the midst of these emotionally intense and heavy themes, there are tracks that balance the weightiness with a fun, jovial spirit — playful and triumphant, the way you imagine Heaven to be after God has wiped every tear. I’m especially thinking of the tracks “The Broken Beautiful,” “Love Never Fails,” and “Marvelous Light.”
Jesus taught that you can know the hidden inner reality of something by looking at the outer fruit that it produces. After listening to this album I was experiencing a deep refreshment in my walk with God, and that continues to happen the more I listen to these songs. The good fruit was immediate. When God places His Word in something, it never returns void. If there’s one album you buy in 2014, do yourself a favor and pick up As Sure as the Sun. God will use it in your life, and He will refresh you — just like in Hosea 6:3:
“Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth.”
The best thing about a live CD is feeling as though you’re there standing before the stage, regardless of whether you’ve ever seen the act live in concert or not. This is Thrice, the Californian rock band now on indefinite hiatus, in a complete snapshot of their expansive career.
It may as well be said now, fans of Thrice should buy this regardless. It’s the band presented exactly as they are live, with no post production audio magic like pitch corrections or overdub. It feels disappointingly rare that a band can be this honest with their fans, and it’s Thrice‘s intention to have ‘Anthology’ serve as a farewell memento in case they don’t return from their hiatus.
It’s a collection of recordings from their last tour, as opposed to just a single show, and this covers the band’s catalogue from start to finish. It feels carefully compiled and the recordings have certainly been chosen with a lot of care, but it still maintains an intimate, direct good vibe that flourishes in the edit-free recordings of songs like ‘Yellow Belly’ , ‘Image of the Invisible’ and ‘The Artist in the Ambulance’. It continues to capture the anthemic, sing-along nature of the band’s cult following and mass success besides in a very respectable tour of the band’s releases since ‘Identity Crisis’, their first full length album released in 2001 storming right on through six more studio releases to the most recent ‘Minor/Major’. No stone has been left unturned, and ‘Anthology’ covers the band from heavy tracks like ‘To Awake and Avenge The Dead’ to the soft and world-weary ‘Beggars’, prefaced by some sentiments by Dustin Kensrue. These live words speak volumes of a band who have been doing what they do best for a very long time.
Thrice are well known for their stamina, and this is another aspect of their career ‘Anthology’ encapsulates perfectly, it could just be the string of performances cherry-picked from a crop of countless shows but it really just serves to highlight the intense connection the band had with the crowd at every single venue, and their consistency from show to show. This should be considered essential for anyone who loves Thrice or just a good live rock performance.
Pretty Good | Posted October-09-2014
In a way it's only natural to want and expect some sort of sonic evolution in a new Thrice album, but if one looks at their output as a whole, the differences between each of their seven albums aren't the giant experimental steps that so often get mentioned when describing the middle of their discography. Instead it's more of a different approach and refinement of what came before. Vheissu had its roots in the slick production and dark mood of The Artist in the Ambulance, The Alchemy Indexes expounded on flushing out the possibilities opened up by Vheissu, and Beggars owed its soul to the second volume of the Alchemy Indexes. That same trend continues on Major/Minor. At its core, the sound is unmistakably Thrice. Major/Minor sees Thrice responding to aching minimalist undertones of Beggars, as musically it is very similar to its predecessor, but where Beggars was at its strongest at its most secluded moments, Major/Minor is an extroverted experience. They are no longer searching inward but projecting outward, like a light leading back from the darkness that ended Beggars.
Leading the charge is Dustin Kensrue. Since finding the beauty in the softer side of his voice during the recording of Vheissu, Thrice lost a little bit of the commanding presence that so defined their earlier work, but on Major/Minor he has rekindled a little bit of the power that came with his distinctive rasp which, in turn, makes for his most impassioned vocal performance since The Artist in the Ambulance. That doesn't mean that he's back bullying the microphone, though. He cleverly and precisely balances his two halves, with songs like the distraught and pleading “Words in the Water” making the best of his later era refinements. The rest of the band step up to the challenge as musically they breathe new life in the the heavy blues groove that was found on Beggars, not only thickening its sound but making it more vibrant by focusing just as much on melody as on atmosphere. One only needs to look at Major/Minor's stand out track “Anthology”, which combines all the playful guitar work of songs like “Of Dust and Nations” and “The Artist in the Ambulance” with the more straightforward approach of the later half of their career, creating a song that truly lives up to its name. Furthermore, “Anthology” encapsulates Major/Minor as a whole as there are moments all throughout it that harken back to the best of Thrice's past.
Major/Minor is just another testament to Thrice's ability to do no wrong. It's no surprise, really. They are continuing to evolve and mature, all the while still being true to what made so many fall in love with them in the first place. What more could we ask for?
3/5 | Posted October-09-2014
When we last left Thrice they had accomplished quite a lot with their quartet of elemental EPs, The Alchemy Index. Though the programmatic nature of the album led some to call Thrice on cheesiness and artifice, the collection of EPs proved that Thrice were a truly special band and in fact worthy of the grandiose labels attributed to them, my favorite being "the Radiohead of heavy music." First, though clearly indebted to the punk, hardcore, and even metal that defined their sound for four LPs, Thrice were no longer genre-bound. Fire continued along the path Vheissu had paved. Water was a masterpiece of texture and moodiness that sounded like it came from a Scandinavian band with unpronounceable album names. Air experimented by taking traditional post-hardcore ideas and warping them with production techniques, and Earth stripped Thrice of that characteristic punk energy and metallic technicality to create something entirely out of the box, yet pleasantly conventional. Second and maybe most importantly, Thrice could self-produce. Their earlier albums were kept tight and youthful thanks to Brian McTernan, but as Thrice's sound matured and evolved so did their requisites for a producer. Steve Osborne, traditionally a pop producer, was in the studio as Thrice changed their sound with Vheissu, and a lot of their makeover felt like it could be attributed to Osborne's hand on the reverb knob. The Alchemy Index featured Teppei taking over as primary producer, with everybody lending a hand. The result of this completely insulated process was Thrice's most accomplished production to date, showcasing both breadth and detail. Though it was hard to back The Alchemy Index as Thrice's best collection of tunes when considering the concise and ecstatic beauty of The Illusion of Safety or the pensive but powerful soul of Vheissu, it was certainly their most accomplished, and hinted at yet-to-be-written magnum opus that blended all of the different elements and styles.
Thrice's follow-up album, Beggars, whose release feels curiously sudden next to the prolonged incubation period and delayed release date of the The Alchemy Index, is certainly a blend of all of Thrice's influences and styles. However, Beggars is an anti-magnum opus. They went into the studio geared to create an album that came together as naturally as possible, emphasizing wonderfully nebulous abstract nouns like "feel" and "groove." Instead of taking a step towards being even more about premise and concepts, Thrice decided to undercut expectations and make an album that is pleasantly geared towards satisfying themselves. In practice, this tactic yields songs that sound like they'd fit in with the Air disc of The Alchemy Index, the disc that was the most familiar and least challenging to absorb for fans of Thrice's previous albums. Air contained some of Thrice's best songs to date (see "Broken Lungs," "Daedalus," and "Silver Wings"). Among the gems were some duds, or at least some very questionable musical decisions. The production on "The Sky Is Falling" muddled the efficacy of an otherwise interesting albeit weird post-hardcore track. "A Song for Milly Michaelson" was enjoyable but tedious and flat at five minutes. Beggars as an album plays exactly like that: sort of amazing, but sort of unsettling and slightly missing the mark.
As a pretty diehard Thrice fan, finding the origin of the bad taste in my mouth was a difficult and painful journey that required drilling through the bedrock of my musical tastes and values from age fifteen onwards (ref: Vheissu review). At the end of the day, it's impossible to trace Beggars's failings to any one high-level problem, but when breaking down the album to an almost microscopic level, tiny musical doppelgangers begin to appear. Thrice has always been a band that, even while obviously influenced by the music of artists they revere, have always found a way to perfectly recontextualize and convolute the ideas that inspire them. Little musical moments on Beggars that are uncanny to ones found on other Thrice albums and those of Thrice's "recommended listening" make Beggars feel more than than Thrice, and as a result somehow less singular and individualistic than any album before it. The album begins in the hands of Eddie, who's love of DC-inspired post-hardcore bands like No Knife and Frodus (who lent Thrice "The Earth Isn't Humming" for the Earth disc last year) defines the polyrhythms of "All the World Is Mad" and might as well be a B-side for And We Washed Out Weapons in the Sea. The background lead-in vocals on "The Great Exchange" (they first enter at 0:30) are just an inverted version of the same melodic cell that begins the outro vocals of Radiohead's "Nude" (they first enter at 3:10). The microtonal inflections of Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U" (an Ursus Veritas favorite) colors Dustin's vocals on word "circles" in the first verse of the track "Circles." Most confounding is what may be a guest appearance by or a careful sampling of Coldplay's Chris Martin at 2:45 into "In Exile." The yearning but uplifting vocals that end the song are effectively the same as those on "Viva la Vida." Even more suspect are instances in which Thrice pay homage to themselves. The ominous, whalesong feedback that is delicately applied to the verses of "Wood & Wire" is the same as the delayed guitar that gives the intro of "Of Dust and Nations" its ethereal pull. Lyrical retreads also make guest appearances. "They'll take flight when the earth starts to shake," shakily balances between being cleverly self-referential and a clichéd rehashing. Comparing the aesthetic down to the opening lyrics of "Wood & Wire" ("Fourteen years behind these bars") with those of "The Earth Will Shake" ("We dream of ways to break these iron bars") also teeters. These musical doppelgangers, though certainly unfortunate and not limited to the examples listed here, are not founded in laziness, plagiarism, idolatry, hubris, or any other negative trait. They are generally awesome ideas that have the sad fate of being leftovers - little fossils of what makes Thrice the great band they are. They are still enjoyable and emotionally relevant, but they dull Thrice's uniqueness just enough to make Beggars feel like a missed opportunity.
Despite this rusting effect, listeners have reason to rejoice; Thrice mostly offsets the considerable weight of these moments by being pretty much the best fucking band in the world. The softer songs on the album, namely "Circles," "Wood & Wire," and "The Great Exchange," are haunting and sad in a way Thrice has never captured before. The opening two tracks, "All the World Is Mad" and "The Weight" make good on the promises of the Air disc by presenting post-hardcore tracks that walk far off the beaten path but never get lost. Even the album's worst song, "Doublespeak," pulls out of the doldrums of its bridge with an inspired, swinging outro that converts the previously repetitive and boring piano part into an anthemic rally cry. Instrumentally, the band has never been better. Riley really runs with the idea of making the album more groove-focused and his playing really transforms Thrice's sound and feel. Eddie's basslines, most notably in "Doublespeak," produce stunning complements to Riley's drumming, or bulk themselves up with satisfying distortion and aggressive counterhythms. Teppei further expands in his role as a multi-instrumentalist. Dustin's performance on the title-track, "Beggars," moves from soulful bluesy crooning to his characteristic pitched shouting that gives the song its smoldering power, and is possibly the greatest achievement of his career (which I had the foolish privilege of claiming about both the entire Air disc last year and "Of Dust and Nations" four years ago).
Beggars is at once familiar and alienating. Thrice wear their influences on their collective sleeve like never before, but this transparency sullies their uniqueness. Thrice's commitment to stripping their music of artifice is refreshing and welcome after the heaving monster that was The Alchemy Index, but they take it a step too far by falling into a complacent territory that doesn't truly push their music to new heights, either intellectual or emotional. Beggars is the sound of a band settling, not for lower standards, but rather settling into a sweet spot that neither attempts to leap past the achievements of previous albums nor away from what has made them so great for so long.
Ok | Posted October-09-2014
Thrice continue to be stubborn and refuse to fit into a neat little genre as all music should.
It’s easy to tell that Thrice were in good form during the writing of ‘Vheissu’. For some artists, their finest work sprouts from conflict and tension – look at Deftones, Soundgarden and hell, even Kings of Leon. For some comes commercial success, others artistic, and for few comes both – what that does for the band is entirely unpredictable. In the case of Thrice, relative peace and prosperity within the group spawned what is a strong, consistent alternative slash progressive slash metal slash everthing else. It is a wonder, with their chronic stylistic convulsion, how the band managed to come through with both their fan base and critical reception intact and better than ever. The surprise comes with how well ‘Vheissu’ was received among fans of the pseudo-pop punk, post-hardcore ‘Artist in the Ambulance’ – if it were any other band they would have been, suffice it to say, ***ed.
It would be curious to note the intent behind ‘Between The End And Where We Lie’. Reflections of the band’s former pop-punk/hardcore sound are seen throughout, with obvious grabs for radio play given the second-track placement and the someone uninspired, hook-laden content. It falls far short of the intensity and vibe of the opening track, which proves to be one of their best and most anthemic. The viewer’s first glimpse of artistic perfection is found in ‘The Earth Will Shake’, the delicate yet chugging, brutal yet stunning epic with a sporadic form and textural construction. Dustin Kensrue’s vocals shine here more so than ever, and the guitar work of Teppei Teranishu is brilliant and expansive at worst. Bliss is thrice more found in ‘For Miles’, ‘Of Dust and Nations’ and ‘Red Sky’, the first of which is I can safely declare is the best track on the record. Its piano-ridden instrumentals provide a stellar backing to one of Kensrue’s finest and most emotional vocal performances. As the man screams ‘when someone stands in your shoes and will shed his own blood, there’s no greater love,’ it is nothing short of chill-inducing, and a sure album highlight.
The band’s musical epilepsy is exhibited ever so fruitfully in ‘Of Dust And Nations’, with some of Teppei’s most thrilling and otherworldly guitar work found throughout. The chorus is uplifting in a way that only Thrice seems to be able to do, and the progressive rock sort of breakdown at the end proves to be the atmospheric summit of the record. ‘Red Sky’ may well be a Glassjaw song, and it has since proven to be one of the band’s most popular and closes the album in style. There isn’t a truly boring track here, with some only proving to be opposing to one’s own personal preference when taking into account the intensity of ‘Hold Fast Hope’ or the odd key signatures of ‘Music Box’.
It truly is a shame that Thrice decided not to go on for a while, but in retrospect of their career it seems that the band had a fulfilling natural life. ‘Vheissu’ was their clear peak, but Major/Minor proved not only to be a solid closing record but one of their best. What the band lacked in hair, they always made up for in the raw emotional content and endless instrumental depth of each LP, constantly growing and challenging their fans (to the point where it’s a wonder they have any left). Perhaps if the band had shot for a ‘Vheissu’ number two, they’d be playing stadiums by now, but we all know in hindsight that we wouldn’t change a thing.
Not Bad | Posted October-09-2014 Some general impressions:
Musically, I would have expected nothing less than showed here by Thrice. A for this genre absolut great bass player in combination with great drumming, dual guitar work on a high level, and good vocals. The singing got better on this one IMO, though it was not bad on the previous album for my likes. But the clean parts come over better, the screamed parts are on the same level as on the previous record. The only thing that could spoil the overall impression of the musical work is the simplified guitar work. Maybe simplified is not the right word, but what disapeared a bit here are the guitar leads that underlined and set the overall mood on 'The Illusion of Safety'. The guitars follow more ordinary patterns now, in a way.
A major thing I noticed is the general 'darker' mood of the record. Many passages of songs from 'The Illusion of Safety' marked something like a little sunrise in the overall feel of the album. On TAitA, the mood is much more melancholic. Don't think now you can await 'whiny emo lyrics' (like some would put it) though. The topics of the lyrics spread from social criticism ('Cold Cash and Colder Hearts' for example) to autobiographic material ('Stare at the Sun'). All on a high level IMO, with nteresting use of metaphors ('Melting point of Wax', for example, is using the picture of Icarus)
What was good:
Everytime I listen to this album, I'm suprised anew by the nice basslines. Use of octaves, unvonventional patterns, excellent fills. Good examples for that are 'Stare at the sun', 'The Melting point of wax' or the title track. The material is played very tight, and shows good energy. No real down points in the middle of the album. Nice is also the occasional use of strings etc in the background to set accents or underline certain moods. The end of 'The Abolition of Man' is absolute great speaking of guitar.
What was not so good:
But this is where the downsides kick in. More guitar work like on 'The Abolition of Man' would have been great. I really got the hang of it on 'The Illusion of Safety', and it is missed on some spots of the album. Apart from that, I have nothing more to 'mock' about.
Summary:
If you'Re into this genre, 'The Artist in the Ambulance' is a album that won't leave many wishes open. I have this album since early 04, and it sneaks into my playlist again every now and then (as well as 'The Illusion of Safety'). This surely counts to one of my 'all time favorites' that gets played over and over again even after years.
The only let down is the somewhat drastic reduced lead guitar that was present on 'The Illusion of Safety'. Apart from that I would not know what could speak against this album (not counting personal preferences in). The musicianship is on a high level, the instrumental use as well as the lyrics. Still, I like the previous album just a tiny little bit better. So, in the end, I'll give out 4 stars.
The album jumps off to an incredible start with 'Kill Me Quickly', unquestionably one of the best tracks on the album. Dustin quickly changes his vocal styling from a hardcore scream (not screamo, kids), to a melodic voice. The up tempo riffs also are broken down into a slower tempo to create an incredible mixture of emotion and fury. From there comes blazing in my favorite track of the album, 'A Subtle Dagger'. Hard metallish chords with a harsh, melodic, hardcore-screamy voice. For some reason I can't stop thinking I'm hearing a Megadeth riff. God bless Dave Mustaine.
Other honorable mentions include 'See You in the Shallows', which again boasts the Thrice-tacular metal influence, but has more emotional vocals. 'Betrayal is a Symptom' is another track which shows the incredible range of this band's talent. To be honest, every track is incredible. I'm too lazy to discuss every one, so I gave you the first 4. I don't know if emotional-influenced hardcore has sounded this good since Lifetime. Thrice seems to tread the line perfectly. Where bands like Kid Dynamite and Strike Anywhere (both of whom I love) tend to dip more on the hardcore side, Thrice is right split in the middle. Kinda like Grade, except they are more metal influenced, and that, is always cool.
Should you buy Thrice's "The Illusion of Safety"? Yes, why? Because I said so? Yes. Because all of your friends will think you have good taste? Yes. You don't need a reason, you punk-rocker. Get out there and rock-out.
Sound: The sound of this album is excellent for a sophomore album. The riffs are excellent , and the lyrics are right on the dot. Dustin wrote most of the songs, and he did a really nice job on them. // 8
Lyrics: The lyrics were some of the best thrice lyrics yet. It fits very well into the music that they play. It just... mixes together. I can't explain it but they are just great. All the songs mean something, there not just mindless dribble you hear from some guy just trying to make rhyme schemes. // 8
Overall Impression: I believe this is the best thrice cd so far, its just very unrecognized. My favorite song on the album is definately "Ultra Blue" probably... and if this cd was ever to be taken from me, not only would I buy a new one, I would track down who took it just so I could show them how much I love it // 8
Fan | Posted October-06-2014
I'm a big fan of this album. If you are a fan of Metal and Hard rock then you really love this album. You won't be disapointed by an song on here. Get this album as soon as possible. You will love it and want to play it all day ever day.
4/5 | Posted September-29-2014
I actually personally got a copy of this album before it came out through 5ive and I love it. I think it has something for everybody who is in to Christian Hip Hop On there. It's a very heard hitting album and I really love it. if you have yet to pick this albnum up do it NOW! You and your family will enjoy it from start to finish.
zeekrkootunga's Music and Book Reviews 
