Bio (from cdbaby.com/Artist/Touchthesky):
Supercharged coder during the day, epic musician after the sunset. I love to create. Submerge into the wicked universe of my music. Enjoy! From the depths of the sea, back in black I present you the latest piece of my work. A bone-thrilling journey through the ruins of an unnamed city, an instrumental packed with eerie sounds and evil guitar riffs. So, stay awhile and listen!
Musicians:
Lukasz Snopkiewicz
Other than the review for Sinicle’s OBLITERATE, which was a music video (here), this is the first time I’ve been asked to review just a single track. Normally I review at least an EP if not a full album, so the request from Touch_the_Sky to review his single MISKATONY was a bit different. So far all that was available was just a single, so why not, I’ll review just one song.
Touch_the_Sky is a one-man-band, like Nine Inch Nails (in the studio), and Lukasz does all of the production, guitars, and “techno-weirdness” himself. I am a fan of the one-man-band, as I used to write my own electronic music mostly all by my lonesome (I had an occasional collaborator on a track or two) under a few different monikers, most prolifically as “SCG” (and if you’re interested, you can hear a little bit of it here: soundcloud.com/dryanmowry), and I know the feeling of accomplishment when you finish a track and you actually like it. I used to write a lot, I mean a LOT, of music, and most of it sucked, but occasionally I’d get that track done that I just wanted to share with everyone so I could hear them tell me just how awesome it was, or at the very least that it didn’t suck as much as that pile of tracks I had tossed out previously.
M is an interesting hybrid, a blend of some different influences. It’s got the atmospheric, almost theatrical background layers as the backbone of the track. Added to this is a pair of guitar riffs, one rhythm and pretty basic, and one more lead-like, wailing in near-metal land. The track progresses into a pretty little guitar riff that is accompanied by more atmospheric weirdness, and then pulls one of my favorite aural tricks: the cut up. If you take your loop and cut out every other note or set of notes you get this stutter to the sound that matches the beat; I figured this out on one of my tracks years ago and loved the way it sounded. It’s not a hard trick at all, but I don’t hear it very often, so it was nice to have it show up in the middle of M; I felt a little homesick for my music-making days. The beat for the track is a very basic electronic drumbeat, nothing special at all but it keeps the track moving along.
Overall the track is interesting. It’s nothing new, the mixture of electronics and heavy metal guitar, and it’s nothing amazingly different than a lot of other things I’ve heard since the arrival of Ministry or Kraftwerk or NIN, but it is nicely done. This is a track that would appeal to the industrial crowd, probably not so much the really heavy industrial people, but those guys that like their industrial music a little more lighthearted. It is a nice beginning for a first track, and while it’s not anything that floored me in its originality or production, it does pique my interest to see what else will come out of this project.
Overall 5.5 / 10
M for sale: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/miskatony-single/id509912957
M site: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/touchthesky
Ryan's Reviews 