MUSIC REVIEW: Acolyte by Delphic

Tracks: 10

Released: 2010

Acolyite is the first album from English based alt-dance group Delphic. It manages to combine some great synth sounds, with some nice guitar riffs, and some excellent beats to create an excellent album that’s a treat from start to finish!

The album starts with a nice opener; Clarion Call, which has a really nice build up to get you into the mood for the rest of the album. This is followed by Doubt, which shows off Rick Boardman’s nice vocal talents, and, you guessed it, has a great chorus. This Momentary gives off a real late 90’s vibe with its heavy beat all the way through, but has the modern touch with the added synth sounds. Its a nice combo, and a catchy song.

The middle few tracks of the album keep a steady pace, Red Lights seems a little more relaxed, but then Acolyte comes in with a great tempo, and actually keeps you interested for the entire 8 and a half minutes of it, which isn’t always the case with tracks that long. It is definitely a song to get you dancing, and the most dance focused song on the album in my opinion, and Halcyon is also a great foot-tapping song… Complete with a great chorus!!

As I’ve said before, I think an end of an album should leave you either wanting more, or with at least some kind of emotion. The last few tracks on this album try very hard to do this, with Counterpoint being a great track, and possibly my favourite, unfortunately, this is followed by the, to be honest, rather confusing and pointless Ephemera.. Which is just 2 minutes of ambiance. It just doesn’t seem to have any place here, and as the penultimate track, makes the album lose some steam. A bit of a disappointment.

We end with Remain. Which is another more chilled track, which has some nice vocals, and the bass line is really nice, along with a good piano riff, however it did have a rather abrupt ending, which while didn’t take too much away from the song, did make me (literally) say ‘Oh, is that it?’.

HOWEVER! Overall, its a great album. Mostly excellent, well produced (look at me pretending I know what I’m talking about) tracks. It is just a little let down by the slightly anti-climactic end to an otherwise great experience.

Skip to: Counterpoint

Skip it: Ephemera.

Overall: 4 out of 5

wich guitar fs

Alive Till I’m Dead – Professor Green

Tracks: 12.

From the first bar of track 1, you know this is going to be something special. Now I know a lot of people aren’t a fan of the London White rapper accent, but please give this album a go. Every track has something in it that will get stuck in your head. ‘Close The Door’ being the only song where I didn’t find myself paying too much attention, but it is a different message in the song, so I don’t at all think it is a bad song. The album Has some of the best uses of samples I’ve heard in a long time and really catchy songs. ‘Need You Tonight’ in particular sticks in my head for days after listening to it, and listen to the lyrics, they are great. Personal favourite of mine is track 11, Where Do We Go, quite moving for a bad boy.

So it’s rap, from a White English guy, sounds like a disaster, but with people like Plan B, Professor Green and Example around, there is a lot of rap excellent music coming from us Brits.

Skip it – Close The Door
Skip to – Where Do We Go. (Though you can’t really go wrong with any track)

Verdict:

5 out of 5

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