V/A Atrocity Exhibition – Year One (CD Album – Atrocity Exhibition)
Genre/Influences: New-wave, dream-pop, shoegaze, electro.
Bands: Cat Dowling, Be Forest, Arc Waves, Tiers, Painted Zeros, Sex Scheme ao.
Content: Atrocity Exhibition is an ‘eclectic, dark live music monthly established in 2013, in Breukelen, NYK’. This CD is meant as a document to this happening and ‘hopefully in the spirit’ of the famous John Peel.
Aside of this purpose it also is an opportunity to discover less familiar names from all over the world, which are mainly active at the wider fields of new-wave and electronic music. It mainly concerns dark-minded bands, but with some evasive passages. Most of the formations are fronted by a female singer.
Cat Dowling and especially the more dream-pop minded Be Forest both are interesting discoveries. Arc Waves injects a psychedelic touch to a shoegaze driven style. Sandy deals with pure dream-pop music and is worthy of examination as well. Only Edges is one more name to keep in mind. I was fascinated by their somewhat mysterious dream-pop approach.
More into electronics are House Of Blondes, which features 2 songs. It’s a kind of electro-wave style with a little Suicide touch on top. A last name I want to mention is Painted Zeros which reminds me a bit of Echo And The Bunnymen and the song “Do It Clean”.
Conclusion: I highly recommend this sampler for its diversity, but mainly for the huge number of interesting discoveries.
Best bands: Be Forest, House Of Blondes, Arc Waves, Only Edges, Painted Zeros.
Rate: (Elise Din:8)Elise Din.
Label: www.facebook.com/AtrocityExhibition.brooklyn
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I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.
