I had barely pressed the play button on my stereo and I knew I was going to be impressed. It’s very rare that I find music that I truly like (as evidenced by many of my reviews here on the site), and it’s even more rare that I find music that transports me to a different place in my mind. Creating a scene in my consciousness for an experience in the future almost never happens to me, yet Sometimes it Rains did the impossible: 30 seconds into the first song, I was already in my car, windows down, driving down the freeway, enjoying the summer.
The album starts off with “We Can”, an instantly memorable tune that will bring you to the beach and surf with you, while your friends sit around a campfire on the sand. I’ve only lived near any kind of coastline for a mere 6 months of my 24 years in existence, and yet in the 5 minutes and 29 seconds it took for “We Can” to play through, I was able to relive every second of it. The sun burning my back and the sand burning my feet – it all came back in a heartbeat.
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6 days ago, the wonderful biopharmaceutical researchers at GlaxoSmithKline released a revolutionary drug in the United States called Alli. It’s being touted as the first FDA-approved diet pill that can be acquired without a prescription. It’s kept behind the counter, but all you need to do is speak to your pharmacist and a box of fat-reducing pills will be in your possession.
From the documentation I could find, the drug works by preventing the absorption of fats in the diet which in turn reduces the user’s caloric intake. Rather than wrapping around the triglycerides and preventing their absorption by simply being too large like some other non-FDA-approved pills claim to do, this one actually prevents the enzymes that would normally break down those same triglycerides from doing their job. What this means is that the fat goes in and then straight out, without ever seeing anything other than the inside of your stomach/intestines.
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Listening to AJ Rosales’ latest release “Ultramarine”, I find myself wanting more. Unfortunately, it’s not because it was so amazing that I must hear more, but rather that it seems to be missing something. Cohesiveness, perhaps? Direction, maybe? On the other hand, it’s a pretty creative album, and he definitely earns my respect there. Because I’m so torn about how I feel about this record, I’m going to present my review in a point/counterpoint-type format.
Positive: The melodies are almost perfect. While there are a few things I might have changed if I was involved in the production process, they are absolutely memorable and you will definitely feel yourself humming them to yourself even after one listen. Not to mention that they are not your regular 4 chord progression – there is real depth here that is seemingly non-existant nowadays.
Negative: My first main problem with this disc is that it’s being marketed as “folk rock”, however the first songs remind me of the alternative rock of the 90′s. It could be that my definition of folk rock is narrow minded, but when I imagine “folk rock”, guitar solos heavy on the distortion aren’t the first things that come to mind. This might not sound like a major gripe, but as soon as I’m even aware of the existance of an album, I start imagining what it might sound like, but being bombarded with loud drums and a fairly screaming guitar when I’m expecting an acoustic guitar and a violin isn’t the way that you necessarily want to impress me.
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