Mikal Cronin - McIi - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

2011 solo album from the Moonhearts member featuring guest spots from Ty Segall and John Dwyer. Mikal's debut is full of personal and universal themes, taking such influences as late '60s Del Shannon and the Everley Bros, a more Punk Harry Nilsson or Curt Boettcher, balancing sweet melodies and chords with chunky, psychedelic guitar freakouts, filtering them through his own mutant California fuzz.

Kim Hyun-Chul DONG-A RECORDS YEARS. The psychedelic-tinged pop / rock sounds masterminded by Shin Joong-hyun, and the college folk scene spearheaded by Kim Min-ki formed the very heart of Korean pop music throughout the 1970s. However, this beating heart would be stifled, intentionally, as the dictatorship ramped up it's repressive practices in the mid-1970s. Countless rock and folk acts were censored on charges of 'indecency'. The leading artists of the time, such as Shin Joong-hyun and Kim Min-ki, found themselves in a situation where they could neither play concerts nor new music. While great bands like Sanullim managed to emerge even amid such dark times, radio and TV broadcasts remained subject to government and censorship. Thus, music broadcasts that reached the masses consisted of little more than romantic ballads, gayo for older generations, and sanitized 'decent' dance music. Although the new regime that took power in the 1980s made some conciliatory gestures, censorship remained firmly in place. Musicians who were forced into a long hiatus eventually gave up on music entirely or faced difficulties adjusting to newer trends. Around the mid-1980s, during which school bands began playing heavy metal, breaths of fresh new air were emerging in Korea's music scene. Independent tag Dong-a Records was one of the central forces in this new wave. For singer / songwriters looking to create something new and different, Dong-a provided not only the top session musicians of the time but also free rein throughout the recording process. As musicians gained the ability to rise to success without having to make TV appearances, new talent began flocking to Dong-a. Perhaps as a consequence of Korea's hosting of the Olympic Games in 1988, radio broadcasters began playing a somewhat broader range of music than they previously had, despite remaining beholden to government infl

Mikal Cronin returns with MCIII. Marked by the rich arrangements, stunning melodies, and deeply personal lyrical work for which Cronin is now known, the album is also a deliberate attempt to simply 'go big.' As he did on his self-titled 2011 debut and 2013's MCII, Cronin arranged and played nearly all of the record himself, including the tzouras, a traditional Greek string instrument he heard and subsequently bought while on tour in Athens. There's French horn, saxophone, and trumpet. There are mood-altering crescendos and heartbreaking turns-of-phrase, guitars both gorgeous and pugnacious. No longer satisfied with the sound of 'just one string player,' Cronin arranged parts for a full string quartet instead. 'It's a continuation of what I've been trying to do up until now, but I'm finding a better way to do it,' he says. 'I'm finding a more successful way of working those unexpected elements and textures and instruments into a rock record, of exploring that wormhole and mashing everything together harmoniously. I like riding the line between the two,' he adds. 'I like finding new ways to bring different musical worlds together.'