COMPACT DISKS 
~TEST.FIL~                     'With a good ending, has to 
                                be a good beginning' 
 
                                 Confucius 
 
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    C O M P A C T  D I S K S       
         by Slimer 
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A wide diversity of compact enjoyment has found it's way into this issue's 
review article. Unlike other diskmagazines we don't keep a narrow mind on 
music. It's not impossible that there actually are people roaming this earth 
who don't like Heavy Metal (shock !).   

Although I personally are quite fond of Metal, I do dig other music forms (how 
pathetic this may seem to some individuals). Anyway prepare yourself for a 
journey through musicland,

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Title        : Jar of Flies   
Artist/group : Alice in Chains  
Playing time : about 30 minutes or so    

I saw this CD lying all alone in the shop, it send subconscious messages to my 
mind, begging me to hire it.... Gently I took the CD from the shelf and before 
I knew it it was spinning in my NAD CD-player at home. With a title like 'Jar 
of Flies' you expect an encounter with a Metal CD but the opposite is the 
truth. No drums of a speeding locomotive and no screamin' electric guitars ! 
This is unlike anything else I heard before from 'Alice in Chains' and it is 
not bad.....     

I will unveil a tip of the curtain, better yet, I remove the curtain ! It turns 
out to be ballad/jazzy/acoustic kinda stuff in the genre 'Swing on this'. Also 
judging by the total playing time, this CD seems to be some-sort of an 
experimental 'wewannadosomethingelseforachange' project! Well, they succeeded 
and to my even greater surprise, the CD can even be given the predicate good ! 
It's even one of my current fave tapes (as I taped the CD) to relax on without 
getting into really mushy and soft music. Quite relaxing while working under 
stress at my work !    

The CD contains the following tracks,    
Rotten Apple                 
Nutshell 
I Stay Away     
No Excuses                   
Whale and Wasp  
Don't Follow                 
Swing On This  

The CD contains quiet and acoustic kind of tracks with nice melodies. There are 
many influences like Jazz in 'Swing On This' and even some Beatless influence 
in the 'I Stay Away 'track. 'The Whale and Wasp' track is quite nice as it's 
melody does actually resemble the 'sonar' sounds of whales.    
  
I can conclude that the songs contain atmosphere and depth and are worth to be 
at least taped ! Before I throw the figures at you, I couldn't keep myself from 
mentioning that 'Swing On This' sounds somewhat like a male Star Sisters track. 

Yeah that figures,     

Musical interest  : 7+  
Recording quality : 8+   
Value             : 7   For being a bit on the short side of things 

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Title        : Superunknown 
Artist/group : Soundgarden 
Playing time : 73:40 minutes    

Another drug addicted 'Grunge' band from Seattle with misty minds and good but 
dark depressive music. Another band that started at the underground music scene 
and reached more popularity than they bargained for. Another band that didn't 
want to be put into a labeled compartment with a stamp on their forehead. 
Another group that failed to get out of the reach of the music-mob !    At 
least 'Soundgarden' isn't your standard Seattle band and believe me there are 
quite a few around these days. The 'Superunknown' CD is the latest creation of 
the group and is well received within the music community. You could describe 
the sound of 'Soundgarden' to be raw, in mine opinion sometimes as raw as for 
instance Nirvana. There are also a lot of emotions hidden in the songs songs 
that sometimes scream in frustration !    

M.T.V. has played the 'Spoonman' track for quite a while and it can be said 
that this is one of the more 'jolly' tracks on this CD. It almost seems that I 
can understand the feelings of leadsinger Chris Cornell on this CD but I think 
that nobody but Chris himself will understand it all...       

There are 16 tracks with titles that shine on the depressive nature of this CD, 

Let Me Drown            My Wave  
Fell On Black Days      Mailman  
Superunknown            Head Down  
Black Hole Sun          Spoonman  
Limo Wreck              The Day I Tried To Live  
Kickstand               Fresh Tendrils  
4th Of July             Half Like  
Suicide                 She Likes Surprises      

The tracks seem to be chaotic at first but they have to grow on you. I have 
said a lot about the tracks already but you could say that it is raw and above 
all 'honest' music. My fave tracks are 'My Wave' 'Spoonman' 'Limo Wreck', 'Day 
I Tried To Live' and 'The Superunknown'.   

The shiny disk comes with a booklet and has all the songtexts with nice 'art' 
photos on the background in it.'Soundgarden' is along with the 'Stone Temple 
Pilots' my favourite 'Grung' group as you will find in the figures,     

Musical interest  : 7+  
Recording quality : 8-  
Value             : 7+    

I throw in the the songtext of 'Spoonman' before I proceed with the next 
review, seems appropriate with this review,  

SPOONMAN   

FEEL THE RHYTHM WITH YOUR HANDS  
STEAL THE RHYTHM WHILE YOU CAN, SPOONMAN  
SPEAK THE RHYTHM ON YOUR OWN  
SPEAK THE RHYTHM ALL ALONE, SPOONMAN      

SPOONMAN, COME TOGETHER WITH YOUR HANDS  
SAVE ME, I'M TOGETHER WITH YOUR PLAN  
SAVE ME
    
ALL MY FRIENDS ARE INDIANS 
ALL MY FRIENDS ARE BROWN AND RED, SPOONMAN  
ALL MY FRIENDS ARE SKELETONS  
THEY BEAT THE RHYTHM WITH THEIR BONES 
SPOONMAN   

FEEL THE RHYTHM WITH YOUR HANDS  
STEAL THE RHYTHM WHILE YOU CAN, SPOONMAN    

THANK YOU, GOODNIGHT PEOPLE 

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Title        : What's Up?  
Artist/group : Various  
Playing time : At least a hour or so      

The music world is virtually drowning in a never ending flow of compilation CDs 
! It seems that the musicscene have their own sort of 'Automation' compiling 
teams that try to bring you several compiles each month. Compilation CDs are 
very popular and the 'music-mob' makes quite a few bucks out of them. A big 
disadvantage of these compiles are, that you always get stuck with several 
tracks that you don't like or already have. The 'What's Up' CD is one of the 
first compiles that I almost like completely. It's ofcourse my personal taste 
and you don't have to share my opinion on this.    

'What's Up' contains a mix of mostly well-known rock-ballads or rock tracks 
from various groups. Here's a list of tracks that you will find on the disk, 
     
Easy                     - Faith No More  
What's Up                - 4 Non Blonds  
Losing My Religion       - Rapid Eye Movement (REM)  
Two Princes              - Spin Doctors  
Runaway Train            - Soul Asylum  
Remedy                   - The Black Crows  
Cats In The Cradle       - Ugly Kid Joe 
Plush                    - Stone Temple Pilots  
Would?                   - Alice in Chains  
Take Me With You         - The Jayhawks  
Taillights Fade          - Buffalo Tom  
Movin' Up The Cattle     - Burma Shave  
Hey Jealousy             - Gin Blossoms  
Motorcycle Emptiness     - Manic Street Preachers  
Parachute                - Something Happens  
Without You              - Childman  
Say Hello 2 Heaven       - Temple Of The Dog   
Under The Bridge         - Red Hot Chilli Peppers  
Smells Like Teen Spirit - ??      

I taped the CD and skipped a few tracks that I already had especially the last 
track, which was really worth skipping. It's a raped cover version of the 
original Nirvana track done by some bitchy female 'singer' who defiantly had 
short-circuited her vibrator. The previous sentence will certainly give this 
issue the predicate 'contains dirty and offending language'(hurrah) !   

Most stuff will be familiar to most of you, so I don't bother describing you 
the tracks on this compilation. I rather throw some figures at you and go on 
with the next review,      

Musical interest  : 7+  
Recording quality : 8   
Value             : 8- 
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Title        : The Soul Cages  
Artist/group : Sting  
Playing time : 48:16 minutes    

Former 'Police' leadsinger 'Sting' is already for quite some time on the solo 
side of things. He has never actually equaled the success days of 'The Police' 
in his solo career till now. But nevertheless he still is one of the big guys 
on the big international music stage. He does charity cases and tries to help 
Indians/Negros/dwarfs or what ever lurks within the dark rainforest. The only 
pity is that non of these poor souls saw any of the money so I have a short 
theory about what actually happened with it,    

With all this charity money rolling in, 'Sting' decided to keep it all for 
himself and use it to record his songs with 'Qsound' technique. He also stole 
bit's of some African music styles and mixed to whole thing together under the 
name 'The Soul Cages'.      

I'm afraid that I'm getting a bit carried away now, so back to the review part 
of the CD. Lets take a closer look at the tracks on the CD, starting with the 
titles,    

Island Of Souls               
All This Time   
Mad About You                 
Why Should I Cry For You? 
Jeremiah Blues (part 1)       
Saint Agnes And The Burning Train                         
The Wild Wild Sea 
The Soul Cages                         
When The Angels Fall      

The titles are not exactly in the right sequence because they are hard to read 
on the backside of the box. It's always hard to decipher almost white 
characters on a white background, huurrraaayy for the designer !

There is only one track on this CD that I recognized immediately and that was 
'All This Time', an older song. All the other tracks are a bit in the style of 
this song (a small hit) and could be seen as average. However, I bought the CD 
for another purpose than it's actual contents, it's one of the few CDs that is 
recorded with 'Qsound' ! You could read about this new technique in many of the 
other (disk)magazines so I will give you the facts in a nutshell  

The music gets more depth, clarity and a more three- dimensional imagery. It 
has something to do with putting sound in multiple channels on the CD(maybe 
something a long the line as a 8 channel tracker instead of 4 chan.) You don't 
need special equipment but you can use your conventional system. The 'Qsound' 
recordings can be recognized by the small 'Qsound' pictogram on the CD box.    

I must admit that the sound of this recording is more alive than that of a 
conventional stereo recording. But I must also state that I wasn't blown of my 
socks by 'Qsound' but it does add something to the recording. Lets hope that 
they going to use this technique in every future recording !  

Musical interest  : 7+  
Recording quality : 9+   
Value             : 8       

Here's another more 'profound' songtext to look at...   

I LOOKED OUT ACROSS 
THE RIVER TODAY 
I SAW A CITY IN THE FOG AND AN OLD CHURCH TOWER  
WHERE THE SEAGULLS PLAY  
I SAW THE SAD SHIRE HORSES WALKING HOME  
IN THE SODIUM LIGHT 
I SAW TWO PRIESTS ON THE FERRY  
OCTOBER GEESE ON A COLD WINTER'S NIGHT      

AND ALL THIS TIME THE RIVER FLOWED  
ENDLESSLY TO THE SEA      

TWO PRIESTS CAME AROUND OUR HOUSE TONIGHT  
ONE YOUNG, ONE OLD, TO OFFER PRAYERS FOR THE DYING  
TO SERVE THE FINAL RITE  
ONE TO LEARN, ONE TO TEACH  
WHICHS WAY THE COLD WIND BLOWS  
FUSSING AND FLAPPING IN PRIESTLY BLACK  
LIKE A MURDER OF CROWS  
AND ALL THIS TIME THE RIVER FLOWED  
ENDLESSLY TO THE SEA  
IF I HAD MY WAY I'D TAKE A BOAT FROM THE RIVER  
AND I'D BURY THE OLD MAN 
I'D BURY HIM AT SEA  

BLESSED ARE THE POOR, FOR THEY SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH 
BETTER TO BE POOR THAN A FAT MAN IN THE EYE OF A NEEDLE 
AND AS THESE WORDS WERE SPOKEN I SWEAR I HEAR  
THE OLD MAN LAUGHING  
'WHAT GOOD IS A USED UP WORLD, AND HOW COULD IT BE  
WORTH HAVING'      
AND ALL THIS TIME THE RIVER FLOWED  
ENDLESSLY LIKE A SILENT TEAR  
AND ALL THIS TIME THE RIVER FLOWED  
FATHER, IF JESUS EXISTS, 
THEN HOW COME HE NEVER LIVED HERE    

THE TEACHERS TOLD US, THAT THE ROMANS BUILT THIS PLACE  
THEY BUILT A WALL AND A TEMPLE, AN EDGE OF THE EMPIRE 
GARRISON TOWN  
THEY LIVED AND DIED, THEY PRAYED TO THEIR GODS  
BUT THE STONE GODS DID NOT MAKE A SOUND  
AND THE EMPIRE CRUMBLED, 'TILL ALL THAT WAS LEFT  
WERE THE STONES THE WORKMEN FOUND    
AND ALL THIS TIME THE RIVER FLOWED 
IN THE FALLING LIGHT OF THE NORTHERN SUN  
IF I HAD MY WAY I'D TAKE A BOAT FROM THE RIVER  
MEN GO CRAZY IN CONGREGATIONS  
BUT THEY ONLY GET BETTER  
ONE BY ONE  
ONE BY ONE....

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Title        : God Shuffled His Feet  
Artist/group : Crash Test Dummies   
Playing time : 44:52   

Sometime ago I came across a very enjoyable CD by a rather new band. The CD was 
given to a mate of mine for his birthday. When I visited him, he played it on 
his CD player. A red fog arose for my eyes, followed by a total black-out ! The 
police told me afterwards that I had brutally molested my mate and stole the CD 
from him. Now I'm in therapy, writing reviews about CDs for a disk- magazine. 
The psychologist's told me that there is only hope of full recovery when I 
write long review articles. Anyway they didn't take away the CD I took and 
therefore you can read the next review,      

I haven't found out exactly yet where this band is coming from but according to 
some information found in the booklet it must be either Canada or the U.S. The 
Crash Test Dummies certainly have a rather odd and funny frontman with a 
remarkable voice who looks like the leadsinger of a Metal band. The same man 
has also written all the lyrics to the songs on this CD. Most of the lyrics are 
simple but quite entertaining as they contain sometimes witty phrases and story 
lines.  

On the CD are 12 tracks from which 2 are hits,     

God Shuffled His Feet  
Afternoons & Coffeespoons  
Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm 
In The Days Of The Caveman  
Swimming In Your Ocean  
Here I Stand Before Me  
I Think I'll Disappear Now  
How Does A Duck Know?  
When I Go Out With Artists  
The Psychic  
Two Knight And Two Maidens  
Untitled    

I think that most of you out there know the second and third song as they both 
roamed the airwaves for a while. A description of their music is a bit hard. 
You could say that it resembles a 17th century music style with lyrics that 
jesters seemed to use in those days. They play the modern 20th century 
versions. My mate described it as a kind of folk music. Whatever it maybe it's 
nice to listen to for a change in a world full of hard-core House and heavy 
Metal.      

Musical interest  : 8-  
Recording quality : 8-  
Value             : 8-   

I leave with the songtext of Afternoons & Coffeespoons,
 
---- 
 
WHAT IS IT THAT MAKES ME JUST A LITTLE BIT QUEASY?
THERE'S A BREEZE THAT MAKES MY BREATHING NOT SO EASY
I'VE HAD MY LONGS CHECKED OUT WITH X RAYS 
I'VE SMELLED THE HOSPITAL HALLWAYS 
 
SOMEDAY I'LL HAVE A DISAPPEARING HAIRLINE
SOMEDAY I'LL WEAR PYJAMAS IN THE DAYTIME 
 
TIMES WHEN THE DAY IS LIKE A PLAY BY SARTRE
WHEN IT SEEMS A BOOKBURNING'S IN PERFECT ORDER..... 
I GAVE THE DOCTOR MY DESCRIPTION
I'VE TRIED TO STICK TO MY PRESCRIPTIONS 
 
SOMEDAY I'LL HAVE A DISAPPEARING HAIRLINE
SOMEDAY I'LL WEAR PYJAMAS IN THE DAYTIME 
 
AFTERNOONS WILL BE MEASURED OUT
MEASURED OUT, MEASURED WITH
COFFEESPOONS AND T.S. ELLIOT 
 
MAYBE IF I COULD DO A PLAY-BY-PLAYBACK
I COULD CHANGE THE TEST RESULTS THAT I GET BACK
I'VE WATCHED THE SUMMER EVENINGS PASS BY
I'VE HEARD THE RATTLE IN MY BRONCHI ... 
 
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~GREEN.PAL~
 
   
