Music reviews. CD reviews. Critically hip!

Endtime ballads.  This is the self described essence of Crippled Black Phoenix's A Love of Shared Disasters.  At its heart, this band is a collaboration started by Justin Greaves of the immensely heavy Electric Wizard.  Joining him are members of many other bands including Mogwai, Pantheist, and Portishead.  Needless to say, the result is an eclectic set of songs that dance between many different genres of music.  Methodical in its movements,  A Love of Shared Disasters tells stories of love and redemption through the employment of Victorian era instruments and the modern rock standards.  The seemingly discordant influences and instruments mesh quite well to carry the listener on a voyage over 12 tracks, where one can still find hope in sorrow, bleak and desperate. 

The myriad influences present here have created an emotional post-rock meets folk-rock opus that few fans of any music should pass up.  Their effort is altogether unique as  languorous post-rock tempos meet ambient trip-hop segments and bluesy folk rock overlays to create 70 minutes of memorable music.  The tunes are hard to compare to anything else, as they are so many different things at once.  The incomparable stylings are creepy, regretful, sad, hopeful, and altogether brilliant.  The album, despite its heavy themes, never gets dull, and feels just as appropriate on the coldest rainy days as it does on a warm summer evening.  The songs I come back to the most tend to be Suppose I told the Truth, and You Take the Devil Out of Me.  The latter song breaks the boundaries of genre borders to create a gripping, memorable experience.

Crippled Black Phoenix should be in any modern post-rock or folk-rock collection as one of the best, most unique albums this year.  Part of a supposed trilogy of albums, one can only hope that this is a sign of things to come.  You seriously owe it to yourself to listen to this album.  Crippled Black Phoenix takes the listener on a private tour through the hardships of humanity, showing that there is still life even at the end of the world.  Endtime ballads indeed.