Best albums of 2004

Is it too late for that ever returning ego-tripping thing they call 'end of year lists'? Dunno, but here's my top 15 (in alphabetical order)of 2004 anyway:
AEREOGRAMME – Seclusion
AUF DER MAUR – Auf der Maur
DAAN – Victory
FRANZ FERDINAND – Franz Ferdinand
MAGNUS – The body gave you everything
MANSUN – Kleptomania
MAURO & THE GROOMS – Black Europa
MORRISSEY – Morrissey, you are the quarry
NOVASTAR – Another lonely soul
SECRET MACHINES – Now here is nowhere
SOPHIA – Collections:One
SOPHIA – People are like seasons
SOULWAX – Any minute now
THE TWILIGHT SINGERS – She loves you
THE VEILS – The runaway found

Robin in INTRO magazine

The people at German music mag INTRO are a bit lazy, so they always ask other people to review new records. In the last issue of the mag, one of those people was Robin Proper-Sheppard. They asked his opinion on the new albums of Handsome Boy Modeling School, Das Pop, Kreator, Chicks on speed,...
Here is what he had to say: http://www.intro.de/magazin/pvg_dyn.php?ausgabe=123

Robin also had to list his all time favourite albums, he chose these five:
Neil Young Harvest
The Morlochs Emerge
Echo And The Bunnymen Crocodiles
The Cure 17 Seconds
Massive Attack Mezzanine

Copenhagen on listening post

Flower Shop band Copenhagen again... If you want to listen to the full album in an excellent audio stream, then check out the VPRO Luisterpaal. It's some sort of online listening post with a bunch of cool music. They put new albums on it several times a week. (You have to click 'Omlaag' to scroll down to older albums.)
It's over here, dudes:
http://www.vpro.nl/3voor12/luisterpaal/luisterpaalmain.shtml
You can still buy the album at the online Flower Shop store.

BTW, if you're at the Luisterpaal, check out the Victory album by Daan. He's Belgian and currently on some kind of disco trip. Groovy. 'Housewife' was a big hit this summer, and it's a bloody instrumental! It really rocks when they play it live.
Daan has a brilliant voice (check out the albums he made with Rudy Trouvé (ex-dEUS) as Dead Man Ray) and - here comes the Sophia connection - just like Robin Proper-Sheppard he's a regular at the L'Archiduc pub in Brussels. Was that a bit far-fetched? Ok, I'll shut up now.

Norwegian TV commercial

If you've visited the sophiamusic.net forum before, you might have seen an entry about a TV commercial for a Norwegian insurance company called Gjensidige Nor. That commercial uses the music from Sophia's 'Another trauma', the last song on People Are Like Seasons.
After a bunch of Google searches and some further detective work I finally managed to track down the commercial. It was made by Fantefilm and is called 'Maria'.

There's always some controversy when 'credible' musicians sell their music to commercials, but personally I don't really care. It doesn't ruin the original song for me. And I can understand why they do it too. Considering the current state of the music industry, big heaps of cash are probably very welcome for any musician. I personally don't mind big heaps of money either!

Anyway, you can check out the commercial here:
http://www.fantefilm.no/nyshow/video/Maria.mpg

PS I changed the 'comment' settings of the blog so from now on you no longer have to register in order to post a comment. (I hadn't noticed that under the default settings you had to register.)

Stare into your Dream Machine

This Sony clock radio was made especially for God Machine fans.
Thank you SONY!

German magazines

Verena was so kind to send me some end-of-year polls from German magazines. Sophia did pretty well!

INTRO
Intro Redaktion Alben 2004
3. Interpol - Antics
5. Phoenix - Alphabetical
7. Kante - Zombi
18. Kings Of Convenience - Riot On An Empty Street
47. Sophia - People Are Like Seasons

MUSIKEXPRESS
Musikexpress Redaktion Album 2004
9. Interpol - Antics
10. Sophia - People Are Like Seasons
25. Phoenix - Alphabetical
29. The Bees - Free The Bees

ROLLING STONE
Rolling Stone Leser Album 2004
8. Interpol - Antics
12. Kante - Zombi
26. Sophia - People Are Like Seasons
28. Lambchop - Aw Cmon/No You Cmon

Spex Leser "Konzert 2004"
2. Kante
5. Phoenix
10. Sophia

Sonic Front R.I.P.

God Machine fans will no doubt recognise the quote in the above picture/obituary. The quote's from a Bertolucci movie and was also used in 'Dream Machine' on the first God Machine album.

Christoph Renne was a member of the German band Sonic Front and was diagnosed with cancer a while ago. He passed away last December. Kai from Sonic Front - who's a big God Machine and Sophia fan - sent me an e-mail today explaining how - sadly - this makes him think about what happened with The God Machine and Jimmy Fernandez. Just like Jimmy had just finished the second GM album , Christoph had just finished most of his parts for the new Sonic Front album. And just like the remaining God Machine members couldn't go on without Jimmy, Sonic Front are so devestated by the loss of their band member that they have decided to split up the band. Or as Kai said it "My band died the same day Christoph did."

Life's a bitch...

Copenhagen review in HUMO

Copenhagens last album 'Sweet dreams' (FLOWCD 20) got a review in this weeks HUMO magazine. No big deal, you might say. Well it is here in Belgium. HUMO is the most important magazine over here and every record company tries to get a review of their latest releases in HUMO. But they only review about 5 albums a week, so you get the picture... If you do get in, better hope for a good review, a bad HUMO review can absolutely 'kill' the album sales.

So Copenhagen got in and they got a good review! They start off with a small description of the 'Tales from the forest' album and how it was so unlogical in a time where everything was about the guitars of The Strokes and The White Stripes and Copenhagen released an album of theatrical 'chamber pop'. 'Sweet Dreams' does have guitars on it (they don't fail to mention that Sophia's Robin Proper-Sheppard plays some guitar on the album) but still turns its back to what's currently 'hip'. Favourite songs of the reviewer are 'Soldier', 'We want you here' and 'Shark attack'. He draws some comparisons to The Divine Comedy and Cousteau and ends like this: "with a glass of absinthe, the album is a perfect soundtrack for all your silent nights".

Copenhagen are currently trying to get sick leave at work so they can tour around Europe. The only gig that I know of so far is at The Cactus Club in Bruges. Better keep an eye on www.copenhagen-uk.co.uk for more dates.

Introduction

Well, here we go. This blog is supposed to be a safe haven for all vaguely Sophia related stuff that's to marginal to fit on www.sophiamusic.net
Expect a lot of grammar and spelling mistakes. Expect a lot of useless information. Expect some gossip. Expect in-jokes. Honestly I really don't know what you should expect. Me rambling on about Sophia I suppose. You know as much as I do, I'm just another idiot with a blog!

Sophia in Spain

Did you know that Sophia's gig at the Primavera festival is the very first Sophia gig in Spain!? Or did I miss something? Sophia have been doing very well in Italy, but Spain never really took off. Untill now it seems.
The festival promotor hasn't announced any names yet but a few have been announced by the bands themselves. Like on Sophiamusic.net. It took the Spanish punters only 1 day to find out that Sophia would play at the festival: http://www.primaverasound.com/foros/viewtopic.php?t=1042

By the way, can somebody in Scandinavia explain to me why PALS didn't really make over there? The other Sophia albums did really well in Scandinavia, but with the last album things went rather downhill. In the rest of Europe (except for the UK, but they don't consider themselves as being part of Europe anyway :-) ) Sophia made a big step forward, but in Scandinavia things got worse. Strange.