Hide and Seek

     I don't totally remember when I picked up Hide and Seek, but I found it in my already-reviewed CD pile. Though obviously I haven't reviewed it. This album, by the synthrock band The Birthday Massacre, reunites some of my favorite sub-genres for some kind of music I haven't seen in a while. It was also refreshing to have a female vocalist because, for whatever reason, the majority of the albums I pick tend to have male singers. The lead vocalist calls herself 'Chibi' which is a term used in Japan to describe small and cute. Chibi's voice in the beginning of the album quite resembles Beth Gibbons of Portishead when using her airy voice not her nasally one. Chibi also becomes less shy as the album progresses and really grows into her voice, ending on a very strong note.

     The opening song to Hide and Seek, Leaving Tonight, starts with an eerie gust of wind, and then abruptly goes into the tune, which I was not prepared for. But the quality of the song later made up for that. The second track, Down, starts out with industrial-type music that kind of sounds like futuristic Nine Inch Nails but when the chorus hits the music changes to an 80's pop background which was a little odd at first but made for an interesting song. Tracks 4 and 5 solely had relations to 80's pop music. The sixth song, Alibis, I especially liked except for some discontinuity between the flow of the lyrics and the music. Track 7 was where Chibi's vocals really started to pick up and retained that throughout the remainder of the album. The last song ended with the same eerie gusts of wind the album started with. All and all, a pretty enjoyable listen, not really a bad song on there. I think this is  what trip hop from the 90's evolved into. So enjoy, listen, and critique.