Music Reviews

In November of 2008, my life was changed forever with the release of World of Warcraft’s second expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. So immersive was the game and the soundtrack that came with it, I ended up spending hours days weeks completely enveloped in the game, experiencing all it had to offer with friends I still know today. Although I don’t play more than once or twice a year anymore, this soundtrack was the backdrop of my late-teens and early-twenties and continues to enchant me to this day.

I remember listening to this a lot when I first moved to London in 2011, and it still scratches a London-vibe itch that I get now and then.

This album means a lot to me. This album came into my life just before the summer after Grade 10, and I remember listening to this almost-religiously with my close friends. It pulled us together and over that summer and during the next couple of years, we ended up forming a four-piece rock band, and played a handful of coffeehouses—once in the cafeteria of a residence hall at University—but the best part were the jam sessions. The funky and soulful sound that RHCP perform on this album was refined, polished and unbelievably-catchy. And it still is.

I remember this album playing in my Dad’s car often when I was young, and never had any particular draw towards it, but I have fond memories of nodding in and out of sleep while this played from a cassette tape in his rusty old Mazda I had named Chickalude. My Mum’s car was called Kaku; although, I called everything Kaku when I named the car in my early years. Revisiting this album decades later, I love this album for its nostalgia, but also its melodic, jazzy, synth-driven sound.

Silky-smooth synths will captivate you and take you to a time long ago… but not forgotten. Like a mother’s cooking, this will instantly transport you back in time to when life was simpler—when all you wanted to do was cruise the winding coastline roads, ever-washed in moonlight, while some hard-hitting basslines and uplifting melodies punch through the night air, interrupted only by the fierce roar of the V8-engine that pulls you endlessly, onwards, into the future.

This is easily one of my favourite albums of all time. Mind-bending beats, deep and thoughtful lyrics. One of the best releases of 2017, I think.