Glass Swords

Trying to describe Rustie's sound would take a while, 'Glass Swords' is a mash-up of everything thats good and bad and worse still in music and video games in the last 30 years, glossed over with the most shiny 1980's sheen you could imagine. Imagine snorting a kilo of Haribo's and you might have some idea where Rustie is coming from.

The album is a frantic mess, when it works its pretty special, but when it doesn't its annoyingly bad. 'Hover traps', 'City Star' and 'After Light' is Rustie on form, perfectly balancing a dizzying array of sugar-coated musical styles with supreme skill, his production skills really come to the fore. But the rest of the album is a self-indulgent mess, using an array of digital excesses bordering on the ridiculous. And it's such a fine line that Rustie has cut, so many tracks fall from the sublime over the edge to fluorescent meltdown.

'Glass Swords' is probably the most in-your-face record you will hear all year, be prepared for a technicolour onslaught, at its best it's as candy-floss pixel-perfectly formed as you could dream of. As refreshing as this album is, Rustie could have done with not throwing everything into the musical melting pot all the time. 'Glass Swords' does not feel of its time, but unfortunately its myriad influences are what lets it down, chiefly the 1980's technicolor sound. The flashy synth chords and slap-bass samples just start to annoy you, in fact the whole 80's synth funk smacks of naff. Its as if he's trying to out-do his Glaswegian funk-bass mate Hudson Mohawke.

"Glass Swords' is all about the rush, the energy, amped to the max with no let-up. If you can handle 40 minutes of such high-octane euphoria, you'll love this album. But for me, Rustie is trying too hard, using too many ideas, and ends up confusing himself and us in the process.

Trying to describe Rustie's sound would take a while, 'Glass Swords' is a mash-up of everything thats good and bad and worse still in music and video games in the last 30 years, glossed over with the most shiny 1980's sheen you could imagine. Imagine snorting a kilo of Haribo's and you might have some idea where Rustie is coming from.

The album is a frantic mess, when it works its pretty special, but when it doesn't its annoyingly bad. 'Hover traps', 'City Star' and 'After Light' is Rustie on form, perfectly balancing a dizzying array of sugar-coated musical styles with supreme skill, his production skills really come to the fore. But the rest of the album is a self-indulgent mess, using an array of digital excesses bordering on the ridiculous. And it's such a fine line that Rustie has cut, so many tracks fall from the sublime over the edge to fluorescent meltdown.

'Glass Swords' is probably the most in-your-face record you will hear all year, be prepared for a technicolour onslaught, at its best it's as candy-floss pixel-perfectly formed as you could dream of. As refreshing as this album is, Rustie could have done with not throwing everything into the musical melting pot all the time. 'Glass Swords' does not feel of its time, but unfortunately its myriad influences are what lets it down, chiefly the 1980's technicolor sound. The flashy synth chords and slap-bass samples just start to annoy you, in fact the whole 80's synth funk smacks of naff. Its as if he's trying to out-do his Glaswegian funk-bass mate Hudson Mohawke.

"Glass Swords' is all about the rush, the energy, amped to the max with no let-up. If you can handle 40 minutes of such high-octane euphoria, you'll love this album. But for me, Rustie is trying too hard, using too many ideas, and ends up confusing himself and us in the process.

I feel inspired to write a review after listening to this CD a few times now. I am not much of a writer and I don't suppose or propose to do any other reviews unless something very unusually good comes along. The other reviews capture some of the qualities of the music. Yes - it is very glossy. Some of the synth sounds used will remind you of the 80's, some will remind you of rave hoovers and some are just plain crazy.

I was stuck in a traffic jam having just purchased this, so I put it into the CD player..... the cars in front and behind must have thought I was having a fit or something. I was smiling all the way home and listened to it around three times - although arrived home with a bit of a headache.

I suspect this CD will be like Marmite to many - you'll either love it or hate it. I found the tunes intelligent and thoroughly enjoyable. The production is crisp, I find the tempo a good 'head nodding' tempo and the sounds and instrumentation are crazy (but not in my opinion a mess). It is very noisy and full-on / relentless but for me personally very very enjoyable. Not normally the type of music I listen to at all - and I suspect there aren't too many other albums like this around.

Thank-you Rustie for doing something different that put a smile on my face!