Just in...Rubik: Solar

    New albums and bands I've never heard of keep popping up suddenly! It seemed like there was going to be a pretty good dry spell this year, until the highly anticipated releases like Radiohead (already out digitally!) and The Mars Volta (waiting on the record company to release finished album) came out. instead, this has been a rather decent start to the year musically and it seems we hit our stride in March with, so far, three new release posts. The latest discovery made was today on WITR FM 89.7 "The Pulse of Music", and it is a Finnish band called Rubik. Their newest album, Solar, releases today on the Fullsteam label and is available fully streaming on Rubik's website here (*edit: link no longer available).
    Actually, the song I heard on WITR was not from Solar, but it struck me as very interesting, well crafted music; also I immediately thought of its likeness to Sufjan Stevens, how the winds and brass instrumentation was added to the pop/rock style of "Goji Berries" from their 2009 sophomore release, Dada Bandits. I've also been listening to their 2007 compilation album, Jesus vs. People, and have found it an enjoyable mix too. Honestly, I have not quite figured out their label yet, pop/rock seems appropriate, except that mostly I hear very progressive rock angular rhythms and drumming, and other times the post-rock sensibilities that Scandinavian and Icelandic bands are surely known for. It also reminds me of Dredg, Radiohead from the more acoustic songs of Amnesiac perhaps, and of course Sigur Rós.
    The album artwork is very interesting for Solar, as if there was a very visible dense cloud hovering around their heads, or the picture has no real personal value and the band decided to blur out the people's faces because they did not even know who they were or something. But, that is just a side note to what matters, the music. At first listen, I heard influences of Jónsi, with intense upbeat rhythmic songs and lyrical melodic singing, while maintaining a lightheartedness and frivolity that makes this more or less complicated music easy listening. Solar as a whole seems to stray a bit from it's purer progressive roots, erring on the lighter pop side of the genre spectrum. Each song progresses nicely nonetheless, hardly staying confined within one particular style, but merging them seamlessly. It is hard for me to categorize or describe their music much further. I realize that the more music I listen to, the more it all sounds a like, or at least evokes musical memories of another song/group. So, instead of telling you how each song sounds like this one or that group, I will have the audacity to suggest that this group listens a lot and samples, in a non-electronic technical definition way, many groups by utilizing and experimenting with sounds they like from each. Either that or they just make stylistic eclecticism very attractive, yet comparably difficult; because they do it very well indeed.
    I have very much enjoyed this album, I hope you do too! It might not be your next favorite album, but they are worth a solid listen, to each of their LPs. Check out the longest track (7:05) on Solar "Storm in a Glass of Water" in the MixPod, which has a great middle section; the whole streaming album using the link provided earlier in the post; or more from previous albums here on their MySpace page.