cLOUDDEAD - cLOUDDEAD (2001) (Special Review: Dan)

I'm listening to cLOUDDEAD's self titled 2001 album by request from Matt. He never really told me what genre it is, or what I should expect and as I've never heard them before I came into this expecting anything. I would call cLOUDDEAD a hip hop album, but as I'm not really a hip hop fan and don't have a lot to compare this to people may wish to argue with this. I enjoyed the track listing - there are six track titles, each with two parts. I was expecting twelve different tracks though, but I was pleasantly surprised after listening to both parts of Apt. A to find that they were relatively similar sounding, and then after hearing the first part to And All You Can Do Is Laugh was pleased to hear that it sounded very different.

To be honest, I find this really difficult to review; There is nothing I like about what I hear, but there is not I don't like at the same time. This genre of music just doesn't interest me. The vocals are bizarre, and I think the whole album reminds me of The Avalanches - which can't really be a good thing.

I'm actually having so much trouble trying to write anything here, I just can't understand what there is to enjoy about this album. I also can't really work out how to give it a score. Because from my statement where I said that "There is nothing I like but there is nothing I don't like" it suggests that it should be given a 2.5 - A nice, medium score. However, at the same time I'm thinking 'If there is NOTHING that I like, how can I give it anything more than a 0?'. So, cLOUDDEAD has been difficult on a number of levels, I think listening has been the worst.

It has a very electronic sound, with vocals that sound quirky, and extremely unusual. I recall Matt telling me that he likes unusual, and I think that is why he likes this - I really can't think of another reason why he might. Also, though I think it's a bit irrelevant, I seem to have noticed that on every hiphop album I have listened to in the past, there has been a section where we hear a phone being dialled or ringing. Hip-Hoppers clearly find this an exciting sound...Sadly, I dont.

I'm going to give up with this now, there really is nothing else I can say. Ah, although I can announce that I was only able to listen to this thanks to Spotify. Though, if anything, this is a bad thing.

So I need to come up with a score...I'm just going to go between my two thoughts, and give it a 1.25 / 5.

"It's all the same shit, but they call it cLOUDDEAD"