Between the Buried and Me's Tommy Rogers has been working on his side project, Thomas Giles, for a few years now and has certain proven and equally extended his musical abilities through the endeavour. From his well-received debut release, ‘Pulse’, which contained some electrifying tracks, to his latest release ‘Modern Noise’ we see a strong progression. The creative control that the solo project allows has worked in the musician's favour making this sophomore offering a release with expectations to meet.
Starting with the beautiful and atmospheric ‘Wise and Silent,’ complete with light, calming keyboards, it's a very dreamy song. At just over three minutes, the track has no vocals but rather starts the record off in a trance-like state before we head into ‘Mutilated World’, which offers the listener a greater rock vibe with layering that shows off how far Rogers instrumental skills have come.
'Modern Noise' largely follows a pop-rock kind of vibe, but we also see some interesting variation. Tracks like ‘Blueberry Queen’ hold a bluesy vibe while ‘We Wander Lonely’ takes influence from a larger gothic sound and ‘The Devil Net’ calls on a dark sound with its synths.
If you listened to his previous solo album, you know that Rogers is a big fan of musical variation and utilising a range of collective influences. However, unlike his previous album, which seemed to lack some cohesion at times, these songs manage to fit together and are structured brilliantly.
The full-length is essentially a very different and intriguing one. The sounds are hard to explain but this is one you will either love completely or hate. Either way, the BTBAM member has come a long way and there has no doubt been a noticeable improvement in his skill set making the album great on a technical level.
'Modern Noise' is structurally a solid album and shows off a lot of Thomas Giles' musical attributes. The album is unique in its own way and honestly rather strange. But that can be a good thing. It is likely to divide fans but, either way, you have to hand it to the musician for trying something different and producing a technically skilled album.
1. Wise And Silent
2. Mutilated World
3. Siphon The Bad Blood
4. I Appear Disappear
5. Blueberry Queen
6. We Wander Lonely
7. M3
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9. Noise Upon
10. Wander Drug
11. The Devil Net
12. Modern Noise
