| Author
|
California Sunshine - Rebirth
|
a'damn
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
89
Posts :
199
Posted : May 21, 2010 06:34:26
|
Artist: California Sunshine
Album: Rebirth
Label: Phonokol
Artist Discogs Page: http://www.discogs.com/artist/California+Sunshine
Buy this Album from Saikosounds here: http://www.saikosounds.com/english/display_release.asp?id=8459
Review:
Reviewing this album is hard. Times have changed, generations have moved forward, and it’s kind of tricky to reference and appreciate this album while also maintaining a perspective of someone who might be new to this music. So I’m going to get a few things out first, then we can move into the review more solidly.
Long long ago, there was a project called California Sunshine. Having a name that is an obvious wink’n'nod to the blotter of the same name gives us our first level of understanding. If we take that concept and also interweave it with the literal idea of some California Sunshine you will begin to understand how to approach this album.
Cheesy named blotter of the 90’s + Sun shining California coasts = a very specific Israeli Trance energy. And it is very epic.
The album starts off with a nice updated version of their classic track Rain. Rain is a beautiful song on, what I believe to be their best album, Nasha. So the album starts by taking a piece of its past and fitting it through the holes of time and into this new world of EPIC. I mean, I know California Sunshine have always been quite epic in their cheese factor, but damn; this album goes above and beyond. They go above and beyond and do it well too. I was honestly caught off guard. I didn’t think that I would love this album as much as I do.
At first, I wasn’t sure what to think of the guitars (and there are lots of guitars), but after the disk ended the first time, I reflected upon the music and wanted to hear it again. The second listening, without the shock of the guitars, was even better. I was able to appreciate why they were there and the story that they helped tell. And there aren’t guitars on every single track or anything either. I just know to mention these things because I will be flamed if I don’t. But jesus christ, this album is so uplifting and so good.
This album feels GREAT. It makes you smile a lot. It pushes forth the energies of cosmic compatibility and hopeful longing. It allows you to appreciate the spring time flowers in bloom, the bits of rain that give those flowers life, then the sun shining down upon them and making them grow. The air of spring. Of life. Of rebirth. The album is a massive MDMA pill that you can ingest aurally and have no shitty hangover with. It just makes you feel good.
*FLASH* memory of playing on the beach with your family when 9 years old
*FLASH* memory of eating a big birthday cake with missing teeth because you just lost another baby tooth
*FLASH* memory of that sunrise on the mountain, in the arms of the person you love, breathing the fresh air of life, watching your friends dance on the dance floor
*FLASH* memory of that one smile, from that one person, that you’ll never ever forget
This is California Sunshine.
It is a massively big hug and a great piece of heart.
Now, for the VERY IMPORTANT DJ ANALYSIS OF THIS RECORD…
lol
Ok, so… I know very few people who would ever actually play this album out. But most of my friends are too cool to appreciate the level of beauty and cheese within this disk, so that doesn’t bother me much. This album is very much for certain types of DJs and people with certain types of tastes. I will gladly play these tracks during any sunrise set. In fact, I promise that if you hear me playing in the morning at a party this summer, I will totally rock this album. The momentum is infectuous. The drive is rejuvenating. The guitars are very unique. It’s not buttrock goa. It’s not metal trance. I almost want to say that it is like a proper Monster Ballads accompaniment to top shelf Israeli morning trance. Done right.
What’s really nice though, is that the album is something that over the past 3 weeks, I have just put on to listen to over and over. It’s not simply DJ material. I actually really love listening to this album and being transported into the feelings and emotions contained therein. Now I just wish Man With No Name would come out and release something totally killer and new again. That would be sweet.
So it’s California Sunshine. If you are familiar with them and like them, you should pick this up. While Rebirth doesn’t quite reach the levels of Nasha, it is still a fantastic album and reaches a completely different set of level and ideas.
I’m very happy that this is getting released just before the summer season starts, because some great anthemic California Sunshine is _exactly_ what this summer needs. Completely.
2010 has been an interesting year and I am very happy to have California Sunshine as part of the soundtrack of my summer. It will be a good summer indeed.
Hopefully you’ll have a good one too. Maybe California Sunshine can help with your soundtrack as well.
xoxox
-A’damn
  nlm - http://goaconstrictor.com v4.2 |
|
|
|
Yidam
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
144
Posts :
3171
Posted : May 21, 2010 10:04
|
Love the review!  Gotta check the album out now. |
|
|
|
PsyUNIT
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
17
Posts :
293
Posted : May 25, 2010 11:26
|
Very nice review. Love these kind of reviews which describe the feelings that the music evokes rather than cold , technical reviews such as "at 1.03 the kick comes in & then at 2.05 the snare starts etc."
How the music makes u feel is what's it all about. Will check out this album just because of the review. 
********************************************
Travel, Without Moving. |
|
|
|
a'damn
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
89
Posts :
199
Posted : May 25, 2010 11:58
|
|
Nathan
IsraTrance Senior Member
Started Topics :
301
Posts :
3605
Posted : May 25, 2010 23:25
|
Nice Review. Good Full-Goa Music. 
-=The Meaning Of Life Is To Give Life A Meaning= |
|
|
|
Bom*shankar
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
19
Posts :
512
Posted : May 26, 2010 09:14
|
|
hmmmm.... me skeptic! |
|
|
|
exotic
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
200
Posts :
5057
Posted : May 26, 2010 21:04
|
I hate to burst the bubble blown & brewing here, but this re-birth is more in the euro-trance world than in the psychedelic universe. the guitars really ruin it for me. i wouldn't recommend this to any one who is expecting 'uplifting' morning trance the way they did it in their previous works. its not very bad but its totally not what the review suggests. very biased and totally unobjective. sorry but thats my take, calling a spade a spade here. Nostalgia doesn't mean accepting re-hashed versions that sound like tiesto going full on and calling it epic.
I will be listening to more of sound of Goa and the midian remix though. the only two good tracks on here. missing plug-in |
|
|
|
a'damn
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
89
Posts :
199
Posted : May 26, 2010 22:47
|
lol
All reviews are biased as there is no rubric for objectivity in What Makes Music Good.
That's a rather ridiculous statement for you to make.
Disagreeing with my review is awesome. Please do. But don't throw around vocabulary that doesn't fit.
nlm - http://goaconstrictor.com v4.2 |
|
|
|
exotic
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
200
Posts :
5057
Posted : May 27, 2010 06:29
|
If you weren't a CS fan and reviewed this as an outsider listening to CS for the first time wouldn't your review have been less governed by emotions and nostalgia because it seems like you wanted it to be exactly how you perceived it to be regardless of how it actually sounds?
Im sorry a'damn, i really like you reviews otherwise for example the evsy album. please go back to that and see how this review is different! music is totally subjective but a review has to be honest and transparent so that it doesn't lead unsuspecting folks up the wrong alley:)
piece out bro.
missing plug-in |
|
|
|
goaren
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
60
Posts :
1151
Posted : May 27, 2010 15:29
|
im with exotic here... I really had high expectations from such a legend to release a new album and like exotic said - its a rehash of classics with an uber cheesey touch, add to that some seriously unnecessary guitar touches that take the tracks nowhere but to maybe handsintheair eurotrance kind of music and you get what is (in my opinion) a very disappointing album 
just yesterday i was at a party where the original version of rain was played, and regardless of nostalgia this track still makes me feel so optimistic, happy and add to that the drive of the track... simply amazing - if you cant keep the original feel/atmosphere of such a milestone track then simply dont remix it - and thats true for any new version of a classic in my opinion.
anyways, i will still be listening to the old california sunshine albums with har-el, cuz what CS is today is just plain cheese for me |
|
|
|
a'damn
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
89
Posts :
199
Posted : May 29, 2010 03:07
|
The only California Sunshine album that I like is Nasha.
Everything else was rubbish. Believe me, I am not a massive CS fan. I just think this album rules.
nlm - http://goaconstrictor.com v4.2 |
|
|
|
a'damn
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
89
Posts :
199
Posted : May 29, 2010 03:09
|
But I am very happy that there are dissenting opinions in here and that there is a lively discussion going with it. Hopefully it will simply encourage others to check out the album and make up their own minds
nlm - http://goaconstrictor.com v4.2 |
|
|
|
