Customer Reviews

Music for a Stranger World

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Veering from their usual formula, Bis finds themselves in a techno setting for 'Music For A Stranger World'. While the lack of guitars and usual breakneck beats aren't exactly abound here, Bis still manage to try things musically that most wouldn't dare think of. 'Are You Ready?', clearly the best of the batch, is anthemic and is deserved single status. 'Dead Wrestlers' is musically melancholy and a little silly, but still somewhat clever...in that Bis kind of way. Hopefully, this isn't the direction the band will continue in, but, for an experimental ep, it's not a bad place to visit. But...a message to Manda, Steven and John: Bring those guitars back and lay off the sequencers for a little while.

This mini-album is probably just a sample to what their new sound is evolving to. I like this album but it's ashame they kept the song out "DJ" which was included in the Japanese album. I was going to buy that import with the song but an extra $... is just ridiculous. "Dead Wrestlers" is a powerful song with good lyrics which does reflect their great lyric writing for "Return to Central". The only down-side about this album is that many of the techno beats sound like something that can be done in an easy do yourself comp program. But that would only be a problem to some people I know who couldn't like this album because of the simple techno sounds. Though I enjoy it nonetheless. The other songs that also make this album good is probably "How can we be Strange?" and "Are You Ready?" I kind of only like the first three songs more than the last three. Over all this new sound is more mature and like how "Intendo" was a sample to what "Social Dancing" is. "Music for a Stranger World" is what "Return to Central". So for a hardcore bis fan as myself this album is for you.

What a great song. Probably one of the best songs that I've ever heard. The rest of the EP is good even though I don't think that they could ever write a song as good as "Dead Wrestlers" again. That's the only thing. If every song by Bis was as good as this song, they'd be the best band ever. All of my friends like this song, even though they don't like dance-pop. The difference between this and radio dance pop is that this is actually intelligent. Something in music that I've been looking for quite a while for.

The opener "Dead Wrestlers" is a track that should be played (and probably will be) over and over and over and over again. One of the best pop songs of the last ten years or so. I have to be honest and say I haven't heard the other tracks more than once or twice, a shame really , but that's how overpowering "Dead Wrestlers" is. I keep setting the player back to "1" and enjoying. I just wish there were a couple of extra verses in it. But as for the other tracks "I Want It All" and "How Can we Be Strange" also sound promising. This was my first Bis CD. It won't be my last.

Bis is a very good band. I'ts the kind of music that makes a person smile. Although not all subjects in their lyrics are very optimistic, the music itself does sound optimistic. I like all stuff they put out. Social Dancing sounded different from the earlier stuff like the Transitor Heroes. After time i decided that, for me, Social Dancing is their best album until now. Music For A Stranger World is just one step further. It continues the progression in the music of this great band and it is a cd that i listen to a lot. It is short -22 min- but that's not a problem. I can't wait for their new album that should be released at the end of the summer.

If you are a Bis-fan already you don't have to read reviews, because you already know that it's one of the best bands around. If you're not yet familiar with Bis I suggest you take some serious action. It's for your own good.

I love Bis and will always love them and will always see them live and buy all their CDs, but this one veers away from both their trademarks, bubblegum and punk. This more mainstream sound is good, but doesn't make me as frantically happy as their earlier CDs. Really! Intendo and New Transistor Heros were like snorting pure Seratonin!

This is for the music fan from Los Angeles...see what happens when you overcontextualize, when you get hung up in your associations and hear ghosts and whispers when all you should be listening to is the fine fine music? Bis is evolving, dear heart-it is growing, like people do, leaving the past behind and finding new people to be, and all the while refining their style and cutting out diamond-hard picture-perfect pop. Feel this; that even though there is mad joy in teen-c revolutionaries, there is a deeper, softer, richer joy in the grown-up art...it's the difference between the feeling you get when you see a chick and the one you get when you see the adult bird soaring on the wind. Two distinct feelings, but both good, so don't feel loss for the child. There will always be new young clockwork punks.

uh...the EP is very good. Please buy it. Thank you.

Bis is a band that is constantly changing.  What began as two brothers and their childhood friend fooling around with guitars and nostalgic synthesizers grew into an actual band.  Their first releases were punk / pop hybrids, and "New Transistor Heros," their first full length CD, spotlighted their spiky, playful side.  The songs weren't profound or life-altering, but they sure were fun. Bis' excellent 1999 CD, "Social Dancing," saw the trio moving more into dance pop territory while still retaining a punk aesthetic.  The songwriting material matured as well, dealing with abusive relationships, gender identity, and shopaholics instead of candy and skateboarding.  This effort has a much slicker production value that allowed for a more layered texture to the music, but some fans complained that the group was losing their punkish edge. On "Music For A Stranger World," the band continues to show us that it can change with each new release.  The punk is still there, but it's no longer a seperate entity from the rest of the songs.  Instead, Bis fuses punk with techno, dance, new wave, and trance while burying their guitar riffs in kitschy synthesizer exhuberance.  The result is exhilerating.  The opening track, "Dead Wrestlers," builds from minimal synth melodies to robust guitar backing to deuling vocal harmonies on the chorus.  This explodes to the anthemic, fist-pumping "Are You Ready?" "How Can We Be Strange?" is a fine song in its own right, but retreads some material from previous releases, and is arguably the weak point on the disc.  After an instrumental interlude, the disc picks up with the swirling "I Want It All," followed by the chillingly robotic "Beats At The Office."  The final track, "Punk Rock Points," lets Bis fans know that the punk isn't quite gone yet. This EP marks a significant change in the overall sound of the band.  While some fans miss the simple attack-guitars of the Bis of Old, I'm a fan of the new cosmopolitan synthesizer Bis.  As for the band's future material?  I want it all.

This is the best Bis Record yet. They keep getting better and better as they gro up. I like BIS. They are the coolest. This is more along the lines of their earlier work than social dancing.

Once again a I give Props to Manda, Sci FI and Disco. They're really come together again proving their Skills. Social Dancing set the stage on which they one up'd things again track 3 gets your head pumping, and the bonus track Dead Wrestlers so funny I love their p-lite sound. Check out 311 and Built to spill if you want somethign a little more on the punk/hip hop side.