Mastermind [Import]

1. Queen Of The World

2. Wonderful Life

3. Move In Time

4. Mastermind

5. Pretty Young Thing

6. Hypnotise Me

7. Hymn

8. Come To Me

9. Increase The Dose

10. Tomorrow's Tomorrow

11. Rip It Up

12. Alive

13. Wonderful Life (Ballad Version)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Tina Cousins returns with her long awaited album Mastermind. Highlight tracks include the hit singles 'Wonderful Life' and 'Come To Me'. 13 total tracks. Big Records. 2005.

Mastermind,Tina Cousins,Big Records,Club/Dance,Dance,Dance Music,Dance-Pop,Euro-Dance,Pop,Rock/Pop

Barbeque Babylon
Average customer rating:

Um...wow.

Righty likes track 16, whoot!

A Masterpiece of Strange / Pop Art for 2006

Track 16 is ridiculous

Stan at top of form!

Barbeque Babylon
Stan Ridgway , and Drywall
Manufacturer: Redfly
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Snakebite:Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive Songs

Holiday in Dirt

The Index Masters

The Big Heat

Partyball

ASIN: B000AXWGTU
Release Date: 2005-08-30

Tracks:

Goin' On Down To The BBQ
Fortune Cookies
Somewhere In The Dark
Abandon Ship
Buried The Pope
In Total Focus
The AARP Is After Me
That Big Weird Thing
Robbers & Bandits & Bastards & Thieves
Rain On Down
The Alibi Room
Wargasm
Bold Marauder
Land Of Spook
Something's Gonna Blow
Untitled

Amazon.com

In the mid '90s, Wall of Voodoo mainstay-turned-solo artist Stan Ridgway bid farewell to the major label treadmill via Drywall's masterfully dark debut and embarked on an indie career as the more historically-rooted, acoustically-centered singer-songwriter found of the compelling Black Diamond, Snakebite and Anatomy albums. The original Drywall concept ("a trilogy of apocalyptic documents") seemed intended to variously antagonize his then-label, subtly evoke his Wall of Voodoo past and offer outlet for his latent "mad scientist" tendencies. But Ridgway has completed that decade-spanning triptych with an album that's closer in tone to his elegiac modern solo work (his main accomplices here are also the same, keyboardist/vocalist Pietra Wextun and guitarist Rick King), if no less thematically provocative than DW's first installment. The infectious, industrialized zydeco of "Goin' On Down to the BBQ" revolves around a typically debauched Ridgway storyline, while elsewhere Stan variously stirs in jazz (the saxed-up "Fortune Cookies"), cinematic cool (the evocative "Somewhere in the Dark" and "Rain On Down") and even folk conceits both nautical ("Abandon Ship," "Robbers & Bandits & Bastards & Thieves") and Celtic (Wexstun's haunting "Bold Marauder"). "The AARP is After Me" and tipsy "Something's Gonna Blow" are filled with typically self-deprecating Ridgway wit, while the electro-edginess of "In Total Focus" and "That Big Weird Thing" contrast sharply with the stark beauty of the morally ambiguous ballad "Buried the Pope." Drywall closes out their first trilogy in rich, expansive style - and ultimately leaves listeners hoping they'll embark on another soon. --Jerry McCulley

Customer Reviews:

Um...wow........2007-01-11

I love Stan Ridgway - witness my extensive collection of CDs and ticket stubs. I think he and Peitra are national treasures.
However.....
I have to say I found this album very hard to get my mind around. I am no stranger to music that is (more than a little) outre'. And I am willing to give anything involving Stan a chance. Several chances. But I honestly didn't enjoy this album. (Sorry Stan)

But it won't keep me from buying the next one!

Righty likes track 16, whoot!.......2006-07-21

All of Stan's work has shown a deep suspicion of the industrial-military complex, heaped and blended with existential nihilism. I never took such a dim view of American life personally, but appreciated his artistic window into the darker side of society. For the record I'm a right-of-center, Republican-leaner who voted for Bush twice and I found track sixteen to be clever and, yes, a bit childish, but fun and I enjoy childish fun even when it steps on my idealogical toes. That being said the rest of the CD is delightfully quirky, loaded with imagery both dark and campy, and sprinkled with childish fun. And very true to Ridgway form this CD is yet another deadpan narrative description of the writhing scaly spectacle that is modernity's underbelly. It's kind of like David Lynch for the ears. The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars was that I didn't feel it rose to the level of "Work the Dumb Oracle".

A Masterpiece of Strange / Pop Art for 2006.......2006-04-22

Continuing an on-again/off-again relationship with his Drywall side project that began in 1986 with Work the Dumb Oracle, the third album in Stan Ridgway's "trilogy of apocalyptic documents" isn't substantially different from his better-known solo work, at least on this 2006 release. His carnival barker vocals, bizarre lyrics, and shapeshifting cinematic soundscapes are in fine twisted form as the songs morph from the moody, bluesy harmonica-laced "Bury the Pope" to the more experimental subtle electronica textures of "Rain on Down" and the whimsical, Tex-Mex party atmosphere of "Goin' on Down to the BBQ." Co-Drywall conspirators/multi-instrumentalists Pietra Wexstun and especially Rick King are relegated to sideline status as Ridgway's distinctive vocals and lyrics dominate the proceedings. The diverse sounds combine aspects of Tom Waits (the percussive "The Alibi Room" sounds like an outtake from Rain Dogs), jazzy noir lounge ("Somewhere in the Dark"), Yello ("That Big Weird Thing"), and even world music ("Bold Marauder" is sung by Wexstun doing her best Grace Slick impression), but ultimately seem like Ridgway pushing his already elastic musical boundaries. At just over an hour, including a humorous bonus track that features sentences from George W. Bush speeches cut-and-pasted to mean something far different than what was originally intended, there is a lot to listen to here. Each track is overdubbed multiple times with layers of sound effects and instruments requiring repeated listenings to fully absorb. As with many Ridgway projects, the lyrical theme is obtuse but the music is so challenging, quirky, and innovative that the whole shebang is a mesmerizing musical trip. Anyone already a Ridgway fan will be thrilled, and open-minded newcomers might find enough of interest here to seek out his earlier, arguably more cohesive albums. Barbeque Babylon is a fun, often but not always lighthearted romp with the participants obviously enjoying themselves by painting a sonic palette the equivalent of '60s pop art. Part pastiche, part storytelling, and part experimental, the album finds Ridgway at the peak of his powers, creating music that demands attention even if at times it doesn't take itself seriously.

Track 16 is ridiculous.......2006-02-10

While I have Stan's full collection of solo stuff and love it, this album may not stay in my collection. There are some fantastic songs and truly innovating and amazinginly talented musicality on this one that we expect and usually get from Stan by the truckload. But I'm writing my comments primarily for the untitled #16 track. I'm not a republican or a democrat. Politics has nothing to do with it but the disrespect and childish editing of the President is embarrassing. The time, technology and (what they may of thought as cool) effort that they put in to making this stupid and over the top ridiculous word editing joke ruins the whole album for me. Perhps a few lines intended to make a point and reflect a measure of personal view would be "artistic" and acceptable but Drywall goes way too far with what they're saying here. A display of that much anti-american sentiment makes me think Drywall should move to Iraq and open up a recording studio there and tour the middle east, North Korea and Afganistan. Free expression, personal point of view and the right to say them are God given rights. But track 16 is just simply bad form, bad taste and childish. I would feel the same way if they did this obsurdity to Clinton as well. Track 16 isn't politics just stupid, really stupid.

Stan at top of form!.......2005-11-23

I'm here to tell you this is the best Stan Ridgway CD! A fan since the vinyl days of Wall of Voodoo, heard all the solo stuff (great, get it!), but this album is an absolute must buy. Killer stuff, classic Ridgway. The best yet!!

Snakebite:Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive Songs

Average customer rating:

McCABES #9 - STAN RIDGWAY Sun May 6th, 2007
Stan's got a lot of great ideas..
A quirky masterpiece
Grade: Incomplete -- needs work
Stan's Excellent Experimentation

Snakebite:Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive Songs
Stan Ridgway
Manufacturer: redFLY
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Black Diamond
Holiday in Dirt
Anatomy

ASIN: B00022AEES
Release Date: 2004-04-09

Tracks:

Into The Sun
Wake Up Sally (the cops are here)
Afghan/Forklift
King For A Day
Your Rockin' Chair
Monsters Of The Id
Running With The Carnival
Crow Hollow Blues
Our Manhattan Moment
That Big 5-0
God Sleeps In A Caboose
Throw It Away
My Own Universe
Classic Hollywood Ending
Talkin' Wall OF Voodoo Blues Pt.1
My Rose Marie (a soldier's tale)

Amazon.com

Like that of many artists who came of age in the '80s, Stan Ridgway's career has often been unfairly haunted by an endless groove of MTV overexposure that's turned perceptions of his music into something akin to a skipping record. Indeed, the veteran L.A. singer-songwriter once groused he'd likely spend his twilight years onstage in a newly liberated Havana casino lounge, crooning "Mexican Radio" to blue-haired former new wavettes. But this savory trove of songs ranks with Black Diamond as one of the best albums Ridgway has recorded since his muscular reemergence as an indie artist in the mid-'90s. Mining the same electro-acoustic vein as Anatomy, Ridgway has refined his nervous balance of traditional folk-blues and ironic-modernist instincts even further here, shrewdly casting the material in a three-act dramatic structure that sharpens its dramatic focus. The usual suspects of Stan's compelling musique noir herein feature seedy, if oddly sympathetic miscreants (the wry toe-tapper "Wake Up Sally [The Cops Are Here]," "Running with the Carnival"), a familiar musician all too wise to both his past and future ("That Big 5-O," "Talkin' Wall of Voodoo Blues"), and a blue-collar warehouse worker moving mysterious cargo Middle Eastward (the dour "Afghan Forklift"). His balladeer instincts may draw him to personal interludes both bittersweet ("Our Manhattan Moment") and elegiac ("Into the Sun," "My Rose Marie"), but it's when Ridgway fuses his Johnny Cash/Ernie Ford/Mose Allison fetishes with his own compelling personal ethos (the haunting, harmonica-seasoned "God Sleeps in a Caboose," a headline-timely, appropriately creeped-out cover of Allison's "Monsters of the Id") that Ridgway again confirms his status as one of America's most consistently original songwriters and performers. --Jerry McCulley

Album Description

Echoing southern swamps and talking beercans. Lonely soldiers and voodoo chain gang ghosts. Midnight mystery trains and singing tumbleweeds. Sixteen new two fisted tales from the Wall Of Voodoo mastermind. Produced by Stan Ridgway Engineered by Baboo God

Customer Reviews:

McCABES #9 - STAN RIDGWAY Sun May 6th, 2007.......2007-05-07

Ex-Wall of Voodoo leadman turned Singer-Songwriter extraordinare Stan Ridgway ROCKED McCabe's Guitar Shop with his blend of alt. roots-rock music and more on Sunday, May 6th, 2007. It was by far to me the most 'electric' performance at McCabe's and his 'band' was simply electrifying as well. His guitarist was wired, so was his pianist-organist and violinist.. well, let's add the drummer as well (Five folks on the small McCabes' stage was a sight to see) Being my first time to a Ridgway concert, I was pleasantly surprised at his twisted humor in between sets (then again, many of his songs are that way as well) It made me at times go to the point of laughing so loud I would had to leave. His music from 'Snakebite' was as wild as the music and wicked bantor on stage - He played "Wake Up Sally (The Cops are here)" and I was laughing to the point of tears (he made strange facial movements on stage while performing) "King For A Day" Was his tribute to the non-sense we call the local modern-day televised car chase (a wild wide in a stolen car that ends up on local TV with the car smashing into the side of a house (Sounds familiar??) and "Running With The Carnival" (Those sound effects are still ringing in my ears) - I have to say the 90 minutes went VERY quick and before we knew, he was back for the encore...He did "Beneath The Green Tree" to make some 'stiff point' - The hightlight for me was when he did that song from 25 years ago that we all know all too well from his 'Wall of Voodoo' days "Mexican Radio" - The house went down at the end of the song with Stan raising his guitar screaming "25 years - I'm branded - damn this song --- I'm branded" (A clue here, folks??) Most folks out there know Stan just for that song, I can see why he feels a bit differently - For true music lovers we love Stan for his quality SOLO stuff that stand out. For those who just have 'Wall of Voodoo's greatest hits' and are reading this, please get this album and do yourself a favor. Overall, one of the best concerts I've EVER experienced at McCabe's and I got very lucky & met Stan after the concert (with Sharpie in hand) and..he was just as funny after the show (I guess that's his personality - that's cool..he's kinda like me) I also spoke to his guitarist Mike as well for a bit before Stan came down. I will most certainly see him when he comes back - you should too. It's a concert you won't forget =.) Peace - Joe "Bear"

Stan's got a lot of great ideas.........2006-04-21

and this collection shows just what an inventive, brilliant, writer he is.

That said, a lot of the songs on this album bump into his limitations as a vocalist. While his lyrics and musical puns make me laugh, some of his vocalizations make me wince.

A quirky masterpiece.......2005-10-07

Stan Ridway's music almost defies description. Using a variety of instruments (including a glockenspiel, mellotron and a 2-string jawbone!)Ridgway and his group of players has created a wonderful bit of Americana. Tales of escaping criminals bedeviled by cops and a noisy dog, a crack smoking daddy on a rampage, and life in a carnival are given inventive musical settings that really have no equivalent. If you want to know what happened to Wall of Voodoo from Ridgway's perspective, "Talkin' Wall of Voodoo Blues Part I" gives you an interesting take on the situation and you follow that with "My Rose Marie" that sounds so authentic you'd swear it was Civil War balled as opposed to a Ridgway original. I've always liked Ridgway's solo stuff, but I feel this one is where all his strengths as an artist come together.

Grade: Incomplete -- needs work.......2005-08-07

Listening to this record is a bit frustrating for me. Some of it calls to mind the best of Stan's past work, namely his albums Partyball and Anatomy. Yes, there are some fugitive songs here. Stan gravitates toward the dark underbelly of society for his subject matter. Yet, somehow this batch of miscreants seems a little more conventional, a little more sane than his usual cast of characters. Sadly, that makes them less interesting.

Into The Sun is a fine start -- about new beginnings. The music, the soaring synths and yearning in Stan's voice, delivers the goods. Other examples of atmospheric production that does justice to the songs: Monsters Of The Id, Our Manhattan Moment, maybe even Hollywood Ending.

But the carnival atmosphere of Running With The Carnival is a bit too predictable.

Talkin Wall Of Voodoo Blues is a chance for Stan to get some things off his chest about the old band, and how they all got screwed by the record business. The song itself is a bit monotonous, and lyrically not clever at all. "We made a lot of noise/For all the girls and boys/It was 1977/Now two are gone to heaven." Ahhhh, you get the picture. A lot of the rhymes on this record are a little forced, and often the words don't quite flow smoothly with the melody.

Wake Up Sally -- too sing song-y.

My Rose Marie is unusually sentimental for Stan Ridgway -- about a veteran who still pines for the gal he left behind when he went to war many years past. I thought the vocals on this song sounded a little too strained. A lighter touch was needed -- something like Stan's vocals on Partyball's Right Through You. And the synthesized orchestrations gave only a suggestion of the grandeur this song could have with acoustic instruments.

With tweaking of the lyrics, a bit of restraint on some of the cheap-sounding keyboards, more work on vocal phrasing and tone, sophisticated programming on the rhythm tracks, and you'd have a record that's a more complete artistic statement and less a glorified demo tape. That is how most of these songs strike me -- just shy of what's needed.

Other fans have obviously been wowed by the performaces on Snakebite. Perhaps they focused on some quality that I missed. I hear a lot of potential, but I can't quite give this record a passing grade. Songs: Need editing. Arrangements: Too simple. Sound: Production a bit primitive -- expand and enhance. I won't beat this to death. Amazon.com is offering a free download of Talkin Wall Of Voodo Blues. Get it. Compare it to with anything on Partyball, and you'll see what I'm complaining about.

Stan's Excellent Experimentation .......2005-06-04

Since the first analog rhythm machines combined with the frenetic wall of voodoo to this latest excellent wonderbug Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive songs Stan is always experimenting in creating wonderful songs that are rich with literary and artistic tradition while at the same time warm and human.

If Stan Ridgway was not a songwriter he'd be a poet laureate, or great American novelist. His work is always narrative, but like a roadtrip, you never know where the story will take you.

In this release Stan seems to spread himself out geographically. This latest release takes in the Americana.

Average customer rating:

Obscure songs that were obscure for a reason
He's My Beloved Movie Star
Let's Cut the Holiday short
Not Bad, for a B-sides album
Vintange Stan!

Holiday in Dirt
Stan Ridgway
Manufacturer: New West Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Snakebite:Blacktop Ballads and Fugitive Songs
Anatomy
Barbeque Babylon
The Big Heat
Black Diamond

ASIN: B00005Y1TG
Release Date: 2002-02-12

Tracks:

Beloved Movie Star
Operator Help Me
Time Inside
End Of The Line
Garage Band '69
Bing Can't Walk
Brand New Special And Unique
After The Storm
Foundering
Amnesia
Whatever Happened To You?
Act Of Faith
Beloved Movie Star Redux

Amazon.com

Roaming a psychedelic no-man's land where Tom Waits and Jack Kerouac might converge, Stan Ridgway is an inimitable singer and precision essayist whose song characters wear life's grit under their fingernails. It's doubtful Ridgway ever broke the legs of a no-goodnik named Bing, but gosh darn if you're not thoroughly convinced of it by the end of "Bing Can't Walk," one of a handful of creaky, ramshackle gems gathered together on the odds-and-sods Holiday in Dirt. He may scribble outside the lines musically, but Ridgway's harp-goosed, art-rock vignettes are enormously detailed--witness the bloopy, futuristic "After the Storm," the eerily straight-faced midtempo rocker "Whatever Happened to You?" or the unlisted cover of Charlie Rich's "Behind Closed Doors," cheekily delivered in a character that might have been crafted by Bill Murray circa Caddyshack. Admittedly an acquired taste, Ridgway repays diligence with cartwheeling, consistently unexpected, possibly true parables sucked straight out of the twilight zone that is contemporary America. If Jackson Pollack paintings had sound, they'd probably sound a lot like this. --Kim Hughes

Album Description

Features 13 rare & unreleased tracks. New West Records.

Customer Reviews:

Obscure songs that were obscure for a reason.......2005-08-25

For people who must have everything Stan Ridgway recorded, this is another item for their collections. I only want the good stuff. Apart from Beloved Movie Star, this is material that never goes anywhere. Reviewer Lon Jones was objective about this album -- it is a mish-mash of inconsequential and incomplete work. I won't discourage people from buying the CD, however, this should be the last Stan Ridgway album on your list to purchase. First get Partyball, Anatomy, Mosquitos, then The Big Heat, Black Diamond, and Snakebite. If you're still hungry for more, then Holiday in Dirt is just the ticket for you.

He's My Beloved Movie Star.......2004-12-18

Stan Ridgway is not for everybody, agreed. However, I have never ever grown tired of listening to any of his songs. When I heard that he had a CD of unreleased songs, I might have been a tad suspect. However, I remembered that I liked every one of his songs he ever made. So I bought this CD and I love it. Moreover, with "My Beloved Movie Star", Stan delivers one of his greatest songs to date. This guy is the Patron Saint of LA Honkey Tonk on a Casio. I can't get enough.

Let's Cut the Holiday short.......2004-02-19

I like Stan, but this one is just a mish-mash of leftovers that didn't make it onto previous albums, usually with good reason. I was very disappointed with this CD and recommend that you give it a miss.

Not Bad, for a B-sides album.......2003-11-17

I don't mind B-sides albums, and R.E.M.'s Dead Letter Office is one of the best I've enjoyed, but parts of Holiday in Dirt seem a little underdone. Stan's goof on Bing Crosby's drunken fall into an orchestra pit, breaking both his legs, is my favorite on the album. I like Stan's sense of humor, and my favorite tracks are always the Garage Band '69's. I could do without My Beloved Movie Star though. It's an interesting montage of Stan's career, the leftovers that never made it on to the final album. All in all, a decent grab bag of Ridgway's music.

Vintange Stan!.......2002-09-27

"Holidays in Dirt" is a remarkably cohesive album, considering that it's made up of rare and/or unreleased material. In fact, it holds up as well as any of Stan's better albums, and sounds more like an album than "Anatomy" (which to me felt more like it was cobbled together from bits and pieces).

HID has everything that has endured me to SR over the years. Losers and hard luck cases and guys named Pete whose lives didn't turn out quite the way they planned. Moments of joy and moments of desperation and moments of unbearable angst. Atmosphere pieces that make you check in the closets and under the bed.

Tracks:

Mastermind
Hard To Do
Who You Are
Sunday
Give It To Me
Starlet Cole
Stop
My Man
Hey
Dance

Customer Reviews:

Buy this and their first one if you can find it........2007-07-26

Forgive Little Steven for his association with the perenially constipated Broooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooce! He has a quasi-interesting syndicated radio show which is where I first heard these incredibly sweet ("typed" with Sugar Cane and Rocket Queen on e-mail, and they're very nice) ladies. This is their second album and a bit more rocky than their first, Rock It! Organist Lisa Farfisa shares more of the vocals with Rocket Queen on this one. If you want reference points, think the Go-Gos or Runaways or the Muffs. Basically you have distorted, loud guitars, female vocals (with a slight accent as they are Norwegian) and themes of personal politics (relationships) and rocking out, all the things that make life more bearable, which is what this album does. Some of the highlights: Hey Now, Dance With You, Who You Are, Sunday, Stop, actually, the whole album is fantastic, so what are you waiting for? And again, while you're at it, try to find their first album on MTG Records and if you look hard enough, their Christmas single with covers of Wham!'s "Last Christmas" and Kim Wilde's "Kids in America."

Signed,
epsteinsmutha

Average customer rating:

Cities Are Temples
Via Satellite
Manufacturer: Loud + Clear Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music

Electronica | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music
ASIN: B000CAGR64
Release Date: 2005-07-19

Tracks:

Seven Winged Lions
Sunrise
Faithfulness
Passing
Close as I Can
Cotton
Revival
Glory
Across Seas
Already Gone

Average customer rating:

Track List

Mastermind, Vol. 1
Mastermind
Manufacturer: Prozone
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Rock | Styles | Music

Progressive Rock | Progressive | Rock | Styles | Music
ASIN: B00008FM5U
Release Date: 1996-05-21

Customer Reviews:

Track List .......2006-09-15

Track List 1. Child of Technology, 2. On The Wings of Mercury, 3. The Enemy Within, 4. Tiding of Battle, 5. A Call To Arms, 6. Long Distance Love Affair, 7. Eye Of The Storm, 8. Fanfare, 9. Reach For The Sky, 10. One By One, 11. War Machine.

Average customer rating:

LOVE IT! A smorgasbord of polished pop and versatile dance gems.
Pretty Young Thing....
doesn't live up to expectation
Lovin it Lovin it

Mastermind
Tina Cousins
Manufacturer: Big Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music

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Euro Dance | Dance Pop | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music

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Rock | Imports | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

Killing Time
Come to Me
Rain
Young Divas
Angel with an Attitude

ASIN: B000A7IH62
Release Date: 2005-08-15

Tracks:

Queen Of The World
Wonderful Life
Move In Time
Mastermind
Pretty Young Thing
Hypnotise Me
Hymn
Come To Me
Increase The Dose
Tomorrow's Tomorrow
Rip It Up
Alive
Wonderful Life (Ballad Version)

Album Description

Tina Cousins returns with her long awaited album Mastermind. Highlight tracks include the hit singles 'Wonderful Life' and 'Come To Me'. 13 total tracks. Big Records. 2005.

Album Details

Tina Cousins Returns with her Long Awaited Album, "Mastermind". Highlight Tracks Include the Hit Single 'wonderful Life' and the Single, 'come to Me' and Watch Out for the Chick Anthem of Summer 2006, 'queen of the World'!

Customer Reviews:

LOVE IT! A smorgasbord of polished pop and versatile dance gems........2006-10-14

While Tina's first CD already sounds dated and specifically geared towards that commercial radio euro dance/trance sound from the beginning of the millennium (with some fairly uninteresting slow jams thrown in), her follow-up catapults her sounds into the end of the decade with stronger arrangements and production that varies in styles but keeps the momentum going.

1. Queen of the World--an electro rocker reminiscent of early 80s female guitar wave
2. Wonderful Life--almost more befitting of her first CD, this is a fairly simple euro dance update of the moody track originally recorded by a band called Black.
3. move in time--kinda sing-song moody pop track, reminds me of something Jewel would do when crossing over
4. Mastermind--sort of like Tina Cousins' version of Seal's "crazy." Has that feel, with a great chorus.
5. Pretty Young Thing--wow. This is sweet sugary dance pop perfection. You'll hate yourself for loving this one, which should have gotten US dance radio airplay.
6. Hypnotise Me--new dance with a new wave feel, this one totally reminds me of the song "Shiny", which is a gem from the re-invented version of Berlin from a few years back.
7. Hymn--pretty euro dance remake of an Ultravox classic. This one could have been a bit more aggressive and powerful--as the original was. There are two trance mixes on CD2 of "pretty young thing", but they are a bit too dramatic.
8. Come to me--let's just say, this slammer could have fit in snuggly on Madonna's "confessions". AWESOME.
9. Increase the Dose--hook-laden dance groove that sounds like something Britney or Christina Aguilera would record.
10. Tomorrow's Tomorrow--you'd think a ballad would ruin the flow of this album, but this is just a stunning, atmospheric lullaby that showcases Tina Cousins' voice, making it clear that she's not just another dance artist.
11. Rip it Up--the only real commercial dance `anthem' on here, this one is too catchy for its own good. Sounds dated, with synth lines you would have heard in a house track recorded in 1993. It would have been huge back then.
12. Alive--another one that could have been on Madonna's album. Infectious.
13. Wonderful Life (ballad version)--would have been fine without this version. Pretty much just as dreary as the original version by Black.

Pretty Young Thing...........2006-02-09

To compare this with her first disc "Killing Time" is like comparing apples to oranges. The first disc was a full on PWL orchestrated effort to promote Tina as the next big thing, on their terms of course. Think about it. Their songs, their label, and their management!
This time around we find Tina has complete creative control. Theres quite a few hits here. The hits being Wonderful Life, Come to me, Hymn and the next single Pretty Young Thing.
PYT - which in case you havent recognized is a track written by the Metro/Rive Droit guys; who wrote hits for Cher, Kylie, Lara Fabian, and Enrique Iglesias. So far this disc is being released by two seperate labels, and may find a home here in the US later this year. We can only hope.

doesn't live up to expectation.......2005-10-22

After the brilliance of Killing Time I have waited and waited for something else from Tina Cousins. The release of her version of Wonderful Life as a single filled me with great hope but unfortunately this fails to live up to my expectations. It is good but barely a worthy successor to her previous work.

Lovin it Lovin it.......2005-09-23

For all you freestylers this is one CD that I would recommend to keep in your library.
Queen of the world 10/10
Wonderful life 8/10
Move in time 9/10
Mastermind 9/10
Pretty Young thing 10/10
Hypnotise me 9/10
Hymn 10/10
Come to me 10/10
Increase the dose 9/10
Tomorrow's tomorrow 6/10
Rip it up 10/10
Alive 10/10

Average customer rating:

NATAS MEMBER IS BACK WITH A VENGENCE!!

Hellrazer
Mastermind
Manufacturer: Oarfin Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Gangsta & Hardcore | Rap & Hip-Hop | Styles | Music

General | Rap & Hip-Hop | Styles | Music

Pop Rap | Rap & Hip-Hop | Styles | Music
Similar Items:

N of tha World

ASIN: B000FUF8H0
Release Date: 2006-08-08

Tracks:

Intro (Scared Money)
Hellrazer
Fuck How They Feel (Let It Rain)
Voodoo
Neva Shut Up
Salute
G-Like
So Gothic
They Have It
Just Crazy
Back Like I Neva Left
Made It Thru (Hellboy)
Sounds Like Drama
Hostile Takeover
NATAS

Product Description

Neva Shut Up
Salute
G-Like
So Gothic
They Hate It
Just Crzy
Back Like I Neva Left
Made It Thru (Hellboy)
Sounds Like Drama;
Hostile Takeover
N.A.T.A.S.

Format: CD

Customer Reviews:

NATAS MEMBER IS BACK WITH A VENGENCE!!.......2006-10-03

always followed natas and esham's work since boomin words! i really dug liquidrano... but couldn't get into mindsi or street valu too much. this album is the real tho. Voodoo is bangin. the beat is kill and his raps slaughter, back like i neva left is tight. so gothic... neva shut up...hellrazer...hellboy... and of course N.A.T.A.S. speaks on the beef.
this is a good album to get for all natas fans!!!