Album Reviews

[binnie]

I've thought about doing that one, too. It's an odd album with spectacular highs and lows.

As I said, I really like VR (even though I know they're solid rather than spectacular). I thought 'Libertad' was a better record, because atleast they tried to do some different things. But at the end of the day they never really found a producer who could capture the raw power of the band live on a record. But 'Slither', 'Fall To Pieces', 'Dirty Little Thing' are all magic...

[Dave's Bitch]

I have tried to like VR but i just cannot stand Scott Weiland.I like the band and i like the music behind some of the songs but Weiland just creeps me out.He is like a skeleton slinking his way around and i really do not care for his voice.I think with a different singer (Baz) I would have been a fan

[binnie]

I think they avoided a Sunset Strip singer because they wanted to move away from their own past. I respect that.

Weiland and STP are truly awesome, and he's one of rock's unique talents. But often with VR it didn't work. I think 'Libertad' was far closer to a synthesis of their talents - less 'metallic', but ultimately more rewarding.

[binnie]

From the vaults: Prong – Cleansing (1994)

There is a scene is Casino where Nicky Santoro (Joe Pesci) – having tortured an enemy for hours on end – crushes his head in a vice. In the moments before the unfortunate gentleman’s eyeball popped out of his head, the sound of compression in his skull must have been remarkably similar to Prong. Tommy Victor’s not-so-merry band of brutalists have specialised in delivering a relentlessly abrasive wall of sound for over two decades. One of metal’s most influential – and incendiary – bands, Prong have always been orchestrators of their own unique aesthetic: sparse where most metal is busy; tense where most metal is flailing; and almost devoid of histrionics where most metal nods towards its own ridiculousness, Prong have always been a band who have pointed to the capacity of heavy music to be truly and devastatingly impactful.

Opener ‘Another Worldy Device’ sums up that barren aesthetic. Hardcore vocals and a thrash wall of riff are laid onto chemical grooves: drum, guitar, bass and vocal perform a staccato dance of colossal weight – ba-ba-ba-ba-BA! ‘Whose Fist Is It Anyway?’ ushers in industrial, urban beats in a manner far more subtle than Ministry and brims with mechanical intent. With its whip-crack delivery, the ‘hit’ ‘Snap Your Fingers Snap Your Neck’ is a more muscular Killing Joke (perhaps aided by the pressense of the latter’s Paul Raven and John Bechdel). But it’s the variety that kills. Whilst ‘Cut-Rate’ is pure DRI circle-pit mania, the mid-paced ‘Broken Peace’ – awash with sing-along rhythmic charm – recalls the urban swagger of Biohazard before they became a bloated parody. ‘Not Of This Earth’ is a further departure. Trippy, and featuring clean guitar, is dark without being maudlin, and proof that this was a band who did not resort to heavy for the sake of it.

This was a genuinely forward-thinking record in the limbo between thrash and nu metal. ‘No Questions’ is a collage of riffs and newsreal soundbites and is awash with the sort of guitar-crunch which Machine Head have made their name on. In truth, Prong ooze underground cool but they have never – and probably will never – get the respect which they so patently deserve. ‘Truth’ sounds like the final song before the apocalypse, and features a riff that deserves an award for welding ungodly heaviness to infectious groove. Any Prong album is worth your time – but this is the one where there’s just no dip in the quality.

[Dave's Bitch]

I've thought about doing that one, too. It's an odd album with spectacular highs and lows.

You really should do it.It would be great to hear a review that did not just piss and moan "Slash is not there so it is shit" or "Axl is fat and an asshole it is not a carbon copy of what they did in 1987 so the songs are all terrible".If i were to give it a review it would probably be the most biased one sided review in the history of the world as Guns N Roses are my all time favourite band (even above Megadeth),So i think you would handle it much better.

For me

[Dave's Bitch]

I think they avoided a Sunset Strip singer because they wanted to move away from their own past. I respect that.

Weiland and STP are truly awesome, and he's one of rock's unique talents. But often with VR it didn't work. I think 'Libertad' was far closer to a synthesis of their talents - less 'metallic', but ultimately more rewarding.

I respect the decision to avoid a strip singer and the idea of wanting to show what they were about at that point,That takes balls and as artists it is only natural for wanting people to respect you for what you can do now and not just get lost on the nostalgia of the past.But I think i just miss the point with Weiland and as you have pointed out his range is very small.I have never really sat down to listen to STP,perhaps if i had been a fan i would have dug VR.Personally i would have preferred they went with Baz for entirely selfish reasons ,Imagine Slither with his trademark screams thrown in.Have to say although i am not big on VR I prefer prefer Libertad to Contraband.Contraband was always going to be compared to Guns 'N' Roses and was always going to fall short.I think with Libertad people were thinking this is not Guns with a new front man but a new band and that comes across more clearly in the album

[Seshmeister]

From the vaults: Ozzy Osbourne - Speak of the Devil (1982)

Is it called Speak of the Devil in the UK these days?

When it was released it was called Talk of the Devil here and Speak of the Devil in the US due to the saying being different in both countries.

It's a pretty stupid idea when you think about it, choose one or use a different name. I guess brains were particularly cloudy in the Ozzy camp at that point...

[binnie]

Yes, it's still called Speak of the Devil.

I thought it was out of print, but I actually saw it on sale last week.......pretty sure that 'The Ultimate Sin' is still deleted, however.

[binnie]

For me

OK.

You'll have to wait a while, however, as I have a huge pile of new(ish) releases to plow through

(plus, I'll actually have to re-listen to 'CD'...)

[fourthcoming]

Speak of the Devil is definitely a time piece record. I listen to that and I'm 9 years old again scaring the shit out of my mother because after all, Ozzy is a "devil worshipper" according to her. It's such an authentic sounding live album....so raw, so real.....never cared much for Night Ranger, but Gillis is phenomenal on Speak of the Devil. He definitely has a uniqueness to his playing.

[binnie]

Mortod – The Myth of Purity

Refreshing debut record, this one. Refreshing because if doesn’t sound over-cooked, over pro-tooled and so ‘perfect’ that it no longer resembles a bunch of angry metallers in a room. ‘The Myth of Purity’ is grittier, gnarlier and wholly more raucous than most metal bands in 2012. If there’s a problem, it’s that the band doesn’t quite yet know where they’d like to sit in the metallic garden: ‘All That’s Born Must Be Destroyed’ is a slice of deathcore, whilst ‘The Heights’ is a gothic pop song and ‘Mirage’ is a darkened slab of metal, Lacuna Coil cross-bred with At The Gates. The band sound convincing in all of these guises, and when they focus in on one album number 2 might be a belter. On the evidence of the quite frankly astonishing title track – a belting twist of evil metal which sounds like Bathory or early Celtic Frost – one hopes it’s the heavier side of their arsenal. With the vocal brilliance of Somi Arian, newfound focus could see this band launch into the big leagues in the future. Infectious – let’s hope they get serious.

[Dave's Bitch]

One final comment on Velvet Revolver,They should have got John Corabi to try out.He would have sounded awesome

[binnie]

Indeed he would (I reviewed the Crue album he was on somewhere in here....)

I imagine that they wouldn't want to be tarred with the Motley Crue brush, however.

[Dave's Bitch]

Probably yes.It is a shame things did not work out better with Corabi and Crue.I really liked the album and would have loved to hear at least one more.I could really see myself being in to VR's sound with Corabi's vocals

[binnie]

I also thought that John Bush's vocals would have worked well, too.

Or even - dare I say it - Myles Kennedy's (that would have given them more range).

Live, it worked with Weiland though. They were a monstrous band.