Saturday, February 4, 2012

Frontside Five - Ressurection Cemetery




“Ressurection Cemetery”, 2009
(DC Jam)

Skate punks Frontside Five impressed me when I reviewed DC Jam’s Skate Rock Vol 1 compilation a few months ago.  Their two songs aimed for the throat with an early eighties punk sound.  Often though it’s difficult to gauge that much about a band’s sound when they just have a couple songs on a various artist release.    “Complacent Youth” Frontside Five’s prototype is driving blistering bass and rapidly pummmeled drums complented with a metallic guitar sound.  Dual male vocals are employed in a single song assist the band to a fuller sound in “Cow Fucker”.  One guy is a raw yeller and the other handles the more melodic pieces.

    “Do The Crime”  could be easily for a mistaken Civ or Gorilla Biscuits  track with it’s gruff yet melodic vocals over a stripped down diet version of New York Hardcore.  With its movie sample and near spoken piece over “Nuclear Solution” brings the “metal” period of the Circle Jerks to mind although the song mutates into a punk thrash.  The instrumentals “Hangin With Hightower” and “On Bernal Hill” travel back to a  time when crossover first really started to blur the lines between punk and metal.  With their feet firmly in punk, the band manages to covers a lot of ground genre wise.   Passing for D-beat would be possible if it weren’t for a high falsetto scream in “Destroy”.   Not all the songs on “Ressurection Cemetery” scream out, “Look at Me and Listen” and often its not hard to think of the better bands that they sometimes sound like and as a whole the band come across as searching for their own identity. But overall Frontside Five is a band well worth keeping an eye on.

3/5

Frontside Five on facebook

Frontside Five on myspace

Friday, February 3, 2012

Pretty Maids - Pandemonium(2010)


Pandemonium [Digipak]


Despite existing since the eighties Danish hard rockers Pretty Maids are a band that I wasn’t previously familiar with.  I’d heard of them but written them off as a glam metal band or hair metal band, if you were born too late and also too lucky to witness the eighties explosion of make-up metal.

Anyone looking for the dirty and raw cerainly won’t find it from this band as there’s a huge production sound that is thrown at the listener from the opening title track.  The album could easily be placed  in the time in the eighties when Def Leppard and Queensryche became radio fodder.  There’s definitely a single that would receive airplay in the ballad “Little Drops of Heaven”.  “One World One Truth” crunches harder and veers towards metal, but doesn’t quite reach, with its anthemic and melodic chorus.  Both this track and “Cielo Drive” could have fitted comfortably on “Empire” although the vocals are nowhere as near as high reaching as Geoff Tate’s.  It comes at night borrows sound effects shamelessly from “Slippery When Wet” period and when the band seem to convince that they are capable of rocking slightly harder, keyboards come in softening proceeding and completely ruin the illusion.

While there’s no denying all the songs here are very well crafted, there’s a lack of any threatening edge due to the radio-friendly production sound.  “Pandemonium” may find itself getting repeat plays by those in the hard rock fraternity but those that need their music harder and heavier will want to pass this one by.

3/5

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Fuck Mountain - Irish Fuzz Mountain





I received an email from this Dublin trio called Fuck Mountain.   They describe themselves a catchy fuzz rock three piece that formed in Dublin in 2011.  Made of members of Crowd Control and Exploding Birds, they play fuzzy catchy rock inspired by good times.
The band are described as being for fans of Superchunk, Replacements, Power pop, Husker Du, Dinosaur Jr, Nirvana.  

The six song demo was recorded over one day in a studio in Dublin.

The band's demo can be downloaded from mediafire or listened to directly or downloaded from bandcamp.

I've given it a listen and hear bits and pieces of various eighties and nineties pop-punk but instead of saying what I thought I'd leave it more open and cross my fingers along with other body parts and hope that listeners and downloaders post their impressions of Fuck Mountain in the comments.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Danko Jones - Below The Belt


Below the Belt [Digipak]

A Danko Jones album was always going to be awaited with drooling anticipation due to the fact that the Canadian  band set a dizzying pummeling hard rock template with “We Sweat Blood”.

Like its predeccessors, “Below the Belt” contains more than a few punches.  There’s the cocky attitude of “Two Active Volcanoes”   that  invokes Kiss.  Never failing to rock AC/DC riffs are ultilized within the hooky “Tonight is Fine” and “The Sore Loser”.   “Magic Snake” is a fast paced rocker with lyrics full of clever innuendo.  An irressistible drumbeat makes it way through “I Can’t Handle Moderation” and the rhythm section prove that Danko Jones is much more than just the Dan Jones show.  “Full of Regret” channels Thin Lizzy with catchy hooks, melody and chorus.   Whilst otherwise enjoyable “I Wanna Break UpWith You” comes across as a little too long and repeating the line “everybody break up” as many times as possible doesn’t help its cause and gives the song a cheesy disco flavour.

“Below the Belt” ascertains that Danko Jones trio are back and mean business.   Despite the slight presence of filler material that will give the fast forward button a work-out, this album is solid and once again demands replaying.

3.5/5

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Rags & RIbbons - The Glass Masses











Rags & Ribbons “The Glass Masses”, 2011

The promo sticker on Rags & Ribbons CD describes the band as “a rock orchestra that is influenced by classical compositions, intricate vocal harmonies, keyboard virtuosos and a desire to be dramatic and deliver a solid rock sound.  “The Glass Masses” condenses different  genres into a very unique collective voice”.  The part about desire is understandable although the use of that particular word suggests a band that aren’t yet able to deliver what they aspire to and are still at the growing stage.

   Musically it cannot be denied that Rags & Ribbons are consummate performers although it’s certainty that the band will receive accusations of merely being Muse clones.  The allegations are fair enough because often there isn’t much more to them than that.  There is evidence, which suggests that there is more going on, like the layered voices in the all-in gospel choir on “The Marks You Make”.  Then there’s the dramatic side which comes out strongest in the pompous Queen style rock opera.

While I’m not the biggest fan of rock with the tinkling of keys I found that my favorite part of the album was a keyboard dominant instrumental passage in “Lady in Midnight Sun” although song-wise  Rags & Ribbons reach the album’s highpoint in “We Have Been Here Before” with paired back vocals and the dominate keyboard replaced with an 80’s guitar sound reminiscent of early U2.

While there are some great moments on “The Glass Masses:, one Muse is more than enough.  Rags and Ribbons have succeeded in their desires but are yet to offer a unique voice.  I’m a sucker for the digi-pak design even if the artwork looks like someone recently discovered Photoshop.

2/5



Rags & Ribbons on myspace

Rags & Ribbons on bandcamp


Monday, January 30, 2012

Avskum - Upprorr Underifran




AVSKUM “Uppror Underifran“, 2008
 (Prank)


Swedish d-beat band, Avskum have been knocking around for some time (30 years) so there is a good chance that you may well have seen your local pro advertising anti-corporation anti-consumerism crust punk wearing one of their patches on their studded jackets or unwashed pants.

“Uppror Underifran” contains 16 songs which last a fast, furious and ferocious 25 minutes.  The lyrics are in the band’s native language with the exception of three songs.  The band take their cue from Discharge(duh) however there’s also a Motorhead feel especially to a lot of the bass playing.  “Slutet” more than hints that  are also familiar with GBH with the bass rhythms used.  I’m certain that  the first four letters of the song title were an intentional reference.  “The Massacre in Fallujah”  rips in a similar style with an even heavier bass sound.  The vocals are shouted over frenetic drums, bass and guitar.

After repeat listening some songs do tend to reveal a sameness.  However Avskum do mix it up more than other bands within the same punk sub-genre so further listens are far from a painful chore.  Judging by this album Avskum have earned their garment defacing place.  Recommended.

3.5/5

Avskum's homepage

Avskum on facebook

Avskum on myspace

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Hellacaust - Disgust



Hello, Precious.  When you’re finished obsessing with the ring, Gollum, meet your sound alike from black metal band Hellacaust.  Although this band attended all the workshops in the dark forests they also paid attention in the hardcore punk class.  Listening to “Whore”  it’s easy to imagine that Bl'ast could have sounded like this back in the 80’s if they been paying attention to both Black Flag and black metal.  There’s also the shouted gang choruses after the George Carlin sample on “Millenial Regression”.

Through the dark thrashing woods comes a guitar sound made by swarms of giant bumblebees encircling a working buzzsaw.   The vocals are strong and clear as they could get for a creature of another earth.  Some Germanic thrash metal sound with tasty frenzy whipping leads is added now and again on “Feeding The Wound”.    Hardcore thrashing black metal is the only apt description for “What we say is real”.  It is unfortunate that often on the album, the drums are muffled and the blastbeats sound like someone with a 300 word per minute typing speed going hell for leather on an antiquated typewriter with no regard for error.  The first two songs blur together, nevertheless Hellacaust have managed to make an album that survives relistens by staying within their comfort zone when mixing sub-genres and provide variety moving from a slow death grind to extreme speed.  The lyrics are based in reality yet this album is a soundtrack for sloppily slaughtering Orcs in the pitch black of night with a giant axe.

3/5

Hellacaust on myspace

Hellacaust on facebook

Beastwars - IV

After over a year off for various reasons, we have returned solely because we wanted to review the new Beastwars album. I really w...