Album Review: Helloween - Giants And Monsters

I've written multiple essays trying to explain the connection I have with certain voices, and it comes in the form of talking about the good ways singers can burrow their way into my heart. The opposite is also true, where certain voices rub me the wrong way, making my brain itch as I'm listening and trying to understand how other people find the sound so wonderful. Speaking ill of the dead means I'll probably never write anything about how much one person in particular reminded me of the sound of Styrofoam rubbing against itself, but I can mention Michael Kiske without poking a body with a stick.

Kiske is a legend of power metal, and has popped up as a guest on several projects I have listened to over the years. No matter the context, I have always hated his voice in ways that are hard to describe. Even as bad a singer as I turned out to be, I think I would rather listen to myself than Kiske. So when Helloween brought him back to bring all the eras of the band under one metaphorical roof, it was the only think the band could have done to make me less interested in what they were doing.

Look, I like "The Dark Ride", but otherwise Helloween has never spoken to me. They are a rare band that manages to sound as if they are trying too hard while not coming across that heavy, and who are cheesy without any of the tongue-in-cheek fun that usually comes with the term. Maybe it's a miscommunication of senses of humor across the ocean, but Helloween's appeal is something I have a hard time discerning.

The entire genre of power metal has been accused of re-writing "Eagle Fly Free" hundreds of times, but Helloween has contributed their share of similar melodies over the years. The opening pair of songs on this album both go for the same soaring vocal approach, but they don't hit the stratosphere, nor do they move with a notable sense of melody. They're flat, but also not showcases for vocal heroics. It leaves the songs sounding quite generic.

"A Little Is A Little Too Much" is a better song, taking more of a hard rock approach. The synths add layers, but it's Deris' hook that is the improvement. The song appears to be about something... premature, but I didn't have to worry about Helloween getting me too hot and bothered too early. It was certainly a choice to write a song about that, though. At least it wasn't a song about how hard they rock, if I can play on words a little bit.

I also like "Into The Sun", which is a semi-ballad dripping with drama, as the piano and strings gives a stirring backdrop for the singers to both take turns and harmonize. It reminds me of a song like "If I Could Fly" from their past, and it the best use of the three singer approach, rather than trading off from one song to the next. Their interplay gives the songs layers and dynamics, and if they did that sort of thing more often, it would only make things better.

The good things the album does get weighed down by the generic power metal, which I can't muster any interest in anymore. "Universe (Gravity For Hearts)" comes along with eight minutes of exactly that, culminating in a chorus that finds the vocal ascending on an awkwardly phrased "you-knee-verse" that hits my ear in an uncomfortable way.

You might be wondering why I'm reviewing the album if I'm not much of a fan of Helloween or Kiske. The answer is that their reunion received wild praise from all corners, even though I didn't listen to it. When I saw the new album come across my desk, I figured I would see what I was missing out on. As it turns out, the answer is nothing I didn't already suspect. More power to the people who love this, but Helloween, especially in this incarnation, just isn't for me.

Opeth's "Ghost Reveries" Killed Them, Still Haunts Them

Rarely do we encounter a single song that ruins an entire band's trajectory. Those kinds of moments are difficult to find, because most bands either go through a slow decline into mediocrity, or they make an abrupt shift that encompasses an entire album. The 'sell-out' accusations come from the latter, and the former is as cliche as they come. No, there's something special about being able to recognize at a specific instant when a band is never going to be the same, and knowing there's nothing that can be done to stop it. Once the momentum of success gets going, no one wants to slow down until they've milked it for everything it's worth.

Released twenty years ago, Opeth's "Ghost Reveries" is the album that marked the end of their 'glory days'. Now, depending on who you ask, that stretch is much shorter or longer than you might assume. Personally, I find the black metal tinged early days rather sloppy and unfocused. Opeth was still finding their way, and hadn't yet developed their songwriting chops. People will praise the twenty minute long "Black Rose Immortal" for being long, without noting that none of the parts have any transitions written between them. Opeth was a 'cut and paste' style of collage band, which might have some interesting pieces, but isn't a great illustration of talent for actually writing songs.

Their height started with "Still Life", and stretched through "Blackwater Park", "Damnation" (not necessarily "Deliverance"), and "Ghost Reveries". During this period, Opeth was an utterly unique band that was able to do things with metal no one else could. Imitators would spring up, but none of them got the pieces right, or had the ability to write any of those pieces quite as well.

Maybe the cracks started to show with the duology, but "Ghost Reveries" is where the band's fractured psyche would finally crumble to pieces. They squeezed out one more inferior album before making their dramatic shift to dad-prog, but "Ghost Reveries" ended the era. It all happened in one ten minute song.

"The Grand Conjuration" is the song that killed Opeth. It's also their biggest 'hit', which says a lot about the taste of the listening public. While the album starts off with the titanic "Ghost Of Perdition" that weaves through a flurry of beautiful musical moments, we can feel the inspiration slowing to a trickle as the album plays out. The opening trio are Opeth at their best, possibly exceeding even their best work. "Reverie/Harlequin Forest" is one of their most gripping numbers, blending crunching guitars with some of the best melodic singing Mikael Akerfeldt has ever put to tape. There's a forty minute core of the album that could be their masterpiece.

The new elements introduced pull from djent and drone, both of which combine to suck energy and life from the record. The slower songs "Atonement" and "Hours Of Wealth" stretch the simplest of ideas to the extreme, repeating dull parts until we reach our breaking point. With the album stretching more than an hour, those extra minutes are wasted, building frustration rather than anticipation. They don't provide a payoff that makes the wait worthwhile.

Then there's "The Grand Conjuration", which brings those attitudes to the band's heavier sound. For ten straight minutes, Akerfeldt basically plays the same three note riff, growling one of the most boring vocals imaginable. It's the exact same thing again, and again, and again, and... you get the point. The riff is barely interesting at all, and it is driven into our heads as if we're trying to remember a dry history textbook. Songs need to justify their length, and "The Grand Conjuration" is barely two minutes of unique content given ten minutes to stretch itself to the point of becoming distorted in our perception as we hang in the balance between consciousness and whatever happens when we space out.

That song became the band's 'hit', garnering them more attention than ever before. They in turn saw this and doubled down on the lesson they were learning. After one last gasp to prove they were complex artists, they made the dramatic swing towards simplicity. "Heritage" saw them streamline their music, but "Sorceress" saw them completely commit to the 'one riff per song' method of songwriting. They moved on to heavy groove rather than intricate melody, stomping rhythm rather than tides of emotion.

That modern version of Opeth has gone through several chapters of its own, each growing even more dull as Akerfeldt seemingly couldn't remember what the heart of Opeth's music was anymore. As the music got simpler, and quieter, his writing lost its sharpness. He sang more, but also more boring lines than when he wasn't relying on his voice to carry so much of the songs. It was sad to hear a band that was once so interesting become happy to noodle around on a couple of clean chords while letting the lighting show carry the hard work of being entertaining.

Even when Opeth recently tried to resurrect their history, they failed. Akerfeldt had so atrophied his writing chops that the return of growling and the cranking of guitars was buried in his obsession with lifeless concepts and refusal to write songs with any clear idea what the point of it all is. People loved it because it reminded them of the past, but it was a pale imitation of Opeth's identity, and a cheap attempt to rip off prestige tv. It didn't translate from visual to auditory media, and much like how watching rich assholes acting like rich assholes turns you into an asshole for wasting your time on such bullshit, Opeth is now a band you listen to with the knowledge you're listening to something you wouldn't actually want to spend time with.

And all of this was clear listening to "The Grand Conjuration". If that song had been the failure of lazy songwriting it should have been, Opeth's career might have been far different. It's success showed Opeth you could aim as low as you wanted and still please the unwashed masses. That's sort of what they did, and it's why Opeth is a tragic 'what if' story.

"Ghost Reveries" is aptly named, because it was the death of Opeth, and hearing how good they used to be haunts me every time I have to hear what they've become.

Sapient Scar's Weaponry Is Anything But Weak

Anecdotally, we hear that people can tell within a minute of meeting someone new whether they are potential partners, or if the 'friend zone' is the velvet rope they will never be allowed past. In that way, bands are subject to the same sense of immediacy, where it only takes a few seconds to know if their sound and attitude is something we could love, something we might mildly enjoy, or something we never want to hear again. Musical pheromones may not exist, but 'love at first listen' is absolutely a thing.

For new bands, the first impression is the most important thing they will ever do. Overcoming the limitations of our psychology is a tall order, and while we have been told since we were children not to judge books by their covers, we all know that's a part of life that saves us an incalculable amount of time.

Sapient Scar is making that first impression, but is slapping us in the face with a particular hue of color we have seen many times before. VK Lynne is the recognizable front-woman of this group, now backed by a powerful group that channels the chunky riffing of modern heavy metal. The guitars are thick and soupy, picking both an angular groove and a thrashy chunk. The tandem of Allie Kay and David Ruiz are pulling from the palate of Bruce Franklin and Rick Wartell on Trouble's stone-cold classic 1990 self-titled album. That gives this song the feeling of a contemporary bit of swing music, albeit with denim and leather rather than zoot suits, all while shifting our head-banging tempo from section to section.

The band is not playing coy as they come out of the gates, playing off the lyrics that delve into that topic. VK sings of someone with the "little voice of a little girl", who builds a world around her that will soon crumble under the reality of what society has in store for her. What society doesn't realize is that she has something in store for it as well.

She plays up her weakness to lull those who don't understand a woman's power into a false sense of security, catching them by surprise when she unleashes her strength upon them. Weak is the weapon takes on a dual meaning, as she uses weakness to camouflage her weaponry to make the maximum impact, but just as much the weaponry society aims at her is weaker than those brandishing it will know... until it's too late.

Some men seem surprised to find out that women are indeed members of the same species, which might actually be understandable, because I sometimes struggle to see how those sorts of men and I are made of the same building blocks of life. In their minds, with a twisted version of what science tells us, there is an inverted sense of 'genus envy' taking place. And yes, that whole convoluted bit was just so I could make that joke.

When we see a spider, the threads she spins might appear weak as they reflect the sunlight, but we find out how strong they are once we are trying to pull them out of our hair. Society is still learning that lesson when it comes to women, or perhaps it is trying to create circumstances where the truth is no longer true. In either case, there is a potency to a woman belting out the truth over the fury of a metal band that can't be captured any other way. If we are listening, that is.

VK may have gotten her start singing the blues, but she is equally adept at seeing red. To return to our dating metaphor, Sapient Scar uses these first minutes to look over from across the room at us, giving the wrinkle of a smile as their eyes gleam, inviting us to come into their gravity. There's no doubt they make the impression we'll certainly be seeing each other again.

"Weak Is The Weapon" releases on September 12th. Pre-save it here! 

Quick Reviews: Rise Against & Ellefson-Soto

Not much good news to report this week. I know, I know, that's been the norm for this year. Anyway...

Rise Against - Ricochet

A lot of Rise Against fans have not been fond of their recent output. I am not one of those, as "Wolves" was the first album of their I had heard, and I've been very fond of that one, "Nowhere Generation", and especially the "Nowhere Generation II" EP. Maybe the band wasn't as raw and aggressively punk as in their youth, but the rough edges around the clean productions was a perfect blend to me. They were clearly angry and disappointed in the state of the world, but they wanted to make sure we heard the message they were trying to get across.

That sort of fails with this record.

The production of "Ricochet" is more raw, with buzzing guitars that contain uncomfortable frequencies, and vocals that do nothing to assuage the concerns I've seen that Tim McIlrath's voice is close to shot. He sounds more strained than ever; damaged, not angry. It sounds like a band scouring their record with sandpaper to obscure what the polish would reveal.

That isn't helped by the songs, which simply don't have the same hooks as before. The sound hinders things, yes, but no production would make this as energetic and hooky as "Wolves" was. There's too much time spent in slower tempos, too many bits where the guitars don't have power if they were even there at all, and too much aimless shouting.

Now watch, I'm sure because I'm disappointed in this record, it will be the one to win back the old fans who had been complaining all along.

Ellefson-Soto - Unbreakable

As I skimmed through this album, it felt like a perfect mirror to an experience I had on the golf course a few days ago. I almost got hit in the head by a ball, and the person who struck the shot never yelled the customary "fore" to warn me. When I stopped him and told him he had almost hit me, rather than say a quick "sorry" so we could all move along, the first words out of his mouth were "shit happens". No, shit only happened because you failed to do the courteous thing.

Why do I mention that? Because when looking at the track listing to this album, and seeing these two writing songs calling people sons of bitches, singing about hating others, and having backing vocals chanting a refrain of "fuck you", the whole experience reeks of that same kind of immature selfishness. Soto was part of the fantastic W.E.T. album earlier this year, but I continue to be unimpressed when he isn't being handed songs by more accomplished songwriters. I don't know if he or Ellefson is responsible for the parts here that turn me off, but either way he signed off on singing these songs.

These are two guys in their fifties, and they come across sounding like two frat bros who can't find their favorite flavor of Monster down at the 7-11. They're able to record an album with impeccable production, which obviously takes time and talent, but then their lyrics sound like they were scribbled in the margins of a high school notebook. Am I the only person who expects, or even wants, just a little bit of maturity from the middle-aged musicians I'm listening to? I hate when writing a few words about a song or album gives me the impression I've put more thought into what they're saying than they did themselves.

To paraphrase the old line: Am I too old (at heart) for this shit?

Singles Roundup: Secret Frequency, The Wonder Years, & Bad Cop Bad Cop

We've got a couple of interesting topics to discuss this week.

Secret Frequency - Crashing Words

Let's start with this one, because it requires a bit of musing. AI and music has been a topic in the headlines of late, with at least one 'band' on Spotify racking up big numbers despite being fake. Myself, I'm at least curious about if AI will ever get easy enough for me to replace all of my own vocals with something that sounds passable, so one day I can be proud of my own work as a musician... but I digress.

I'm not sure what to make of Secret Frequency. Their music is on Spotify and YouTube, but I can find no social media presence; no website, no Facebook profile, no Instagram account. Are they real? Honestly, I have no idea if 'they' are an AI performance of a song someone has written or not. The interesting thing is to ask myself if it matters.

In a way, it doesn't. The song sounds really good, the vocal doesn't feel artificial, and the composition is very strong. It's the kind of swelling rock song that hits me in the way I want to feel music, and that should be the only important factor. It isn't, of course, as it's hard to ignore the possible lack of humanity behind it. There's the theoretical and the practical in play here, and it leaves me both enjoying and hating this song at the same time.

The Wonder Years - New Lows

I found it rather funny that the song was credited to Becky Lynch featuring The Wonder Years. Oh, when you're the bigger deal in the marketplace, you get to make everyone else grovel for crumbs of attention. In this case, that would be WWE, who got The Wonder Years to record this new theme for their biggest female star. Since their last album won AOTY from me, of course I was going to listen to what they came up with. The results are... frustrating.

The song is excellent. It makes reference to her story, and it has the band's signature brand of propulsive fury in the stirring hook. It's really good, except for it only being two minutes long and feeling incomplete. It needs a bridge or a breakdown, so we can cycle through the cathartic moment one more time before it's gone. I know why it was written this way, but if you're going to release it as a stand-alone song, it needs to work that way too. This one maybe doesn't.

Bad Cop Bad Cop - I4NI

The opening lyric of this song asks an interesting question; "Why are we so obsessed with 'an eye for an eye'?" What we have seen over the last decade of our lives is not just a coarsening of culture, but an embrace of vengeance and violence as the answer to life's problems. Somewhere along the way, we forgot the second part of the phrase that tells us that eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.

There's something hopeful about punk music being the source of introspection asking us to be more respectful people toward everyone. If you look at many of the most controversial issues out there, they can be summed up as a lack of respect for people who want to live their lives differently than we might. Truly, who gives a damn what other people do when it doesn't make fuck-all difference to our lives?

Bad Cop Bad Cop are breaking the news to us that perhaps we need a refresher course on how to be decent people. They do it in a pop-punk gloss that soothes the burn, and gets our head bopping up and down, agreeing whether we mean to or not.

Album Review: Lord of the Lost - "Opvs Noir Vol. 1"

Time to start with an inflammatory statement.  Lord of the Lost’s Opvs Noir Vol. 1 is not perfect by any means, but it’s the album that genre luminaries Ghost should have released this year, instead of the one we got.

Backtracking a little bit - for those who don’t know, Opvs Noir is to be a trilogy of albums from Lord of the Lost, which as a concept is a little dubious (how can they, or anybody, possibly have three quality albums of material ready at hand?) but if this first installment is to be the launch point, then the subsequent two releases (release dates unknown as of this writing,) should at least merit attention.

Lord of the Lost has long been a singles band.  Each of their albums has a couple of satisfying earworm bangers on it, but they also have a history of stocking their albums with dramatic borderline ballads, as fits their idiom, so it can be a tiresome exercise to find the wheat amidst the chaff.

The band’s previous album, Blood & Glitter, did a lot to correct that trend, by writing an album full of bopping sing-alongs and cutting back on the number of purely dramatic pieces (which makes the sublimely excellent “One Last Song” resonate even more.) Now for this new record, it’s come to the point where the bombastic, over-the-top songwriting of the band’s younger years has been paired with the pacing lessons learned from the previous record, to produce an effort that is solid both in breadth and scope.  The band delivers a versatile experience of both down-and-dirty metal chugging and easy to digest, passionate choruses.  You know, like Ghost should have.

Not to mention that the songwriting on Opvs Noir Vol. 1 has also become more dynamic and varied.  Skip all the way down to “The Things We Do For Love,” and suddenly Lord of the Lost is writing a Combichrist song, but interspersed with the kind of high drama that Lord of the Lost is so accomplished with.  Could the blending of these two things been a little smoother?  Yeah, the song kind of sounds like two songs in one, but the juxtaposition of the two pieces is so entertaining that it works anyway.

What we see from Lord of the Lost that’s hard to say they’ve displayed previously is a sense of real ferocity.  There’s a lot of destructive potential in the riffs on this album, as evidenced both by what the band is playing and the sheer volume and distortion of it.  Past the mid-point of the record (more on this in a minute,) beginning with “Ghosts,” the riffs bite with a savagery that is uncommon for Lord of the Lost, and it adds a new and appreciably dire dimension to the band’s typically more accessible fare.

There’s a sense that even with this being the first album in a trilogy, that this new record is two albums in one, and the first half is the weaker of the two.  Four of the first six songs test the waters of what’s in the second half, but they feel a little more wallpaper, especially in conjunction with what comes after.  Only “I Will Die In It,” which sounds almost like a righteously angry song from a musical, and “Moonstruck,” really hit a chord (no pun intended) of something more substantive and of greater promise.

It is worth mentioning that Opvs Noir Vol. 1 is peppered with guest appearances, from the influential (Feuerschwanz, Tina Guo,) to the shrug-inducing (Within Temptation.)  This gives a possible window into how three albums of material in succession may be possible - by incorporating many other artists into the creative process and making the trilogy more of a collaborative work, under the single banner of Lord of the Lost.

Either way, Opvs Noir Vol. 1 is a quality jumping-off point for a musical project that is ambitious in scope.  Just make sure to listen to the whole thing, and not get stuck in the first half.  Fingers crossed that it can keep the momentum going through parts 2 and 3.

Singles Roundup: Creeper, AFI, Rob Thomas, & The Requiem

Three out of four are Goth(y)... how is this happening?

Creeper - Blood Magic (Is A Ritual)

It's no secret I hated Creeper's last album, when they veered into the world of 80s Goth. They are continuing that on their upcoming sequel record, but something has changed. I liked "Headstones" quite a bit, and this second single is just as good. It's dark and cheesy, but there's also a bit of actual fun injected into the mix, as if they finally realize being camp needs to be self-aware. They have a penchant for borrowing bits and pieces, and here the melody of the chorus reminds me quite a bit of "Heaven Is A Place On Earth". That gives the song an immediate lift when it comes on, and reminds me why Creeper came onto the scene as one of the most promising new bands. If the album is able to keep this up, I might still have issues with their complete rip-off poser status, but they'll at least prove they have the substance behind the style.

AFI - Behind The Clock

I must be missing something. When and how did Goth become a big trend again? It feels like everywhere I turn, there's new Goth music coming out. AFI is not the band I would expect that from, but I've also learned not to expect good music from them any longer. They are a completely different band than the brief time in which I liked them, and now they are fully embracing being weird old coots. Danny Havok is sporting a look that is as cartoonish as The Village People, and this first song from their upcoming album is the kind of tuneless tripe that leaves me convinced he spent more time on his mustache than on writing the song. It's slow, boring, and without any redeeming qualities. It drones on as Danny croaks out vocals that sound nothing like him, 'singing' a melody that is purely theoretical. It's... the sort of thing that makes me wonder how anyone likes this sort of thing, even more so when I see fans still praising it. Ugh.

Rob Thomas - Hard To Be Happy

I found myself listening to "Yourself Or Someone Like You" a lot over this last year, so hearing where Rob Thomas is now is a bit like trying to figure out what is in the center of a black hole. This jaunty bit of sadness is so far removed from the past that it doesn't seem connected by even the thinnest of pretense. I agree with the sentiment that it's hard to be happy, but I can say this song is doing nothing to help correct that. It tries to have the energy of the upbeat songs from Rob's first solo album, but the flat production and passionless vocals don't let the song resonate with anything approaching sincerity. It feels hollow while trying to say something meaningful, and it doesn't work for me at all. Compare this to how he sang on "Long Day" or "Kody", and age isn't the only explanation for what's gone wrong.

The Requiem - From Dust To Dawn/Vanity

Here's one of those uncomfortable cases where good music could make you angry. The Requiem's album was my Album Of The Year in 2024, but now has me asking questions. How can that be? These two songs come off the new deluxe edition of the album, which features a few other songs that aren't quite so important. These two fit right in with the album, adding even more great emo/punk numbers to the track listing. They have the same flair, attitude, and big hooks that made the record what it was. The issue is that by putting out this deluxe edition, the band is doing two things; 1)They are showing us the album could have been even better with these songs included from the get-go, and 2)They are making fools of anyone who went to the trouble of buying a CD from them. These deluxe editions coming out months (or a year) later are an insult to the fans that support you from the start, and the kind of cheap cash-grab that ultimately turns people off from being active and engaged fans. In another head-scratcher, they aren't even cashing in properly, as right now I don't believe the deluxe edition is even available for physical purchase. So what's the point in bundling these songs in for streaming playlists? I don't get it.

If We're Lucky, We Write Our Own Ending

As a writer, perhaps the hardest part of the process is figuring out the ending. You want to give everyone a satisfying conclusion, but not one the audience can see coming a mile away. You want to tie things up, but you don't want the bow to be so perfect it doesn't look tied by human hands. Finding the balance between a happy ending and a cloying one is incredibly delicate, and more often than not the former cannot avoid being the latter. We want to hold onto optimism that things can be better than they are, so this is natural.

That is fiction, but we live in fact. In life, we do not get to write the ending to our story very often. We don't know when, where, or how the end will come. All we can do is be ready to say we did what we could, what we wanted, and we made peace with our regrets. Some of us will have more issues with that than others.

Saying goodbye, in a musical sense, is much the same. So many artists never fully retire, so they make each album thinking there will be another coming down the line. A true farewell is not so common, which makes evaluating the last statement by an artist a tricky thing. They usually weren't intended to be their final word, so reading messages into them is more about us working through our thoughts about those artists no longer being with us than it is about what they have actually said.

I think about this when I listen to the music of Ronnie James Dio. He stands as a titan of the rock/metal world, but his legacy is a period from 1975-1985, and the remaining time he spent making music is largely considered a long and slow slide into the vast morass of mediocrity.

That changed when Dio reunited with the "Mob Rules" lineup of Black Sabbath in the guise of Heaven & Hell. They were a celebration of music that had gotten lost as the public image of Black Sabbath had been reduced (and we know why) to merely the Ozzy years. The live album/DVD performance at Radio City Music Hall was a document of a great band reminding us how much they accomplished in just three albums, and giving us cause to wonder 'What if?'

Those memories were powerful, and we weren't ready to say farewell to that music just yet. The band made a new album, which may have been intended to be merely the start of a new chapter, but instead became the final testament of Dio's career. For that reason, it is a critically important record. It is also a record that was critically viewed, often depicted as a disappointment that left a sour taste in the mouths of many who were ecstatic over the reunion and tour leading up to the record.

We don't always know what the end will be, but there is something poetic about the last song on Dio's last album being titled "Breaking Into Heaven". After decades of singing about knights, the fight, and the power of metal, Dio's last words were about storming Heaven for an eternal reward.

The song tells a story of angels (demons?) waging an assault to be let back into Heaven, as the doors were closed behind them when they were exiled. It is an allegory about mercy, as the God we are taught about is said to have an infinite supply, and yet so many followers are consumed with the inevitability of Hell. The math of the whole thing never added up. The worst among us could (depending on particular denomination) ask for forgiveness after a life of sin and be forgiven, while a good person who made a mistake before they could atone would be punished. We are all made in God's image, which would mean sin is a part of God's nature, and yet we are treated as needing salvation for being exactly what we were created to be.

According to that theology, there are two endings to our story. Here on earth, we are able to see infinite gradations between the two extremes. When it comes to Ronnie James Dio, I find "The Devil You Know" a fitting epilogue. It was a record where Dio wanted to tell us stories, wanted to pull upon the threads of our minds as much as our metallic heartstrings. The people who criticize it for being slow are missing the point; the album was intended to draw out the drama and watch it slowly drip down the dagger that had been run through our hearts.

Dio was very much one of the bright lights the character in "Stargazer" would have been watching in the night sky. He burned bright, he led the way, and then one day that light was gone. Maybe we noticed it had grown dimmer, but we didn't realize how bright that fire still was against the blackness of the empty sky until it was gone.

Ronnie James Dio was never the biggest star in metal, but he was perhaps the one who was most joyous about being able to make music. His greatest legacy is that being the biggest star doesn't mean you will last longer than any other. The stardust we leave behind is all the same.

Even after fifteen years, we're still finding it everywhere we look.

Album Review: Halestorm - Everest - Part 2

Ughhhh, Chris is gonna be so mad at me about this.

Halestorm is a band I respect a lot.  They’re the top of my list when it comes to ‘bands I saw live back when they were nobody.’  I first saw them in 2009 with a couple hundred other people.  I wasn’t even there for them - I was there because a music promoter wanted me to check out The Veer Union, one of the opening bands.  I stuck around to see what the headliner was all about, and I’ve been following Halestorm ever since.

I haven’t loved everything they’ve done, I’ll be honest.  And that’s okay, they’re not writing albums for me, nor should they.  

“Everest” is the first time though, when I’m wondering where this album is coming from, and what’s driving it.

It starts off promising enough - the lead cut, “Fallen Star” is, to my sensibilities, the best on the record and offers the best glimpse of Halestorm in their truest form.  Lizzy Hale, rightfully so, gets the lion’s share of attention that comes Halestorm’s way, but there are three other very talented musicians making music on all their records, and this lead track is the one that best showcases the balance of all of them.

Skipping down a couple cuts, I want to address “Like a Woman Can.” Lzzy has always been willing to be more literal than most mainstream vocalists in her sexual allegory, which is to say there is rarely any allegory at all, and “Like a Woman Can” is no different.  The song is strikingly seductive and sexually charged, which is refreshing as opposed to the clumsy, juvenile metaphors about cars or playing cards or whatever else that dumb, sweaty men tend to write.  It is, in many ways, one of the album’s jewels.

But I’m a long-time media member, and that makes me cynical.  It makes me constantly wonder about the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of a thing.  Lzzy is publicly bisexual, so it’s not like the song is contrived or made up - it comes from a place of absolute authenticity.  But here’s what I don’t want to happen.  A thing can be manipulated to two purposes, and this song would no doubt be an easy sell to a horny, middle-aged, male-dominated rock audience.  I am certain this song will be pushed, possibly by the label more than by Halestorm themselves, and what is meant to be an empowering female anthem could well be perverted to commercial or other nefarious ends.  And that makes me cringe just a little as I listen to it.

And then we come to “Rain Your Blood On Me” and now I’m confused.  In the middle there’s this whole thrash-y, big chorus, kinda Overkill-y section that’s cool and definitely grabs attention the first time you hear it, but some of that attention grabbing is because Halestorm has never really done THAT before.  And there’s nothing wrong with the central riff that the song already had - it’s punchy and strong of its own volition, so the section in the middle feels air-dropped in, and out of place.

Then we come to a series of hair metal ballads, and they’re all, to me, indistinguishable from each other, except that they all remind me of that part in the “November Rain” video where Slash is playing guitar out in the desert and being filmed from a helicopter.  Halestorm has always had this side to them, with varying degrees of success.  All of these lean heavily into Lzzy’s vocal prowess, which is a safe bet as she remains one of the most impressively vibrant voices in modern rock, but this crop of ballads in particular feels very much like a throwback to an era that Halestorm was never a part of.

When I first saw the album track list, I was immediately nervous about “K-I-L-L-I-N-G.”  I needn’t have been.  This is an old school Halestorm thumper, something that would have felt perfectly at home on their first two albums, along with “Fallen Star.”  It’s a stark reminder that the interplay of the band members, and the arrangement of the music, is of prominent importance in everything Halestorm does. Is it the highest form of Halestorm's art? Nah. But it's simple and fun.

The album closes with “How Will You Remember Me”...okay, let me reference what Chris said first.  It’s well executed, and Lzzy shines on it.  I agree with all that.  On the other hand, the motif of ‘hey, remember when we were carefree and young and hung out drinkin’,’ has spent more time in the oven than a twice-baked potato, and makes a lazy appeal to the basest of sentimentality.  There’s nothing wrong with being nostalgic for better days in and of itself, but I’m surprised that a band as lyrically provocative and accustomed to taking on complex issues as Halestorm couldn’t find a more creative or articulate way to say it.

“Everest” has a fair amount of likeable material, but there’s also some questionable decision-making. The band is allowed to experiment with whatever sounds and hallmarks they want, but in particular the reliance on the big rock ballad on the album’s second half feels a little forced and not like Halestorm at their best.  Tread with caution.

Album Review: Halestorm - Everest

God is described to us as a trinity; father, son, and holy spirit. Our minds are also described to us as a trinity; ego, superego, and id. I don't view this as a coincidence, as we take the talk of being 'made in His image' with straight-faced sincerity. It becomes natural to not only see ourselves in God, but see God in ourselves. I never put it past the ego of many people to justify thinking they are truly the center of the universe.

While God may be all-powerful, we are not, and rarely is that as clear as when we are faced with picking up the pieces and reassembling our shattered psyches. While it's possible that knowing the secrets of the universe would guarantee a mental breakdown, our struggle to maintain sanity in the face of a world that seldom makes sense is in many ways the very basis of the existence of art. We use art in every form as a means of trying to seek out and share a truth we don't know how to build a conversation around.

Lzzy Hale has been bravely honest about needing music to pull her back from when it feels like gravity is the force collapsing our chests from inside us. This album is the chronicle of Lzzy's journey to rediscover who she is, who she wants to be, and the nugget of happiness that some of us are never able to see through the thick walls of the ore buried in our hearts. On "Everest" she tells us that she "won't ever rest" until climbing the proverbial mountain high enough to see the promised land. This is not a case like Jim Steinman saying you have to go over the top to see what's on the other side, this is needing to find high ground to realize how deep the hole we were in truly was, and how far we have come.

The raw honesty of Lzzy's writing is matched by the band and production of "Everest", which is the band's most metallic album yet. The polish that made their early records so irresistible is stripped away in favor of guitars whose grit can be felt, and a mix that moves Lzzy's voice around so we can hear every angle of her confessions.

"Sometimes loving you feels like dying" she sings on "Shiver", which is a terrifying bit of truth. For as much as we have written about love in our existence, we still cannot explain exactly how or why it happens, nor can we control who comes to consume us. To give yourself to another person is to put your flaws on display and hope that person doesn't see them as the mortal wounds that we often do. Unrecoited love is among the most painful experiences we can have in life, and 'unrecoitus' (as I have satirically coined the term) only brings a momentary reprieve before the tissue needs to be put to its proper use to wipe away a tear again.

"Shiver" is a lovely slice of hard rock with melodic phrasing from Joe Hottinger pulled from the era of classic rock. Followed by the almost bluesy jazz power ballad "Like A Woman Can", Halestorm is not just pulling from their souls, they are pulling from across time. Those songs carry the spirit of classic rock in them, from a time before the homogenization to fit the narrowing niches of radio formats.

Whether it's the 'scream to the heavens' hymnal vocals of "Rain Your Blood On Me", or the Dio-esque epic structure of "Darkness Always Wins", the band is going wherever they must to tell the stories they need to tell. Some thoughts are too raw for pop songs, some feelings too complex to fit into tighter structures. The work Lzzy has done to build the best version of herself is the work of a lifetime, and requires an album that explores every facet of her relationship with music over the years. You can't paint the full image of yourself in just one color, and you can't tell the full story of yourself with just one tone.

My favorite song on the album might just be "Gather The Lambs", which blends atmospheric guitars with the sweetest melody of the song cycle, but also asks an existential question; "Why does everybody run?" That is one I have asked myself nearly every day for the last couple of years. To return to the thought I started with, there is a way in which I would argue I feel like the center of the universe; that being the reality in physics where the universe is constantly expanding, so having people and love drifting further away with every breath would fit the bill. It's easy to feel like a black hole when people avoid getting close for fear of being destroyed.

That leads into the feelings of the later songs, where Lzzy tells us she feels broken and misunderstood on "Broken Doll", and how "this loneliness is killing me". The spotlight does not guarantee people will truly see you, nor does telling your truth in a song guarantee people will truly hear you. Homer Simpson told us once that "it takes two to lie; one to lie and one to listen". There is real truth in that joke, because no matter how honest we are about who we are and what we're dealing with, we cannot make other people hear us, let alone understand what we're saying.

In that respect, "Everest" is less an album about the songs than it is an album about Lzzy making her clearest and most direct statement to us yet. By stripping away the gloss, we can only hear the power. By bouncing less on the hooks, we can only hear her voice shredding itself to get through to us. It takes bravery to change the formula and take risks because that's what honesty requires you to do.

Lzzy is a brave soul to share herself with us in this way. On the beautiful power ballad that closes the album, she asks "how will you remember me?" Hopefully, I will be able to say I remember her as her truth. I would hate to think I didn't properly hear a voice that is so dear and important to me.