Album Review: Against The Current - Till Death & Back

Ten years ago, after a long back-and-forth powered by my indecision, I nearly gave my AOTY award to an album by the band Shiverburn. They were the first of what would become many bands I found myself enamored with who fell into the same category of fusing catchy pop/rock melodies with rather crunchy/heavy guitars, powered by a piercing female voice. That sound became something I chased over this last decade, essentially seeking the evolutionary thread of Kelly Clarkson's "Breakaway" album. Shiverburn never released a second album, but others stepped up to fill that role, even if they have struggled to build upon that initial impression. Against The current is the latest band to catch my ear in this same way.

Much of the record can be read in terms of the band's journey, as they now find themselves independent from the music machine. That gives them complete control over their music, as how we get to engage with it. That shift can absolutely feel like the hope and momentum of a career has died, but the people most dedicated to music are able to find the freedom of creation a liberating experience. That is what Against The Current have done, making a record that is better written and produced than a huge swath of what the label system gives to us every year.

When "Fortune Favors The Brave" opens the album, it's with bouncing guitars that crush with every hit. They pull from bits of radio rock, emo, and pop/punk, with hints of Deftones-esque groove lurking just under the surface. Everything kicks up a notch when Chrissy Costanza begins singing. Her voice is direct and sharp, cutting through the heavy production whether she is crooning a low rumble or scraping her higher registers. When she opens her lungs on the chorus of "Ashes To Glory", I'm reminded of Yours Truly's early work for the way they are able to blend light and dark so effectively. The music is a rolling wave that crashes into us, while her voice is the light we see when drowning that shows us where to fight for breath.

That metaphor is echoed in "The Moth", where Chrissy sings about being trapped under the waves of life, unable to resist the urge to get close to the very thing that is so dangerous. It's an entirely human experience to know better, but not be able to take your own advice. Those mental gymnastics are one of the reasons we engage with art, because it is through things like songwriting that we are able to unknot some of the threads that confuse us so. Whether we know anyone is listening or not, being able to give voice to those demons is the first step toward figuring out their weaknesses.

Across a tight ten songs and thirty-three minutes, Against The current never lets up. Every song is finely crafted for maximum impact, delivering melodies that will create communal experiences when sung on stage. There is a lot of music in this style that rides the cliches so hard they slough off our memories as soon as we hear it. Against The current is one of the bands that does it so well, and so honestly, that is never a concern. Chrissy's passion shines through, and the band plays with the power needed to drive these songs home.

We recently celebrated the fortieth anniversary of Slayer's "Reign In Blood", which I bring up because there was a lesson learned from that album Against The Current execute to perfection. A record that concentrates its punches without ever missing is the kind we can listen to repeatedly, and those are the ones that have the chance to make the most lasting impact. The first listen is charming, the next a bit more, and eventually we see the heart behind the smile. "Till Death & Back" doesn't need to be any longer, because it trades the initial knockout shot for the experience of wearing us down with body blows.

As the music business continues to evolve, the worst thing about it also happens to be the best thing; bands are able to make music outside the confines of the system. Sometimes that inundates us with music we never needed to hear, but sometimes it gives bands a chance to show that greatness can slip through the cracks. Against The Current is one of those gems that shines even brighter now that they aren't getting buried in a pile of other stones.

"Till Death & Back" was worth the trek. It's quickly becoming one of my favorite albums of the year.

Album Review: Tony Iommi - From The Dark

For some people, including me, Black Sabbath begins and ends with Ronnie James Dio. The combination of Dio and Tony Iommi proved to be one of those magical things in music, elevating both men in a way they never had with any other bandmates. That carried through all the way to the end, with the chapter written under the name Heaven & Hell. While many people have complained about "The Devil You Know", mostly for being too slow, I have always enjoyed that album more than most. The drama of Dio's delivery intertwined with Iommi's guitar unlike anyone else, and the immensity of the resultant sound was exactly what "Dehumanizer" should have been close to two decades later.

When we lost Dio, there was one obvious next step, once the mourning period had ended. The perfect person for Iommi to work with next was Jorn Lande, the man who fashioned himself the modern Dio, and wasn't shy about telling people about it. If anyone could have filled Dio's shadow standing next to Tony on a record, it would have been Jorn. It was too obvious not to happen... and yet we have waited nearly fifteen years for it to come to pass.

"The Devil You Know" is the basis from which we can approach this record, not only because it was the last time Tony worked with a singer other than Ozzy, but because Jorn's approach is very much in the mold of Dio's. The opening "Over The Violent Sun" features a riff reminiscent of "Fear", but played with a bit more restraint. The low-end rumble of Iommi's guitar sets a tone perfect for Jorn's rasp. Jorn doesn't have the baritone power of latter-day Dio, but he brings a touch of 80s Whitesnake in the melodic department that Dio wouldn't have. That mix creates a sound that melds Dio's era with that of Tony Martin's, which gives us a bit of a summation of all Sabbath was in its various incarnations without Ozzy.

"Black Times" slows things to a doom crawl right after, building to a heavier ending the way classics like "Falling Off the Edge Of The World" did, but without the same level of payoff. Jorn is a great singer, but he isn't best suited to those kinds of slow numbers if they don't have enough air of drama, so the record stunts itself before any momentum can be built up. Flipping that one with "World Alone" in the track listing would have helped, as the latter being the most up-tempo song on the album would get the blood pumping enough for a cool-down to be warranted. Contrast that with "Beyond The Dead", which is also slow and doomy, but has strings and layered vocals to create a more epic scene. Jorn is perfect in the role this time, recalling to my mind what his "Dracula: Swing Of Death" album would have been if played without any of the tongue-in-cheek, 60s television Batman camp.

The majority of the album sits in that slower tempo, and despite that being true of "The Devil You Know" as well, I feel the tempo more on this record. Jorn's voice blends into the wall of guitars more than Dio's, which gives the mix a flatter sound, one that gets more tiring to my ears by the time these forty minutes have passed. The biggest issue, though, is what I have noted about Jorn for as long as I have been listening to him; his songwriting is hit-and-miss. He was part of writing great songs on that "Dracula" album, and his hand in the fourth Allen/Lande album was essential to that being as good as it was, but he also has a string of solo albums that all blend together into a pile of uninteresting songs. This record has a little bit of the former, but too much of the latter, because Jorn doesn't have the vocal charisma someone like Dio did. His rasp is amazing, but he hits the same tenor and tone in every moment that isn't a quiet lament, so he lacks the nuances a dark and shadowy noir requires.

This album doesn't live or die on Jorn alone. Iommi brings his trademark riffs to the table (including at last two, one already mentioned, that sound quite like previous ones), but he also uses several songs as attempts to build a dramatic swell that might limit where the melodies can go. There was a point where this album was intended to be instrumental, and I wonder if that's what holds it back. 

And here is where we cycle back to the starting point. Jorn was the obvious pick to carry on with after Dio's passing, but the people saying that were ignoring one major factor; chemistry. Jorn has the right voice for Iommi's music, no doubt, but I don't hear the same chemistry between the two the way I did with Dio, or even with Glenn Hughes. "From The Dark" is a good record, but it doesn't live up to what these fifteen years have let us imagine the combination could accomplish. Having the right pieces in place still requires great songs, and there just aren't enough of them on this album. I like this, but I don't see how it will ever leave as much of an impression as "The Devil You Know", which even if flawed was an album filled with personality. This record is trying too hard to be exactly what you would think it should be, to the detriment of what it could be.

Album Review (again) - Graveyard - "Fever"

(There is, very occasionally, an album of such import that Chris and I both feel the need to take it on. I purposefully wrote this without having read Chris’ review, so it wouldn’t influence me.  I’ve gone back to read it now, and I’m thrilled that we independently hit on so many of the same ideas. Great minds and all that.)

Cutting out a lot of requisite details to the story, I used to work for a guy who was obsessed with the idea that every day, USA Today ran a full-color graphic on page 2.  He wasn’t really all that obsessed with the graphic - he was obsessed with the idea of templating, with the concept that something could follow the same structure, every day, and thus give the end user a predictable and familiar experience.

Graveyard, by virtue of being (the best) retro-rock band, is naturally given over to this concept.  There are only a limited number of permutations fuzzy blues-rock can take at this juncture, and Graveyard furthers the concept by tending to put similar songs in similar slots on their albums.  

That is, until Fever.

What we hear here from the Swedish titans of rock is a stripped-down, disarticulated experience that’s meant as a deliberate counter to the sullen introspectiveness of the previous album, 6. This new record is much closer to the motif we saw the band in two albums go, the thunderous Peace, than any other record in the band’s increasingly impressive catalogue, though Fever is an even more straight-ahead effort than that one.

Case in point, every Graveyard album comes equipped with a slow-burning, blues-muddled dirge, often the best song on the record.  “No Good, Mr. Holden,” “Slow Motion Countdown,” “Cold Love,” “No Way Out”...you get the idea.  Fever lacks any song that would qualify under those conditions and that in and of itself speaks to the band’s intended shift for this new collection of songs.  (The closest analog would be the deeply grooved “A Better Cut (Note to Self,)” and while effective, it’s outside the mold in that there’s a sinister undercut to it that menaces the entire track, and kinda sorta sounds like a Troubled Horse song.)

The musical phrasing on Fever is short and thus more aggressive, more than we’ve ever heard Graveyard to this point, and the guitar tone is appropriately edgy and grinding to match.  Go no further than “A Means to An End,” and hear a stylistic change into something more raw and unrefined. This is a simpler, sleazier Graveyard, which is unexplored territory for the band, and is further punctuated by no song going longer than four and a half minutes (until the very last one.)

Which probably all sounds like a polite way of saying that Graveyard is playing down to their competition.

But here’s the catch.  They’re such good songwriters and arrangers that they get away with it.

To go back to the templating argument, sure, Fever doesn’t sound like the Graveyard template, but take a step back at the larger picture, and see the genius of a head-nodding metronome like “Don’t Shoot!”  That’s where the idioms come into play.  Graveyard, over their last several records, going back all the way to Innocence & Decadence, has quietly and confidently displayed that they can compose in any vein of classic fuzz rock and be utterly compelling.  Fans will hear album opener “Back From the Grave” and at first be taken by surprise with the ferocity and dark-alley atmosphere of the song, but will ultimately grin as they realize the song has simply menaced the roots of “An Industry of Murder,” and given this new version to the world.

That, in the end, is the Graveyard template.  It’s worth repeating - we talk a lot around here about the two ways to be successful in music.  Either do something new, or do the familiar exceptionally well.  Graveyard is the standard bearer for the latter, they’re the top dog of the very idea, and there’s no one especially close to them.

Album Review: Dead Poet Society - "Monarch"

First things first.  If any listener should take on Dead Poet Society’s new album Monarch without the benefit of proper speakers, the listening experience is automatically a failure.  Compression and tinniness of any kind will ruin the record.  This album can only be listened to with a set of woofers that will properly and truly replicate the fathoms-deep bass and full impact of the arrangement.  Anything else does a disservice to the listener and the artist both.

With that established, Monarch is as unique an album as DPS has released to this point, and that’s saying something for a band who has historically linked the tone of Soundgarden’s “4th of July” to the proto-emo of the turn of the millennium.  Monarch is not an easy album to quantify - as insane as it sounds, the record is half pop emo record, and half Doom soundtrack.  Thumping beats play to a metronome like hammering rhythms pound and never let up - but this is juxtaposed by airy, disinterested vocals, high guitar harmonies and a general sense of emotional unease.  As is often the hallmark of many of the best works of music, it feels like pieces from entirely different jigsaw puzzles have somehow been mashed together to fit, by some miracle without needing tape or glue or rageful pounding of the table.  Ever had a fragile repair or project where someone has said “so long as no one touches it, it’ll keep working?”  That’s kind of how this album is.

Take a listen to the album opener “Hollywood on Fire” (assuming proper speakers.  If not, don’t touch it.)  Skip to about two-thirds through.  There’s a discontentedly yelped section of “oh-ee-oh-oh” which in a different universe, might have been the sing-song outro to some Selena Gomez song, yet underneath it is a thunderous avalanche of music that is inherently incongruous and laughs wickedly at that very idea.

Same goes for “Die If You Don’t.”  There’s a pop song in there somewhere, and not in the sense that all rock-based music has popular elements to it.  Something in structures here is novel and different, as though the band is trying to write true top-40 music, but distorted and warped through the lens of their idiomatic sound. (Coincidentally, when we here interviewed Spider from Powerman 5000 some years ago, he confessed that this same concept is exactly what he’s trying to do.)

While it sounds like the music should be physically exhausting to listen to, it never really is, but the same can’t be said for the lyrics.  This is the third straight DPS album that spends the wide majority of its time crooning about the pain of shitty relationships, most romantic, but also platonic, and the veneer is wearing a little thin.  This is what made “HURT” on their previous album such a success - it was a window into the band’s struggle same as the rest, but about a different kind of struggle, and relatable to anyone who has chased a dream or felt misunderstood while doing so.  Which isn’t to say that shitty relationships aren’t relatable, but only to say they’re not the ONLY thing people can relate to.  

This is what in turn makes songs like “Miami For The Weekend” and “Get Hot” a breath of fresh air on the album’s second half.  Are they the best songs on the record?  Hell, no.  But they’re fun and defiant and offer a mental break from the dirge, not altogether different from when Ice Cube stuck “It Was A Good Day” in the middle of The Predator. “Get Hot” is worth discussion for a second - we stated previously that The Warning took some lessons from Dead Poet Society for their new record, and “Get Hot” might be evidence that DPS took some lessons back in turn.  There’s a rock edge to it that the band rarely employs.

Then we come just about to the end with “The Park,” which is discordant and creepy and weird in all the best ways.  It slams the experience back down to earth after the brief respite.

Dead Poet Society is and has always been a singles band.  No shame in that, lots of good bands could be qualified as such, and with the borderline experimental nature of their sound, it’s hard to envision everything Dead Poet Society throws at the wall working perfectly.  Monarch is riddled with great moments, but also possesses some filler and material that elicits little more than a shrug.  On balance though, the great moments outweigh the quiet ones.  Just make sure you have the right goddamn speakers.

Album Review: The Warning - Everything's Falling

In his memoir, Sid Meier, one of the true titans of video game design, goes to length to explain that, in his view, to steal someone’s idea and clone it is plagiarism. He also says though, that to steal someone’s idea and add to it is the very soul of progress and advancement.

We talk a great deal around these pages about how musical artists, particularly in rock and all its various splinters, are faced with a decision - either do something new, or do something familiar really well.

The Warning, the upstart trio of Mexican sisters who have been clawing their way up into the public consciousness since they were literal children, have found that rarest of all paths - they achieve both.

If you want to lay down as fact that The Warning are a band with a lot of polish and a refinement in their production that belies their age and status in the pantheon of rock, you’ll get little argument here.  Those who thirst for the dingy edges and grimy ethos of the rock pits may well turn their noses as this new effort, Everything’s Falling, positively shines with high fidelity audio and pitch-perfect recording.

The loss is theirs.  To dig into this new record is to discover a collection of songs that are, yes, sent through a glossy filter, but all have their roots in the messy experimentation of their forebears.  The title track of this record may deceive through the prism of Dani’s airy vocals, but make no mistake - it’s a Soundgarden riff lurking under the melody, “Burden In My Hand” for the new millennium, juxtaposed against a bigger chorus and a (slightly) less fuzzy thump.

The album moves seamlessly to “Why Do You Like It When I Cry?” and now we’ve blended The Warning’s traditional tone with the playful rock romp of Canada’s BRKN Love. There’s a little melodrama here, to be sure, but that has more to do with The Warning and their idiom than it does with the style they’re weaving in.

And then the band takes us to “Bite My Tongue.”  The Warning famously had a collaboration with Boston’s Dead Poet Society, a re-edit of the latter band’s “HURT” with the assorted vocalists trading spots.  The two bands have also worked together on the festival circuit, and that connection bears fruit here for this single. “Bite My Tongue” is in many ways a DPS song, but again, filtered through the kind of melody and well-structured chorused that The Warning have become known for.

For all that, there are still two spots on the record where The Warning are inimitably their own - the requisite song “Ego” sung in the band’s native Spanish, thus continuing and long and successful succession of such songs.  It does merit mention; the last couple tunes in their native tongue have the same rough cadence and tone.  While catchy and listenable, it would be nice to see them blend this style and the playfulness of previous efforts like “Narcisista” into something new.

And at the end, the single “Kerosene.” Some Foo Fighters in there.  A dose of Queens of the Stone Age.  But all The Warning, especially the quasi-playground R&B chant in the song’s final third.  This is the most successful blend of elements The Warning demonstrate on Everything’s Falling, and we haven’t even discussed the band’s penchant for groovy rhythms.

What we have here is a record that both synthesizes the success of the other members of rock’s current vanguard, and also displays what we’ve come to know from The Warning.  Their ability to layer their own style over the…borrowed…concepts creates something new and advances the cause of the band as a whole. It’s well-crafted and original, even as the echoes of other artists ring in the background.  It also proves that rock may not be dead after all.

Album Review: The Jayhawks - Sanctuary Park

You never know what you're going to get when The Jayhawks release a new album. Sometimes, they are exploring Americana, and sometimes they are exploring sonic texture. That makes them 'interesting', but also one of those bands that is incredibly frustrating to follow, because I'm not sure how many people are as fond of the wide range of sonic experiments they have played with over the years. I can say I am not one of those who enjoys their more left-field works, preferring when the band sticks with the tried-and-true that highlights their melodic gifts.

This new album is interesting because what it reminds me most of is "Back Roads And Abandoned Motels", the odds and ends collection that brought together songs that had come from all different sources, played in a collaborative way. This record is similar in that it doesn't venture far from the core of the band's sound, but it also feels like everyone is contributing more than usual to the overall result.

You could say that also makes this a bit like "Rainy Day Music", which is a favorite of mine, but that record was a finely-tuned set of utterly infectious songs, while this one is even more somber and restrained. When they do put a bit of energy into the mix, like on "Keeping Our Heads Above Water" and "Hands Upon The Wheel", it's The Jayhawks that I love, and want to hear. When they fall into more folk-leaning songs, the slow tempos and pensive delivery can become a bit of a drag. Those are times when the band's former incarnation would have come in handy, as the days of dueling vocals gave added depth and texture to songs that sounded a bit flat otherwise. As much as I like Gary Louris, he can become too soft on the softer numbers to leave much of an impact.

The majority of the album finds the right balance between the band's laid-back style and having just enough energy to keep things from falling apart. I could certainly use a bit more of Louris' trademark fuzz guitar adding details to the acoustic picking, but I also understand that's not the kind of record they were trying to make. This is a somber record for a somber time, and I do appreciate that.

Now this is a personal nit to pick, but I'm not the biggest fan of 'story songs', which leaves me rather confused by "Mr. Lincoln". I don't know what to make of a perfectly nice song that tells the story of Lincoln's funeral train passing through the countryside. It isn't... timely, let's say.

That leaves the album sitting firmly in the middle of The Jayhawks' history. It can't compete with "Hollywood Town Hall" or "Rainy Day Music", or even the underrated reunion of "Mockingbird Time". It does best their less successful experiments like "Paging Mr. Proust" or "Xoxo", so it winds up both satisfying and disappointing at the same time. It's a perfectly pleasant Jayhawks album that does enough to make me happy while I'm listening to it, but it doesn't do enough to convince me it will be essential the way my favorite Jayhawks albums are.

Album Review: Airbourne - Airbourne

Nearly twenty years ago, Airbourne splashed onto the scene with their debut smash-hit Runnin’ Wild, and those who had been thirsting for something akin to the youthful abandon of AC/DC in their early days were summarily convinced that their ship had finally, at long last, come in.  Airbourne bore all the hallmarks of their elder countrymen, and it was more than just a sonic similarity - the band embodied all the brash and carefree je ne sais quoi of their forebears, in an appropriately loud volume.

Four albums followed in the next twelve years, some good and some not so good, but none could quite capture the edgy, mischievous, winking vitality of that memorable, classic debut.

Following six years without new material, the band released the single “Gutsy” in June of 2025, and showed real promise; while this new record is self-titled, “Gutsy” leads the album and is clearly the centerpiece around which the rest of the exercise is built.  As a single, “Gutsy” snaps with the kind of flair that Airbourne has built their career on - sure, this is rock music plain and simple, but it has the necessary hook and bite that makes a band stand out from the also-rans.

Not to make too many easy parallels to AC/DC, but there are similarities in career arc with Airbourne that make for good context.  Fifteen years after AC/DC debuted with High Voltage, they released The Razor’s Edge, which proved to be a comeback album given that the Australians' four previous efforts ranged from acceptable (For Those About to Rock We Salute You, which is a great song on a not-great record,) to lamentable (Flick of the Switch, Fly on the Wall, Blow Up Your Video.) 

Why mention this? We discussed above the four middling Airbourne albums between their debut and this eponymous effort.  But also because The Razor’s Edge gave the world “Thunderstruck,” with a guitar intro that would go down in the annals of rock lore…and a version of it can be heard towards the end of Airbourne’s “Here She Comes.”  AC/DC padded out their album with a sleazy Christmas song, “Mistress for Christmas,” and Airbourne, not to miss an opportunity, drops the even more cringy “Christmas Bonus” on the public.  And yet, for all that and perhaps because of it, this new Airbourne record doesn’t feel like the reinvention that AC/DC achieved.

(And of course, listen to the opening of the new “Last Man Standing” and try to argue it’s not an interpretation of “For Those About to Rock…”)

That doesn’t mean it’s all bad.  The album does end with a decent trio, beginning with the pretty good “Bogota,” the catchy and thumping “Hell’s Got No Vacancy” and the reasonably thoughtful and well-executed “Send Me to Rock N Roll Heaven.”  But there’s nothing revelatory here, other than a band who occasionally puts the right pieces together doing exactly that.

There was a time when Airbourne was criticized, rightly or wrongly, for sounding too much like AC/DC.  That really doesn’t apply anymore.  After nearly twenty years, it’s impossible to survive as simply a clone of some other band that came before.  The issue now is, after six albums, the most recent of which comes after a seven-year period of relative silence, Airbourne sounds just like Airbourne.

Album Review: Cancer Bats - Give Me Dirt

Cancer Bats seems like one of those bands who is perpetually in the youth of their career.  It’s something to do with the vitality of their sound, as well as their chosen genre.  Hardcore has a flair for sounding young by itself, and there’s an intrinsic quality to Liam Cormier’s vocals that denies the natural effect of aging.

It’s easy to forget then, that the band’s new album, Give Me Dirt, marks the twentieth anniversary of their debut record.  Which is worth mentioning in this context - as raw as Cancer Bats can often sound, there is no doubt that it is intentional; the grit and visible seams and loose ends are intentional and by design.  It’s impossible to have lasted this long and have that not be the case, and an equally notable feat to sound so brash and tread the line of noise without descending into madness.

That does not mean however, that the Bats (may we call them simply the Bats?) haven’t fine tuned or evolved.  Every album since 2012’s excellent Dead Set on Living has worked to refine the band’s signature chaos and come up with new and novel ways to craft great hooks while staying true to their hardcore roots.  It hasn’t always worked - Searching for Zero was something of a mess - but by and large the Bats have always found a way to keep themselves relevant and fresh by incorporating rock grooves into their sound.

Moreover, the veteran Torontoans have taken from their own previous experiments and combined that knowledge into this new record.  To hear “Ocean Crash” is to see a possible evolution of the slow thump that made the previous album’s “Hammering On” work so beautifully.  

As ever, what really makes the Bats stand out from their contemporaries in the hardcore scene is their invocation of the big, hook-laden rock and roll riff.  The spindly, groovy opening of “Long Tooth” is the same kind of sensibility that made most of the album The Spark That Moves such an automatic classic.  There are few artists who better understand that a big chorus and a memorable hook can connect disparate pieces of almost any composition.

That doesn’t mean that Cancer Bats can’t still hammer with the best of them.  Album closer “Fools Like You” is a ready-built, down-and-dirty hardcore banger that feels at home on the album, but also would be just as comfortable in the dirty, street-corner clubs of Brooklyn back in the ‘90s.

Now, there is a dark cloud over all of this.  As good as Give Me Dirt is, and it is, it seems very familiar.  As evidenced by what’s been said so far in this piece, the band is at their best when they sound like themselves on previous efforts.  It’s not unfair to say that Give Me Dirt is an amalgam of Dead Set on Living and Psychic Jailbreak and in so doing, this album lacks the pure visceral nastiness of the former and the refined exploration (such as one can have in hardcore) of the latter.  That’s not wholly a death sentence - but it does imply two potentially damaging things.  First, that in an effort to cannibalize their lessons and synthesize new avenues, the band has trimmed off too much of their edge and possibly done some regression to the mean.  Second and more concerning is the possibility that after twenty years the Bats have hit their creative limit.  It’s much too soon to make that judgement now - after all, Searching For Zero was a dud, but they followed it up with their best album in The Spark That Moves.

Anyway, don’t get too carried away here.  Give Me Dirt is good.  Really good.  For longtime fans though, it may be hard to escape the feeling that this record has been heard before.

Album Review: Street Tombs - Existence is Corruption

This’ll be pretty quick.  Let’s not try to complicate this and make Street Tombs’ new album Existence Is Corruption something that it isn’t.

Have you ever enjoyed Goatwhore?  Or Venom?  Or Celtic Frost?  Or Darkthrone?  If you’re nodding your head vigorously (especially if your neck hurts while doing so,) you’ve come to the right place.

Listen, that might sound like an oversimplification, but really, Existence Is Corruption doesn’t need to be more than that.  There will always be a place in the crowded, gore-addled metal landscape for a band to remind us all of the days gone by in a fresh way, thumping out old-school death with a grimacing sneer and a bunch of stringy black hair and leather jackets.  It’s part of the collective musical DNA of the genre and appeals at the most primordial, instinctive level.

Especially when the artist crafting the tunes is so evidently good at it.  Street Tombs excels at knowing all the proper beats of how to write music in this vein, and the band is tight in their recitation.  It’s hard not to grin at the single “Deceptor,” which provides us with grim tones, yes, but also an accessible riff that’s easy to bop along to (as much as one can be said to ‘bop’ to music in this stripe.)  

Everywhere you turn, the record offers four-minute chunks of fun death metal, chugging along with broken-glass guitars and the usual growled missives about the futility of the human condition.  Real old-home-week kind of stuff, and that’s meant as a compliment. Best of all, unlike so many albums in this particular splinter, Existence is Corruption doesn’t sound like it was recorded in the back of a garbage truck.

(There is also, in all the guitar solos, just the barest hint of an East Bay Ray guitar tone, which sounds like it would be out of place, but works surprisingly well here.)

There is a…oneness…to the sound of the album.  Which is to say, in a blindfold test, it would be hard to identify one song from another, and the tone and pacing of the record never changes in a tangible fashion.  In a paradoxical way, that makes the record really fit for leaving on while doing office work (try it and see!) as it provides excellent, high-octane but not overbearing music to set your rhythm to.

As stated at the top though, don’t make this record something it doesn’t need to be.  Street Tombs knows what band they want to be.  They’ve recorded an(other) album that illustrates that point.  Relax and just enjoy the album for the simple joy of it.

Album Review: Weezer - The Gold Album

Most of us probably have a scar somewhere on our body that reminds us of a time when we were young and stupid, perhaps that reminds us of a specific decision we made that we regretted as soon as the blood started to seep out. In musical terms, Weezer is one of those scars. There was a time when Weezer was maybe the most important band in my life. I was listening to those first four albums a ton, and I made what were at the time essential friendships on a Weezer message board. I needed Weezer back then, but that is a chapter that has come and gone in my life. Sadly, unlike my high school class that couldn't organize a way to wipe their own asses, Weezer calls us to reunions every year or two, which only serves to remind me of how much we can love and hate the past at the same time

For this latest album, Weezer is once again in nostalgic mode, trying and failing to recreate the sound that made them famous. They do this every so often, seemingly unaware that even with the same production choices, they cannot play or sing like the people they no longer are. Rivers at his age can no more pretend to be the literary misanthrope who was glued to the metaphorical wall any more than the high school quarterback acting like a big shot at the reunion when the only thing his arm has been used for over the last twenty years is pleasuring himself.

We heard this when "Shine Again" was released as a single, with it's fuzzy guitar stabs sounding like a return to "Beverly Hills", and Rivers' unique ability to sound out-of-tune while I'm sure actually hitting the note he's going for. It was a song that showed Weezer trying to sound gritty again, but with a song that was soulless enough the grit felt like applying makeup to trick people into thinking you have a black eye.

Then "We Might As Well Be Strangers" is unique for being a Weezer duet, but has to be noted sounds as if it was borrowing some melodic contour from a song off "Make Believe", which until Weezer dug an even deeper hole for themselves was considered their worst album. These are not the reminders you want to be giving your fans. Nor was "C.E.O.", which ruins everything we ever loved about "Undone" by borrowing the sonic palate and the spoken word-ness of it, turning it into a meditation on Weezer recycling their own past. It isn't a 'meta' song so much as an admission Weezer knows they haven't made, and cannot make, anything that endured with the audience since about 2001. Rivers admits he's going through the motions of recreating the past, which is honest, but also a complete charade. We should not be applauding him for pandering to the audience if it isn't what he has his heart set on, although it's hard to tell what Rivers is actually passionate about, considering the passionless way he usually sings.

This record wants to be a new "Pinkerton". The guitars are crusty in the same way, and when Rivers starts singing about being gaslit, it has echoes of his pleas to turn a lesbian straight so someone would fuck him. In this case, he is the victim of the psychological warfare, but his ultimate message to give in and "say yes" is the worst thing he could say. The song is basically a declaration that he doesn't want to be in Weezer anymore, but the audience and the reaction more or less forces him to continue on. That explains a lot, doesn't it?

The bullshit continues when Rivers starts to sing in "Hoops" about having to scan a QR code to buy a toaster. It's not a compelling topic for a song, and it's written without an ounce of interesting perspective. Rivers is once again at his worst as a lyricist throughout the record, whether it's this or when he mentions how his mother told him to comb his hair. It's all trite nonsense that gets in the way of saying something that actually matters. I know no one turns to Weezer for insight on the human condition, but there's no way to relate to lyrics that are this vapid, sung by a voice that sounds absurd when trying to inject emotion. This is very much taking the old adage about someone singing the phone book as a challenge. Rivers throws words together, but they don't form songs that have meaning. It's very much the same as when he wrote "Where's My Sex" based on a mispronunciation by his kid. It might be an amusing slip of the tongue in the moment, but that's not enough to write an entire song around.

But I knew all of this before I ever listened to a note of this album. Weezer has been terrible since at least "The Red Album", and the periodic check-ins with them have less to do with seeing if they will ever improve, and more to do with me checking myself for early-onset senility. The day I start to like new Weezer music again, I will know my brain fog is something to be concerned with, and not merely an artifact of depression.

What Weezer prove every time they release one of these records is that life is not like school, and you can write a failing grade in any color. I appreciate the nostalgia of the production (even if the actual grittiness of this one is like a ChatGPT recreation of "Pinkerton"), and this might be the best melodic writing Rivers has done in quite a while, but as an album I still find myself thinking it would say something about myself I wouldn't like if I told you I enjoyed this album. It's an improvement, but that doesn't make it good. Maybe in 1998 when we were all still young and stupid, but not now, not when we're all as old or older than our heroes were when we first called them washed up.

Album Review: Adam Jensen - Hymns For The Damned

"I hate myself," Adam Jensen sings before the chorus in the opening song, "Cellophane". It's a bold statement to make on the first song of your debut record, which if you're like me is the first time you've heard anything from him. To set the stage of your record as being one of working through your self-loathing, you're telling the audience that this is not a record traveling down the arc toward the end of a rainbow. We're going to be digging further into our psyches, not our bag of self-deluding tricks.

The soundtrack to these thoughts is not of the more predictable, gothic sort. There is no gloomy melancholy of shimmering darkness, but rather a sound I would describe most accurately as 'grungy power-pop'. The guitars bristle with a thick fuzz of distortion, but the songs settle into catchy melodies that turn this record into, if you pardon the pun, fitting music for a pity party. There is an almost upbeat sense of fun to the suffering contained in many of the songs, which is something you can only understand if you are of a certain mental disposition.

"All my friends are dead or in my head," he sings on the second track. Most people have no idea what that feeling, metaphorically speaking, is like. I am one of those that does, and the spirit of that song carries a lot of weight with me. The mere act of writing these words is in a way proof of that, as I am more or less talking to myself about all of this. We who are so afflicted either write songs that become like friends, or we write characters that stand in for the people who are no longer around. I was recently commenting to someone that characters from sitcoms are a more constant presence in my life than most of the people I've ever known, so I understand where Adam is coming from.

As the record continues on, I'm torn on whether it more resembles Andrew WK's party rock filtered through the misery of we who possess social idiocy, or if it is the ultra pop-ified version of Nirvana that Kurt Cobain was fighting to prevent. When "Champagne Vein" opens with a riff that sounds like an inverted "Smells Like Teen Spirit", that connection was impossible for my brain not to grab hold of. In either event, there's something unique about this record that is hard to explain to people who don't see the world the same way.

Perhaps the best way is to say that with Adam's voice resembling that of Ryan Adams, this record is what Ryan's attempts at rock and roll would have been if he thought himself to be a piece of shit, rather than him being the only one who didn't realize it.

One of the interesting aspects of this record is that with so much fuzz on the guitars, this is a record where fidelity doesn't matter much. Listening to a pristine stream is powerful, but there's a gritty realism if the quality isn't quite there. It's almost like watching a restored version of an old movie, enjoying all that you couldn't see in the version you grew up watching, but still finding comfort the experience of the blur.

There has been a bit of a theme this year where my favorite albums have been dealing with how we process and persevere through the difficult times that are difficult to get out of our heads. We can be our own worst enemy, and often we think what Adam sings on "I Will Only Bring You Down". This record is not going to be for people who are happy, or who only want to be exposed to positivity. This record is thirty-three minutes of self-reflection that doesn't try to paint over the fact that things are not always what we want them to be.

But if you're one of those people who remembers all of the bad times more vividly than the good ones, why not remember them in the form of some memorable rock songs?

Album Review: Coyote Man - "Prosthetic Memories"

There’s a whole bunch of music exploding out of Chicagoland lately, up to and including our previous review of the Afrofuturistics.  One can only hope that there will be more and more, and that this becomes a new developmental scene, the like of which we’ve not had since the eruption of Montreal, circa 2009.  

As for Coyote Man, the (largely) instrumental power prior from the Windy City, they’ve dropped their new full-length on the world, Prosthetic Memories. It promises to carry the freight for artistically-leaning instru-metal through a combination of creative blending and well-practiced sensibilities.

Cutting to the quick, I wish there was more to this record.  To come to the band’s defense in some regard, it’s hard enough to write one instrumental, let alone an album full of them, which is likely why we see so few artists attempt it (John 5 and Mountain of Wizard notwithstanding.)  It’s a tricky enterprise, trying to tell a story without words, often best left to the Tom and Jerry’s of the world, which can lean into the visual medium to help move the narrative along.

And all that is to say that Prosthetic Memories starts off with great promise - lead single “Coping Mechanism” begins something like an irradiated “Baba O’Riley,” as though the 45 single of the latter song were played on 78 (kids, ask your parents, or possibly, sigh, your grandparents, what the hell we’re talking about.)  The aural similarity is complete and convenient enough that it must be intentional, yeah? A lovingly tongue-in-cheek tribute to one of the most distinct album openings of all time.

From there we go into “War Hatchet,” which moves with a nice pace, and then the central chug that might as well serve as the refrain for the piece rocks with the same cadence and thump of Static-X’s “Push It.”  To the degree that it’s uncanny.

Sigh…therein lies the rub with Coyote Man’s new album - they’re at their best when they sound like somebody else.  

The remaining tracks are fine for what they are, but as discussed, it’s damn hard to write an album’s length of compelling instrumentals, especially in the absence of a true hook or gimmick.  To use the artists referenced above, John 5 has his obvious virtuosity, and Mountain of Wizard is catchy and creative, stretching into all the corners of blues-based rock with a clean guitar tone and memorable licks.  

Coyote Man is shooting for something more ethereal and cerebral than that, a sound more akin to the (probably forgotten by most,) progressive metal band Prototype, but in the absence of a vocalist to convey a central theme, Prosthetic Memories finds difficulty holding attention.

Just when you think damn, this needs a singer to push the narration, one appears for the final song “Faith in a Burning Room”…but it doesn’t really make a difference.  The die have been cast at that point.

To circle back, Prosthetic Memories isn’t a band record - it just needs more. There’s a lot of meat still on this bone that Coyote Man could have explored.  Their talent and capability are unquestionable, but for this record, they’ve not found an inspirational footing.

EP Review: Afrofuturistics - The Enigmatic

Do we here at BGM know the first damn thing about jazz?  I don’t want to speak for Chris, but I’m going to say the answer is a resounding ‘hell no!’ (Although despite what some fans may say, I know enough to say that Angine De Poitrine is jazz, thereIsaidit.) Now, do we here at BGM know the first damn thing about hip-hop?  I’m gonna throw Chris under the bus here (sorry,) but while I’m sure he’d say no, I’m going to say yes!  While not as well-versed in those arts as I am in metal, I can say I have supped at hip-hop’s bounty.

Why the hell are we talking about this at all?  Isn’t this the space where I normally would talk about some gore-soaked overdrive fest, with art and themes about human depravity and the wanton destruction of the universe? Yes, it is! (Is that a raincoat?  Yes, it is!)

But not today.

It’s important to get outside the comfort zone.  To that end, today we’re taking on the debut EP The Enigmatic from Chicago jazz-hip-hop fusion combo The Afrofuturistics.  And man, is it fun.

The EP has a bunch of novel features to talk about, all of which add up to a cohesive whole.  As mentioned, jazz may not be the strong suit around here, but groove sure as shit is, and The Enigmatic has groove in spades.  The beat of opener “These Things Happen” is catchy enough, but dig down and tune into the rhythm, and there’s a saucy, thick bass line in there that subtly establishes the hook and never deviates while the vocalists above it create.

The low tones featured throughout the twenty-eight minute runtime of the EP are the central star, which means yes, as thoughtful as the lyrics are (more on this in a minute,) the music is really the focal point, which just goes to remind that this is a jazz album first, and everything else second (never mind the instrumental pieces.)  There’s an additional twist, though - conventionally, brass tones are used to brighten a piece, to make it prouder and more bombastic, but in the case of the title track, The Afrofuturistics make them sound uniquely dour and almost threatening.  This only serves to highlight the airy, ethereal saxophone interlude all the more.

The lyrics, and their delivery, are thoughtful and well-parsed.  This is more Saul Williams than DMX, with references sprinkled through both modern (DraftKings) and dated (Alanis Morissette and Calgon, which I’m not sure they make anymore.)  Still this is part of the novelty of the EP as well, as briefly discussed before - the lyrics are nearly secondary, or at least companion to the music, rather than the fixation of the exercise.  Even so, the bars we get to enjoy are a refreshing change from the false bravado and repeated cadences so pervasive in modern hip-hop, and they’re delivered in a slow-burning style similar to…well, does anyone remember Camp Lo?  They’re the closest analog.

There you have it, then.  If you’re looking for a different flavor to get you through the rest of the summer, try out The Afrofuturistics.  And if you’re unwilling to expand your own horizons and try something new…well, I don’t know what to tell you.  Must be a boring life.

Album Review: Combichrist - The Venom In The Mouth Of God

Today, class, we’re going to use an exceptionally nerdy analogy to help define what Combichrist’s new album The Venom In The Mouth Of God both is and isn’t.  Bear with us - the analogy is painfully arcane, but works in the context of dealing with an industrial record.

In recent years, electronic music has become pervasive in the mainstream as well as on the fringes - both in the sense that digital programming and electronic sounds are being incorporated into compositions at an increased rate, and that in some cases, electronic entities themselves are writing the music (see the current controversy with AI artists breaking through the country music charts.)  With that comes a sense that the music should be brighter, springier, more energetic, as electronics so often take us into higher registers and up-tempo beats.

Here’s where the analogy starts - there is a sense that electronic music is a late-era Gundam - agile, accurate, festooned in bright colors and blazing across the sky at a nigh-unbelieveable rate.  Combichrist, by virtue of being an industrial band from back before the proliferation and ready access of electronica, is a lumbering OmniMech; a seventy-five ton Mad Cat (or Timber Wolf,) of teeth and forward-facing visceral power, painted in unforgiving gunmetal gray. 

Ever since the band composed the soundtrack for the video game DmC: Devil May Cry, there’s been a theory that the band has slowly moved more toward metal and away from the straight industrial they cut their teeth on.  The culmination of this was 2024’s excellent CMBCRST, which one writer on these pages named the Album of the Year.

The Venom In The Mouth of God, slams the gears into reverse, and takes the band back to thundering basics.  It is not until halfway into the album with “Rise” that the band even hints at the metal that forged so much of the three albums before (we remain convinced that it was coded into the Geneva Convention and Vatican II that every industrial band has to write a song called “Rise” or “Risen” or “Rise Up” or some such.)  

While those metal hammers get dropped now and again, that’s not really what The Venom… is about.  The album wants to be sparse and haunting and deadly, a brooding monster with a fission core that threatens with every ponderous stride and shadow of presence.  While the songs at the outset prove the attempt, it’s in the back half where the record really flashes its jagged fangs.

No song on the album more proves Combichrist’s (and ideaman Andy LaPlegua’s) skill at composing in this vein than the questionably mature “S.T.F.U.” (not just a John Cena maneuver anymore!) This is one of those rare songs that shouldn’t work, but does - it is, ironically, kind of a strange cousin of Fear Factory’s ill-conceived “Back The Fuck Up” from 2001, a stream-of-consciousness quasi-rap that has no business being as well assembled or catchy as it is.

It sets the stage for the rest of the album, where, as odd as this sounds, Combichrist composes a series of beat poems on steroids, with LaPlegua as the cybernetic Allen Ginsberg.  Again, should this work?  Maybe not, but listen to the venomous undercurrent of “The Way We Want To Be Seen,” and try to find a crack in the armor.  LaPlegua has always had this in him; the ability to set introspective missives on personal anguish and impermanence to a cinematic beat (thinking of “Bottle of Pain” from One Fire,) but he really takes the chains off for this album and leans into the style.

What the listener takes away from The Venom In The Mouth Of God, will really come down to what side of Combichrist is preferred.  Those who exclusively believe the band’s best material has been in the their last three albums may well find this a harder journey, where those who lament the band ever straying from their roots will rejoice.  Either way, the fact remains that the album’s final eight songs will take the listener on a journey of steel and fire and discontent, with nary a beam saber in sight.