Celtic Frost – Monotheist

Bands fall in and out of favor about as often as fashions and trends change. Fan bases are often fickle and will flock to the next hot band before the last’s 15 minutes of fame are up. Cries of “sellout” and “genius” are uttered in the same breath, and as one band prepares for stardom, another is put out to pasture. Music has many sacred cows, and for every Led Zeppelin there is a Kingdom Come waiting to have their faces spat in.

Then there are those bands that exist in notoriety, producing legendary music just beneath the mainstream consciousness that eventually goes on to influence millions. Then, in the same instant they spawn genius and art, they stumble, fall, and disappear from the collective consciousness faster than the speed of light. This happened to Celtic Frost, the legendary Swiss metal act whose first three records – Morbid Tales, To Mega Therion, and Into the Pandemonium – simultaneously influenced the development of death, thrash, black, doom, and avant metal. From Morbid Angel to Nirvana, Neurosis to Napalm Death, Sigh to Opeth, countless musicians were influenced by this seminal metal band’s classic works.

However, in 1987, shortly after the tour for Into the Pandemonium, things were amiss. Sales were poor and the record company demanded a sure-fire hit, something that would boost Frost’s dragging sales and rescue them from obscurity. So mainman Thomas Gabriel Fischer (AKA Tom G. Warrior) fired the entire band, replaced them with pretty-boy session musicians, teased his hair, and wrote a record full of commercially acceptable pop-metal tunes. The result was 1988’s Cold Lake, a record known more for the quantity of copies thrown out of the car on the ride home from the store than for the quality of music.

The band attempted a comeback in 1990 with the passable Vanity/Nemesis and then broke up in 1993 to toil in obscurity… until an early 2000’s campaign by Sanctuary Records to reissue their catalog (sans Cold Lake) brought Fischer and bass player Martin Eric Ain back together to supervise the process. This chance meeting brought them to the decision to reform the band in 2002. They worked in silence over the next four years until finally, in mid-2006, Monotheist was released.

The most evident thing about Monotheist is the sheer amount of work put into it. The music lurches, creaks, and lumbers like a decapitated golem, incredibly heavy and not quite sure of its impact. The album is well over an hour and feels as laborious as its creators must have felt while writing it. It opens with “Progeny,” a five-minute exercise in riffage and atmosphere. The song opens triumphantly with one of Fischer’s trademark “UGH”s, as if to announce “we’re back!” The most immediate difference from Frost’s early work is that most of the speed and thrash riffing is gone, replaced with a slow, sludgy approach that echoes bands such as Neurosis. Some older fans may miss faster songs like Morbid Tales’ “Into the Crypts of Rays,” but the increased bottom-end and dark atmosphere are a fair tradeoff.

“Dark atmosphere” doesn’t even begin to cover the depths of Monotheist’s sound. As in past albums, Frost feels free to experiment, such as on “A Dying God Coming into Human Flesh” and “Obscured,” which both build from almost skeletal song structures into heavy and emotive pieces of music, featuring atmosphere reminiscent of Sisters of Mercy. Other songs like “Ain Elohim” and “Domain of Decay” are closer to older Celtic Frost in sound and arrangement, though they are noticeably slower and the guitars are tuned lower.

The production is very bottom-end heavy and almost industrial-sounding thanks to the band and Peter Tagtren of Hypocrisy and Pain fame. These elements may turn older fans off at first, but Monotheist, like great Celtic Frost albums of the past, is a deep experience that rewards the listener with multiple full listens. Good things come to those who wait, and none fit this old adage better than Celtic Frost.

Nights Like These – The Faithless

Let’s take a look at the good things to come out of Memphis, Tennessee recently…well, I came up with nothing. Oh wait, I forgot that Nights Like These came from the Southern city famous for country and rock ‘n roll. Hmmm, my answer still stands; nothing good has come out of Memphis lately. Victory Records is back again, dropping another ridiculously lame attempt at the next big thing. Watching paint dry is more exciting than listening to these jokers. In fact, I almost wish I had to write a review about watching paint dry at this point, because it would be better than having to try and make it through this entire album.

Mind you, I used the term “album” loosely. I should have said “recording of the same song 11 times.” Seriously, did these kids just give up? Actually, I think they didn’t even try in the first place. “Hey, Johnny, you want to start a run-of-the-mill metalcore band with me? We can get together after football practice. Barrington High School football rules!” “Well sure, Brock, but I don’t know how to play guitar.” “Oh don’t worry, that doesn’t matter.” That’s what I imagine taking place during “band meeting number one.” These guys look like your average jockos that got a hold of the latest Killswitch Engage after stumbling across it on MTV2 while looking for TRL. Guess what? They sound like it too. “Yo, brah, this shit is dope! Let’s listen to it before the big game!” “Right after this keg-stand, broseph! Wooo that’s cold!”

Some at this point might think I am being a bit of a jerk, and to be honest, I totally am. But let me explain something – as someone who plays guitar AND has listened to heavy music for quite a while, I am sick and tired of this garbage being pumped out all the time. There was a time where one actually needed to have the slightest bit of talent to be in a heavy band. That has all changed. Talent comes after the cool hardcore band look, and labels like Victory are just feeding the fire by releasing this compost.

This album has nothing interesting at all. None. Zip. Zero. It is absolutely bogus. The song structures are beyond weak, and the breakdowns aren’t even cool. It’s not even worth going over individual songs, because they are all exactly the same. They all suck. There is no diamond in the rough anywhere in there.

All I can say is the following: go back to football practice and stop helping to pave the way for more douchebags to start bands like yours.

Sub Rosa – Slings & Arrows

The female voice has an advantage over that of males in that women often have a greater range and versatility. However, they also have the ability to be whiny, piercing, and extremely grating when off key. If a male doesn’t quite hit his note, the lower tone can sometimes mask the mistake or even, if he’s good enough, make it seem cool, as if he intended for it to be that way. This also has to do with the types of songs women usually sing, which are challenging and rangy or screaming and whiny. There are also the breathy types with guitars who sound lovely but boring after a while. But then there the voices that are neither breathy nor extremely high-pitched, and they have more of an instrumental quality to them that allows them to flow through different notes seamlessly and with a bit of their own style. These are artists like Sarah McLauchlan, Alanis Morrisette, Bjork, and Tori Amos.

Sub Rosa is lead by Jennifer Boeder, who has one of these melodically haunting voices with similarities to that of Sinead O’Connor and Sarah McLachlan. She has a strong voice that, while it could probably hold up with little accompaniment, has a greater effect blended with the slightly dark, moody music. She may be a woman with a guitar, but like Sinead O’Connor who partnered up with Massive Attack on their most recent album, her songs are no campfire sing-along. Her music partner, Jesse Hozeny, is a great force, contributing guitars, bass, and drums to the mix.

The couple’s debut, Slings & Arrows, opens with an instant taste of the album’s cloudy mood with “White Flag”. Well-written lyrics like “White flag rolled up nice and tight / I could break it out tonight / Leaving all this mess behind” let us know that this is not a girly album with cheesy lines. Instead, the songs are about her discontent with the ways of the world and the feelings one has when choosing not to follow the pack.

Musically, the album conjures up images of heavier bands like Tool that have been given a softer edge. The guitars and harmony parts within the album seem heavily influenced by such bands. The mood is consistent throughout the album instead of trying to hop around from genre to genre. This works very well for the group and is a fitting backdrop for Boeder. The artists have found a good blend of pop that helps them sound catchy without seeming radio-hungry. With nine tracks that go by quickly, they have the ability to stick around for a while even after the first listen. So if you’re like me and often not a great fan of female-fronted bands, you may want to give Sub Rosa a try. And if you do like female vocals leading the way, then this album is definitely for you.

Murder By Death – In Bocca al Lupo

At first glance, In Bocca al Lupo ( “In the Mouth of the Wolf”) has all the makings of a death-metal release: nihilistic band name; cover art depicting a tree whose roots extend into Hell amid flames, a collection of skulls and flying devils; equally creepy, although expertly done and intricately detailed, booklet art; and song titles like “Dead Men and Sinners,” “Sometimes the Line Walks You,” and “The Devil Drives/” But one spin of In Bocca al Lupo dispels any notion of death metal. Instead, what comes blasting from the speakers is something that could pass for Stan Ridgway fronting Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.

But this is not Stan Ridgway fronting Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. This is Murder By Death with Adam Turla on guitar and vocals, Sarah Balliet on cello and keyboards, Matt Armstrong on bass, and Alex Schrodt on drums and percussion. And while their music may lurk in the shadows of NCATBS, Murder By Death emerges with a concoction of Americana blues, gothic post-rock, western folk, and gritty indie rock that these artists can call their own.

It’s no surprise, coming from a band that takes its name from a 1976 Robert Moore novel, that each song unfolds as a tragic short story whose eccentric characters are brought to life with Turla’s passionate crooning. He belts out the sordid fables with the same emotional intensity as Nick Cave but with the tone and drawl of Stan Ridgway. The diverse music is played with equal fervor, as the band’s artistic hybrid of rock is an ideal fit for these twisted tales.

There aren’t many bands that can carve their way through such a dense musical pallette with such conviction and dexterity, but In Bocca al Lupo shows Murder By Death strutting its stuff in a variety of styles from turbulent to delicate. Highlights include the drunken sailor pub song “Dead Men and Sinners” that sounds so authentic you’ll think it really was recorded in a pub with drunken sailors; the blazing indie-rock beats of “Brother”; and “Sometimes the Line Walks You” with some hard-driving bass lines that rivals “Let Love In”-era Nick Cave. The sound is tempered a bit towards the end of the disc, as Turla gives Johhny Cash a run for his money on the mostly acoustic “Shiola,” and the band even flirts with a bit of gospel on closer “The Devil Drives.” Balliet adds the perfect compliment to each song with an infusion of keyboard washes and assorted cello techniques. Whether deep pounding staccato to add grit, expressive bowing to provide a touch of melancholy, or ethereal glissandi, it is all sublime, smoothing over the rough-edged rock and giving Murder By Death a leg up on others in the genre.

It takes guts to play music in a genre that includes clever, oddball eccentrics like Stan Ridgway and rock icons such as Johnny Cash and Nick Cave. But it takes talent and conviction to emerge from their shadows with a distinctive album, and In Bocca al Lupo proves that Murder By Death has all three.

Clouds Forming Crowns – Race to the Blackout

It’s common knowledge to never mix business with family. The combination usually results in broken hearts, hurt pride, and bankruptcy. Yet while most people take heed to precedence and avoid working with their family like Kansas City Royals home games, brothers Todd and Tim Tobias relish in it, creating some truly amazing music, both with the legendary Guided By Voices and with their pet project, Clouds Forming Crowns.

The latter’s most recent album, Race to the Blackout, is, quite simply, excellent. It’s pure rock and roll pulled straight out of the 1960s, complete with everything I love about the genre: hypnotic and heavy guitars, fuzzy, growling bass, and surreal lyrics, tied together in a concise, no frills package. Mars Volta, listen up. There’s not a filler track or interminable noodling jam to be found on this album. No, Race to the Blackout has nary an ounce of fat on it, as the brothers Tobias choose instead to cut the crap and stuff the record full with some of the dirtiest, meatiest blues riffs this side of the Mason-Dixon Line. Within the first five seconds of album-opener “Phantom Dog Black Water,” you’re hit with ball-breaking distortion and grimey cymbal decay. The song segues into the second track, “Animal Drunk,” without skipping a beat, shifting into an ingenious variation on the main riff of “Phantom Dog.”

Throughout the album, Todd and Tim play around with their gritty tone, altering it just enough to keep it from getting boring. On one of my favorite songs, “Matter of Choice,” grungy guitars and psychedelic moans stutter and collide with breakneck intensity. The following tracks, “Have a Dream” and “Satellite Ingestion,” are vastly subdued, airy pieces, like Bob Dylan’s songs after he went electric. And “Floating” features an utterly brilliant, floating chorus that just elegantly drops the bottom out when the up-tempo, bobbing verse and bridge screeches to a halt.

One after another, Race to the Blackout fires off incredibly breathtaking songs, each one memorable and unique in its own right. I have literally been unable to stop playing it, and on each listen, I marvel at the Tobias brothers’ knack for writing swampy melodies and hooks that rival quicksand in their ability to grab hold on someone. Savor this album, as it’s one of the best of the year so far.

Hairshirt – Lover Politician EP

There was a time when bands could release whole albums that were 26 minutes long. I’m almost certain DRI and the Ramones did exactly that more than once. Hairshirt’s EP Lover Politician clocks in at 26 minutes, too.

Except Lover Politician is only five songs. That means — with three of the songs over five minutes long — it requires a degree of patience. Fortunately, that patience is rewarded.

I don’t mind bands that wear their influences on their sleeves. It makes new things easier to listen to, like if you’re already a Joy Division fan and somebody plays you some Interpol, or if you’re a Depeche Mode fan and somebody plays you some She Wants Revenge. Comparisons are useful.

But I feel like I’m the only one who would realize how close Hairshirt’s sound is to the ComSat Angels and early Talk Talk. Hairshirt, like both of these bands, is icy and distant. Vocalist (and guitarist and sequencer/programmer) Amir Husak sounds like he’s singing to someone else in the room even when you’re alone. His voice is deep and stark, wrought only barely with any kind of emotion. Not that it’s not expressive, but it is absolutely precise. There’s no slurring, and it’s totally accentless, quite a surprise from a singer who claims to have learned English from Iggy Pop records.

All five songs are excellent, well-crafted, post-punk, early-80s throwback compositions that would sound right at home on mix tape from my cousin circa 1984. These aren’t small songs either, and not just in length: the songs are full, from top to bottom, with music. Unlike the glacial emptinesses that plague some of the early ComSat Angels albums, Hairshirt seizes on studio wizardry to fill up these complicated constructs with noise layered on noise layered on, well, more noise. And it works wonderfully.

The two last and longest songs, “Obstacles” (6:30) and “Rubber Hands” (7:28), are the standouts here, perhaps because they show the band employing some of those emptinesses for dramatic effect and also show Husak in a more emotional light, coming off almost like a Bosnian Edwyn Collins.

This is an impressive debut. It’s not traditional pop — it’s too controlled for that — but it is a fine collection of tracks nonetheless. I look forward to a full-length debut (and won’t be surprised if it’s 77 minutes long). The three guys in Hairshirt deserve your money and your time.

Trigger Point – A Silent Protest

The guys in Los Angeles’ Trigger Point rock out, but they wouldn’t punch you in the face. On their debut album, A Silent Protest, singer Taylor Wallace is somewhat compelling in the tradition of Glassjaw, and drummer Dave Gentry ads polish to an otherwise average sound.

Trigger Point treads water between hard rock and hardcore. With some production help, the band could be on the radio right now, and a lot of junior high and high school kids would be all over this. But in a genre in which 90 percent of bands rely on the same dynamics, instrumentation, chord changes, and lyrical content, a little originality in Trigger Point’s sound would go a long way toward getting the right radio people to listen.

Most of the tracks on Trigger Point’s A Silent Protest start off with quiet parts. This is probably intended to make the actual song seem more impressive when it finally hits. Doesn’t work. But please note that this review is based on downloaded mp3 files, which are hopefully not true to the final mix – the guitar sounds weak and the vocals are too up front. This could pass given singer Wallace’s vocal versatility, but my enthusiasm wanes after hearing lyrics like, “Anger, anger, all I ever feel is anger in this fucked up world. It’s inside me. You’re the only one I trust. Gave it all to you, then you threw it in my face and you ripped me apart inside. What do you think of me now?”

Bright spots on A Silent Protest include track 4, “Picking up the Pieces,” and the harmonies in track 12, titled “Seven.” If you like hard rock and are interested after hearing those tracks on their myspace page, buying the album will pay off.

The Model/Actress – S/T EP

The Model/Actress marks the reintroduction to music of former members of Boston hardcore act Bullet Lavolta and Cincinnati’s electro-noise irritators Brainiac. Both those bands came to untimely ends (tragically so in the case of Brainiac – car crash, promising life cut short, band folds), though many if not all the players remain actively involved in music. Now, after meeting up in L.A. while pursuing various film related careers, Todd Phillips (ex-Bullet), Monostereo (ex-Brainiac), and Curtis Mead (ex-Chamberlain) have formed the Model/Actress and put out this powerful five-song EP.

The band leans more toward Bullet Lavolta’s guitar-centric overkill than Brainiac’s ear-tormenting synth abuse and abrasive riffs, but these guys do make room for some ugly, strangled guitar lines and a violent guest vocal from former Jesus Lizard frontman David Yow (“Nodder”). In all, this debut might not stand out much for its bracing originality or anything – some tempered hardcore, some straight-up metal moves, and enough tunes amid the barking to keep things catchy – but it does rattle its cage with just enough individuality and some striking burst of cacophony and/or melody in each of the five songs to make you (by which I mean me) want more.

The opener “Equestrian” does sound dangerously close to a Queens of the Stone Age template for a one-note metal riff (albeit with a farty synth accompaniment), but the aloof vocal and hook of the chorus redeem it. Even better is “Wait What,” snotty, distorted vocals alternating with smoother cooing and menacing guitars against humming synths. Again the song’s focus is the simple drone of the chorus, a one-note keyboard grove underneath a flock of shrieking guitars.

The band even has an anthem, which is saved for the closer, “Sweep the Day Away.” The refrain kinda dwindles after the initial eruption, but it still shows the band has a knack for both arrogant, bullhorn-delivered bluster balanced with noisy hooks.

This EP is good, but the Model/Actress needs to cement its intentions with a full-length, something as ornery, thumping, and fun as these songs are at their best. I’ll be checking my mailbox.

Bosque Brown – Cerro Verde EP

Mara Miller, who performs under the name Bosque Brown, created the Cerro Verde EP as a reaction to Hurricane Katrina. Miller’s grandparents had lived near Biloxi, Mississippi, for nearly 50 years when their home was devastated by the hurricane, and although Mara’s grandparents survived and the house still stands, much of the contents were ruined. The songs on Cerro Verde – named for the street Miller’s grandparents live on – are a reflection on the family homestead, all the events and memories of the place, and the emotions dredged up during and after the disaster.

Cerro Verde starts with the aptly titled “A House.” This somber, sparse number paints the picture of a coming storm. From the onset, Bosque Brown’s acoustic music is stark, and Mara Miller’s voice has an interesting lilt that further highlights the sober tone of the songs. “That Door” follows a similar stylistic path, but here Mara’s vocals are even more urgent. “Tell Her” and “The Pain” are more of the same indie folk – gentle strumming of the guitar with the focus on Miller’s off-kilter vocals that run the gamut from nearly spoken to almost cracking under the pressure.

Bosque Brown’s Cerro Verde is almost too short to seriously like or dislike. Each of the four tracks sounds very similar to one another, and there isn’t much in the way of nuances to catch your ear. Still, the songs are extremely poignant, and they definitely seem to embody everything Mara Miller and her family must have been going through emotionally in the wake of Katrina. However, I fear the focus is so narrow that Cerro Verde may not ultimately appeal to a broad audience. If the devastation of Hurricane Katrina affected you as intimately as it did Bosque Brown, this short collection of songs will likely prove quite cathartic.

The Waylons – S/T

New York’s The Waylons’ self-titled full-length debut is a solid rock/pop album with country charm. While not as sugary as some Tullycraft or early Of Montreal, The Waylons do play Splenda hooks and have playful sing-alongs a plenty. One of the real successes of this album is the production, which gives these seemingly effortlessly crafted songs extra character. The guitars are up front with a cabinet sound, and, as a result, The Waylons sound more like a real band than a pop machine. Furthermore, the mix does the band a favor because the vocals ring harmlessly flat at times. This full-length debut is, overall, an accessible and very enjoyable listen.

Despite the band’s claim it is “not a country band,” there are some young cowboys in there somewhere. It’s a shame they don’t indulge themselves more, because their countrified moments are some of their best. Examples include the sadly devoted “Day for Night” and the at-ends ballad “Take Me Out.” A charming country-tinge appears even in tracks with chord structures much removed from the oft-vilified genre, as in two of the best tracks, the love-sick “Twenty-six” and the near-perfect “Stunning.”

In all, only two or three songs, such as opener “Front Porch,” will be skipped, and that’s a good batting average for a 14-song album. That said, The Waylons do not offer much in the way of originality. When listened to in its entirety, the album plays like a checklist of tried-and-true pop hooks. But The Waylons somehow make it new again. The simplicity of form, variety of tempos, and sincere performances make for good times.

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