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 The Rant - Feb 2010

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Slegna
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Slegna


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PostSubject: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 1:32 am

Hi, I'm Andrew, no-shower extraordinaire.

And I'm Dylan, rehabbing Twifag.

Welcome to The Rant, the (hopefully) monthly column where we will review recently released music albums and generally give each other shit.

Why, you ask? Well, we figured we might actually do something productive with the discussions we do in the AIM chats.

Which is also where we got our column name from, thanks to Dyl's rants in said chats. Good times. But without further ado, let's get rolling.

Now, Sleg and I could only find two albums from January that we thought we'd enjoy, so we just decided to merge it with the February edition. So we'll start with those two, and then move on to our regularly scheduled programming.

Holding the honor of being The Rant's first reviewed album is Fozzy's Chasing the Grail. Cue graphic:

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Awesome. Well, first off, I'm going to say this: If Dylan hadn't forced this album down my throat, I wouldn't have even given this album a listen, yet alone a second glance. Regardless, I gave the album a few listens, and honestly, it's not all that bad.

"Martyr No More" is a good song, up until the solo. Now, don't get me wrong, I love Jeff Waters (Annihilator guitarist), but the solo just doesn't match up with the rest of the song. It starts without warning, and ends just as abruptly. They get an 'A' for effort though. The vocals during the chorus of "Grail" completely ruin what could be an excellent song. It just sounds like Shawn Michaels gave Chris Jericho one too many Inverted Atomic Drops. "Broken Soul" is the least transparent Christian Rock song ever. It can go die in a fire. That's all I have to say on that matter.

"Pray for Blood" sounds like Mastodon at times, which gets a big thumbs up from me. Jeff Waters' solo on "God Pounds His Nails" flows better with the rest of the song, and maybe save for the lyrical content, it's also a pretty good song. Easily, my shining star on this album is "Paraskavedekatriaphobia" (Look it up, you lazy twats). From the hard riffs to the epic mosh-terpiece of a intro/outro, this song is easily the best on the album.

As the album nears its end, the album progressively becomes more, well, progressive. The second to last song, "Revival", features a mystical riff that draws you into the rest of the song. The last song and supposed crown jewel of the album, "Wormwood", has been described as a 'prog metal epic'. I'll agree with the first two words, but the last one is still up for debate. The intro almost lost me, but the rest of the song won me back over, and good thing too, because most of my review has hinging on this last song Dylan hyped so much. Of note, Chris Jericho doing death growls is epic fucking win. The keyboard solo is excellent, until they pull the same mistake they did in "Martyr No More" and end it too abruptly. And then they did it again with the very next riff, too! Prog rock/metal is definitely a hard genre to grasp, but to make the same mistake twice on an album definitely takes away from the experience. However, it's still a good song, despite its blatant similarities to Dream Theater's "In The Presence of Enemies".

Overall, Fozzy just seemed like they tried too hard with this album at times, trying to incorporate too many genres into one album. Chris Jericho and Co. tried too hard, and sections of the album suffered.

But in order to be a semi-decent critic, I have to be harsh at times, even when the album might not deserve it. Chasing the Grail is still a good effort, especially considering I wasn't expecting much from the album in the first place. All in all, I give it:


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Five and a half stars.

Ooh, shiny.

Your turn, Dyl. Go.

Well, here we go. First off, I'll admit, I'm a total Fozzy mark. I love these guys. Their passion for metal is obvious, which is what draws me to them.

So, we kick the album off with machine gun like drumming, and then just as the opening riff kicks in, we hear Chris Jericho come in. This is "Under Blackened Skies", and everything about this song just clicks. The riffs, the drumming and Jericho's vocals all come together to form an excellent combination, making the opener a smashing success. Jericho is a totally competent vocalist, and he shows that with this opening track. An excellent solo from Rich Ward, and away we go. My only gripe is the outro could have been shortened, as it went a tad bit too long.

Next up, we have "Grail", and this song is totally phenomenal. Jericho shows a great vocal range, going from lower ranges during the verses to higher registers during the chorus. Also of note is the excellent vocal harmony going on in the chorus. Rich Ward slows the riffage down for this track, and to great effect, setting a darker mood. Jericho proves an excellent lyricist, avoiding going too cheesy, while still retaining the darker, more depressing feel of the song. Win song is win.

"Pray for Blood" is a hair metal fans wet dream. With an excellent open, Jericho has described this song as being about "10th century Vikings who would eat their enemy's hearts after killing them." That is fucking win. This song is just totally epic in every way, from the lyrics, to the solos, to... everything. Just a total "wow" song.

"New Day's Dawn" is an extremely interesting song. Starting off with a chick performing the vocals-


Uh, Dyl, that's Rich Ward doing a falsetto...

Well shit, who woulda thunk it?

Idiot.

<3 you too Sleg. Anyhow, "New Day's Dawn" is different, and honestly, I find this to be a lower part of the album. While it's decent, it just doesn't quite click. That's really all I can say about this song.

Next up, the second highest point of this album. "Paraskavedekatriaphobia (Friday the 13th)". Starting off with a nice, thrashy riff, the song is a headbanging moment. Obviously, it deals with Friday the 13th, and a fear of the day, which is what that ridiculously long title means. Fuck, that title is something Iron Maiden would use. An excellent song, with great vocals once again from Jericho, and a sweet scream at the end, showing off more vocal skill.

"Watch me Shine" chokes me up. Really. The song is very well written, being about not being able to fix things. Just a great overall song. This song is really the radio friendly "Enemy" style song.

Here we are. "Wormwood". Easily the best track on the album. Opening with ominous whispers, including a section from the Book of Revelation, then entering into a nice acoustic intro, the song quickly enters a fury of riffage. We get a very Dream Theater style section, and then enter a darker section. The vocals kick in, and Jericho shows a much lower, more mature side to his vocals. This song deals with the apocalypse, and the end of days as pertaining to the Book of Revelation. The song winds and courses throughout the story, ending with a flurry of riffs and a final scream, before once more going into a whispered section. The song ends with one last flurry of guitars, before closing out with an acoustic outro. Such an epic win song.

Fozzy markdom aside, this is a great album, and a big step forward for the band. A couple of misteps, but otherwise, a great effort from the boys.


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My final mark is 9/10. Great album, and I officially declare my subscription to the Fozzspel.

Fozzspel? Really?

Shut up and start your next review.

Fine. Our second January album is Gamma Ray's To The Metal.

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Gamma Ray is one of those bands that you either like immensely or cannot stand whatsoever. I happen to be in the prior category, but I can see why people could be turned off. One thing you can't deny though, is that these guys are incredibly musically talented. In 1995, the group released the universally acclaimed Land of the Free and the proceeded to fall off the radar until they released its' sequel, Land of the Free II (nothing says 'let's return to our former glory' than naming a new album after your own bestselling album, amirite?). Now Gamma Ray is back, and in fine form too. Oh, and for the record, the album art is pretty sexilicious.

Let's get to the nitty-gritty. The album starts off with one of my favorite tracks from the album, "Empathy". The song starts off with a slow intro, which leads us to the power/groove metal hybrid riff which sets the tone for the rest of the song. I love the drum intro into the chorus, and the chorus itself is amazing. "All You Need To Know" gives us more of a power metal feel, as well as another excellent solo from Kai Hansen . A common theme throughout this album is guitar solos that fit the song. Good lead-ins, good finishes, the appropriate BPM and appropriate amount of shredding.

"To The Metal" is one of those songs that is catchy as all hell. It serves as a good midpoint for the album, slowing the pace of the album down to give you time to savor To The Metal, before kick starting the pace again in "Rise". "Rise" is the epitome of power metal, with fast guitar work during the verses, to the epic power chords during the chorus. Hansen's voice in "Mother Angel" sums up why I enjoy Gamma Ray so much. It bears so much emotion without straining itself. And the solo is once again amazing. Nothing new, nothing flashy, just plain solid.

"Deadlands" is another song where all the pieces fit together beautifully. The up-tempo staccato keyboarding during the verses, and Hansen again shows off his shredding ability with an awesome solo, before handing soloing duties over to Henjo Richter for a keyboard solo. The final song, "No Need To Cry", starts off with a slow piano intro, and then the slow vocals hit, and then the realization hits you - this is an epic power metal ballad. Winwinwinwinwin. The guitar solo fits in so well with the rest of the song it's unreal. Chalk another one up to Hansen's genius. The pre-solo, however, is very Yes-esque (rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?) and while I enjoy Yes, it doesn't fit in with the rest of the song at all.

Overall, this an good album with good quality songs, albeit they aren't all that memorable. A few songs truly shine while the others wallow in the vague territory of 'I like it when I hear it, otherwise I wouldn't think twice about it'. To quote "To The Metal", 'Hail to the metal'. Hail to the metal indeed.


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Ok Dyl, your turn, I'm intrigued about your thoughts on the CD.

Gamma Ray, huh? German power metal has had it's ups in the past, most notably with Helloween, who are credited with starting the power metal movement. Eventually, Kai Hansen left Helloween and formed Gamma Ray. So here we have To the Metal. The first thing I need to point out is that while the songs on this album are good, there is nothing truly memorable about any of the songs. There are a couple of catchy numbers, but overall, it's a fairly straightforward album. With that said, there are no really 'bad' songs on this album. All of it is extremely solid.

The album starts with “Empathy”, and I have to say, this is probably the best song on the album. Some really good guitar work, great vocals, everything comes together here. Not exactly the catchiest number, but it keeps your attention. “All You Need To Know” is another excellent track with a sweet guitar riff in the intro, and remains interesting throughout the song. “Time to Live” is a fairly generic track, but still good. One thing I'm noticing is the power in the vocals, which is impressive considering the advancing age of Kai Hansen, the vocalist. Like I said, good song but somewhat generic.

The title track is very well done, the second best on the album. Opening with a sweet sustained riff, the song quickly picks up into Power Metal 101. You want to play good power metal, listen to this song and this band, Gamma Ray does it so well. Excellent track right here. Hansen changes his vocal approach here, adding a cool rasp that really adds to the overall song. “Rise” is good, but comes across as filler. “Mother Angel” is an excellent track with a killer riff. How these guys can continue to come up with great riffs after so long in the business is amazing. The chorus in this song is infectious, and has been stuck in my head for a bit. This is one of the few catchier numbers on this album.

“Shine Forever” starts off with a tricky bass intro, then goes into more riffage. The highest pitched vocals to appear on the album come in. The higher pitched vocals ruin this song, they sound like they were thrown in simply to be there. “Deadlands” is a highlight of the album. The riff is somewhat generic, but it's made up for in how they use it. While generic, the riff overall adds to the song. One of the better songs of the album. “Chasing Shadows” is about as power metal as you can get. The lyrics, the vocal style, everything about it screams power metal. Then solo is face melting, and one of the best solos on the album. Another highlight. We finish this album with “No Need to Cry”. I take back my statement on “Empathy”, this is the best song on the album. Kai follows the Iron Maiden idea and places an amazing epic at the end of the album to leave a great final impression. Excellent, excellent song with excellent lyrics that really got me choking up a little bit. To finish, I give this album:

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While great, the lack of great hooks and memorable tracks hurts this album, but not enough to ruin the experience. I'll be checking out Gamma Ray's back catalogue now, these guys are really good.

Good to see something we finally agree on.

Great minds think alike.

Great mind. Singular. As in mine.

Ugh, I really don't know why I put up with you. Let's move on.

Alright, first up of three February albums is Fear Factory's Mechanize.

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Well, let me start the review like this: This album gave me a headache.

...From moshing so hard. The best in industrial thrash metal is back and running like a well oiled machine. So, to the album. The opening track, from which the album gets its' name, starts off with what sounds like ambient noise from a factory, which slowly builds us into the actual song. Cue classic Fear Factory. Hard, in your face, not overdone. Thrash in its purest form. From the verses, to the chorus, the bridge which leaves you itching for more, and the outro, I can't say anything wrong about this song. Next up, the chorus to "Industrial Discipline" caught me off guard at first, but it was a welcome change to the rest of the song.

In "Fear Campaign", the opening scream caught me off guard, and almost ruined the song for me, however, the rest of the song plus Dino Cazares' rare (yet sweet) guitar solo more than made up for it. "Powershifter" and "Oxidizer" are much like "Mechanize", nothing much to say about. Hard and heavy, what more can you ask from it? In between "Powershifter" and "Oxidize" is my favorite song from the album, "Christploitation". Not only does the lyrical content get two thumbs up, but the piano intro/bridge/outro is damn hell ass epic. Cazares gets a little more shredding in here, albeit not in solo form. However it still sounds awesome and compliments the chorus extremely well. The very ending is pretty awesome as well.

"Designing the Enemy" caught me off guard for the first listen or two, but it really shows the lighter side of Fear Factory without compromising all of what makes them awesome. Lastly, "Final Exit" also was very hit and miss. It feels like the song was made in the same vain as "Designing the Enemy", but "Final Exit" feels like it just is a bit too long for it's own good. But despite that setback, it's still an expressive song and a great finish to the album.

Fear Factory had five years of anger to work with while writing Mechanize, and they sure used it to their benefit. To put it in broad terms, the album is currently number one on my shortlist for album of the year. The album gets marked down slightly for various annoyances here and there, but no glaring mistakes at all.


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Your turn, igloo dweller.

Hmm, so now my turn to review this. I went in to Mechanize listening with caution, as I'm not the biggest fan of this type of music. By the time I finished, I was converted. Mechanize is easily my current pick for Album of the Year. It's that good. There really isn't a bad track on this album.

We kick off with “Mechanize”, and holy hell, these guys sound pissed. With a perfect blend of death growls and clean vocals, these guys get it done setting a vicious tone with the opener. You can just feel the anger radiating from vocalist Burton C. Bell, who growls with a massive fury. These boys have found their mojo early. “Industrial Discipline” and “Fear Campaign” slow things down a bit. In a lot of cases with this kind of music, slower is not a great thing, but Fear Factory pulls the slower pace off to perfection. Two songs that, while not standouts, are a good skeleton for this album.

Here we fucking go. My personal favorite song of the album, “Powershifter”. This song almost exactly describes the way I think. From the angry growls to the amazing clean vocals in the pre-chorus and chorus, this song fires on all cylinders. I can listen to this song a million times in a row and it will never get old. It just has that 'It' factor to it. Now things get interesting. Fear Factory doing a piano intro? Yes indeed, and the song is “Christploitation”, another standout track on the album. Starting as I said with an excellent piano intro, we quickly move into a furious riff, and then Bell comes in. Passion and fury combine into one on this track, making this easily one of the best on the album. Closing with a piano outro, this is where any listener should be realizing that they have something special on their hands.

“Oxidizer”, “Controlled Demolition”, “Designing the Enemy” and “Metallic Division” are all great skeleton tracks for the album, continuing the furious pace the album takes. These tracks set the stage for simply the best song on the album, “Final Exit”. I really don't know what to say. I would imagine this is something different for Fear Factory. Starting off with a bone chilling spoken verse ('It's quite an experience to hold the hand of someone as they move from living to dead'). We slowly get heavier until Bell comes in, and we calm down again, going at a slower pace. This song definitely gets me, as I have suffered a lot of loss recently. The song also makes me question my own mortality. This track is the perfect way to end this album. The furious, relenting pace, finished with a softer, more mellow pace, where Bell puts on his best display of clean, haunting vocals in the entire FF discography.

I'm floored. This album is just... I don't want to use “perfect”, but that is the only thing that comes to mind. I have to. My final rating is 10/10.


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From now on, every time you speak I'm going to imagine it's Burton C. Bell singing. It will still be psychobabble, but at least it will sound good.

Wow, finally a decent barb, you are learning. Next up, the one and only Rob Zombie with his new album Hellbilly Deluxe 2: Noble Jackals, Penny Dreadfuls and the Systematic Dehumanization of Cool.

F yo subtitle.

Agreed.

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Well fuck. I came into this album with high hopes and expectations. I read that John 5 was doing the guitars (seriously, check his solo stuff out), and I got all excited. It's just too bad that this album is a great big ball of meh. To the rundown:

One big problem most, if not all, of this album had is multi-tracking of the guitar. For the people not in the know, multi-tracking is when you hear two (2) separate guitar tracks, but only one (1) guitarist. Of course, for live performances you just hire a touring guitarist for the rhythm, but on an album it just bugs the ever living crap out of me. And while I don't expect anything all that special in terms of lyrical content from Rob Zombie, it gets a little ridiculous at times.

John 5 gets some sweet soloing in at the end of "Sick Bubble-Gum", but too bad the rhythm track is louder than the lead guitar. Needless to say, I facepalmed. The acoustic intro to "Mars Needs Women" is interesting and builds to what could be a decent enough song. It stops, Rob Zombie blurts out 'Mars needs women! Angry red women!', and I'm forced to resist the impulse to move onto the next album. I enjoy "Werewolf, Baby!" only due to the fact that the main riff vaguely reminds me of CCR's "Up Around the Bend", don't ask me why.

"Virgin Witch" is probably my favorite song on the album (though, that doesn't really say much) thanks to the way Zombie's vocals flow with the guitars. Plus we get a decent solo at the end. "Burn" brings in some sick slide guitar that compliments Zombie nicely. Other than the nu metal vocal style reminiscent of Korn's "Freak on a Leash" in certain parts, it isn't a bad song. "Cease to Exist" is a pretty groove oriented track, and I didn't even mind the distorted vocals all that much. Finally, "The Man Who Laughs" is an interesting enough piece of music, but the four minute drum solo fails to capture the magic of the drum solo from "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly, as hard as it tries to do so. It's also pretty boring up until the last 30-45 seconds of the solo.

So in the end, the album shows momentary flashes of brilliance during an otherwise dull and listless 46 minutes. But maybe I was looking at it the wrong way, I was looking for a lot more guitar work from John 5. Hellbilly Deluxe 2 (insert long subtitle here) wasn't a bad album per se, it just wasn't, you know, good. Thoroughly meh-tastic. And I know it could've been so much better. Hence,


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Quite frankly Sleg, I'm not sure how you could be so optimistic with this album. Here we have Rob Zombie with Hellbilly Deluxe 2. And unfortunately, I have to start out by saying that this album blows. It is boring, uninspired, and overall sounds like Rob going through the motions.

The album starts with the albums best two songs, “Jesus Frankenstein” and “Sick Bubblegum.” While these songs are good, they also fucking suck for giving you hope that this album might be any good. Everything goes downhill starting with “What.” This song is Rob starting cruise control, and he never goes to any other speed from here on. This is Rob going through the motions. The riff is fairly generic, and the song just drags for its duration, before mercifully coming to an end.

“Mars Needs Women.” My god, this song sucks. The repetition of the song title gets old after the first three times. The intro, I like it. It's a cool acoustic intro, which is something new. Then it falls downhill. Fast. Another extremely generic, boring track. Slow and plodding, this track is nothing to write home about, and is a major low point of this album. “Werewolf, Baby” is an interesting song, but it gets old fairly quickly. Thankfully, the song is faster, and has a better riff going for it. The chorus is fun, but ultimately, this song is just like the last two. Boring. I can't stress this enough. THIS ALBUM IS FUCKING BORING!!


Here, let me call the Wahmbulance for you.

Go die. Anyhow, “Virgin Witch” has a cool little guitar riff, bit, once again, fails to catch my attention, and is overall another boring ass load of shit. Fuck this shit, I'm done!

Hell no, I had to do it, Twifag.

Fine. Fine then. Next up is “Dream Factory,” and hey, we have a decent song. That is three good songs on an 11 song album. Wow. Just wow. A cool riff with some good vocals from Zombie, we have our first winner since the first two tracks. Too bad this victory is short lived. “Burn” starts off with a nice little riff, but gets real shitty real fast. More repetition of the title, as if we don't know this fucking song is called “Burn”. Slow, plodding and FUCKING BORING, Rob has really got some explaining to do for this steaming pile of shit. “Cease to Exist”. Hey, another winner. This is a passable track. Nothing amazing, but with the way this album has gone, I'll take anything decent. The track sounds almost ballad like, which isn't a bad thing. I like the occasional ballad, although Zombie has a fucked up concept of what a ballad is. Winner.

“Werewolf Women of the SS” is another boring, plodding filler. Man, people rag on Iron Maiden for having lots of filler, this album is just fucking stupid for filler. Finally. The final track. And everyone knows, the final track is how a band goes out. They want to leave a good final impression with this song. Iron Maiden, for example, has almost always had an amazing, beautiful epic at the end of their albums that just makes you say “wow, what a way to end an album.” Any folks expecting that will be sorely disappointed. There is nothing epic, great, or even decent about this stinker of a closer. The song ends with an absolutely fucking BORING drum solo that sounds like it serves simply to indulge the drummer. Fuck that shit. Fuck this album. Fuck you, Rob Zombie. You've let me down. Fuck you.

My final rating for this steaming pile of horseshit is 2/10. Fuck this noise. Nice try Rob, but you failed. Better luck next time. Go make another shitty Halloween movie and leave us alone.


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That was quite a lot of hate.

I'm going to snap if the next album is as bad is Zombie's. Fuck that piece of-

Ok, holy shit. We get it. Last up for this edition of The Rant is Mutiny Within's Mutiny Within.

Creativity at its finest.

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Well, I've been the first to review all the other albums, why don't you start this one Dyl.

Fair enough. Ok, so Mutiny Within. These guys are very interesting. The guys are a death metal band, but the majority of their vocals are clean, almost power metal style vocals, and not nearly as heavy as death metal usual is. These guys are extremely interesting indeed.

We kick off their self titled debut with “Awake”, which is a hell of a track. The chorus contains a great use of higher pitched vocals, while the verses have a good combination of clean and growled vocals. However, the transition sounds somewhat frail and broken, which distracts from the overall song. “Images” is really fillerish and plodding. Not Rob Zombie fillerish and plodding (thank fuck), but nonetheless, this is not a standout track. These guys are capable of better, as they showed on “Awake”. The intro to “Falling Forever” is cool. The falsetto scream, however, is not. Ignoring that though, this a solid track with great vocals and guitar work. The transition between clean vocals and growls returns, but still sounds frail and forced, which really hampers the song, and most of the songs on the album for that matter.

“Year of Affliction” is a forgettable track. While decent, it really doesn't do a lot. More forced vocal transitions, and a very poor pace. “Forsaken” falls into the same trap. While better then “Year of Affliction”, this is still a generic filler track. A really sweet intro for the track “Lethean”. This track gets us back to the winning formula. Better then the last two tracks, this track picks things up right on time, because I was about to shut this off and give the album 3/10. Thankfully, I don't have to do that.

“Oblivion” is next, and honestly, this track sucks. I much prefer the Mastodon song. Nothing special about this one at all. So much for the winning formula. We continue with “Undone”. Honestly, this album is getting more and more generic. A decent song, but once more, nothing to write home about, and pretty much filler. “Hours” is a solid track, and breaks the boring, filler mode again. Considering the last few songs, this is a really solid track. Good to see a slight bump uphill. “Suffocate” is up, and now the vocalist is beginning to sound strained and even more forced, which doesn't bode well, especially considering this is the second to last track on the album. This dude needs to find a better method to do his transitions, cause he is gonna blow his voice out if he keeps this up. This track also sounds way too much like “Awake”. Decent song, but this doesn't look good.

Thankfully, the guys go out well with “Reflections”, which is a rocker. Well paced, the vocalist still sounds strained, and that takes away once more from the song. Great end to an alright album.

Overall, for a first album, Mutiny Within didn't do terrible. I'll give them a 6/10. They need to do better on their next album to get any foothold though.


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So far, despite Mutiny Within being a very green band, they've received a considerable amount of hype on the metal scene. After hearing their eponymous debut album, I would have to agree with quite a lot of it.

The leading track and first single from the album, "Awake", starts with an almost Protest the Hero-esque grand piano solo before entering into a huge thrash metal riff. Lead singer Chris Clancy uses a multitude of vocal styles throughout the album, and it is especially prominent on the song, including a great chorus. On a similar note, I love the chorus on "Images", though some of the dirty vocals during the verses sound forced and don't flow as well with the rest of the song. Also included on "Images" is a keyboard solo very reminiscent of Janne Wirman and Vadim Pruzhanov (Children of Bodom and DragonForce, repectively), which is full of win. The intro to "Falling Forever" is questionable to do the vocals, most notably a cringe-worthy high pitched yell. And even though some styles of vocals are used at inappropriate times during the album, calling into question Clancy's vocal ability as downright retarded. Hell, the guy can even sing opera.

And I know Dylan mentioned "Year of Affliction" as filler, but I love this song. Great guitar work, epic power metal chorus, and an awesome piano-backed bridge section. The verses on "Forsaken" are very cimilar to Trapt's "Headstrong" in terms of pacing, and the pre-verses are hard and heavy, not to mention the album's best solo that unfortunately gets cut off a few seconds too early. "Lethean" was heavier than the rest of the album, almost too heavy too the point where it didn't fit. The "Hours" intro was a little off and threw off the pacing slightly, but the rest of the song, as well as the next track, "Suffocate", got it back to par on the course.

In the end, it was an good debut for Mutiny Within. As a band, they have all the pieces, they just have to work on fine tuning their sound to be fully harmonious. The album had its great moments, its good moments, and its WTF moments, ultimately resulting in a bi-polar album. But once all those pieces are functioning together smoothly, watch out. These guys could be big.


The Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GoldStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 HalfStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GrayStarThe Rant - Feb 2010 GrayStar

And holy shit, we're done. Hopefully we'll be more organized next time. And maybe even procrastinate less.

But probably not.

Very true. Well, we'd like to thank you, the reader, for taking the time to read what is probably the worst column ev-

Wait, didn't Seth write a column?

Lolololol, good point. Thanks for taking the time to read the second worst column ever.

Lolol. Feedback and tributes to our greatness are very welcome. For the record, we enjoy music, wrestling, and animal sacrifices.

Also feel free to suggest an album coming out in March for us to review. We probably won't use your suggestion, or we will only because it was already planned and the two of us will just say it was your idea. But we'll appreciate the input regardless.

And I think that wraps things up, thanks again, we'll see you next time.

*ninja vanish*


Don't steal my line and proceed to leave me here, you sonofabitch.

...

Fuck it.

*ninja vanish*
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PostSubject: Re: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 9:20 am

Yay a new Fear Factory album! Getting that after work. Nice little rant/blog deal. Entertaining read.
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PostSubject: Re: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 9:36 am

If I had considered doing something like this some albums have been missed for these months. The main one missing is American VI, Johnny Cash's final work. Screamworks by HIM would have been worth a listen, and Almost Alice, the alice in wonderland soundtrack, although I can't remember if that came out last month or this. I cant think of any others off the top of my head, but I'm sure they're there.

Other than that, good stuff. I expect to see Plastic Beach in for March.
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PostSubject: Re: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 11:39 am

Rob Zombie's new CD was god awful to say the least.

On that note...

*goes back to Educated Horses*
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PostSubject: Re: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 5:00 pm

Clarke wrote:
Yay a new Fear Factory album! Getting that after work. Nice little rant/blog deal. Entertaining read.

Watch out, your head might explode from its sheer awesomeness. Driving and/or operating heavy machinery while listening to it is ill-advised.

PX wrote:
If I had considered doing something like this some albums have been missed for these months. The main one missing is American VI, Johnny Cash's final work. Screamworks by HIM would have been worth a listen, and Almost Alice, the alice in wonderland soundtrack, although I can't remember if that came out last month or this. I cant think of any others off the top of my head, but I'm sure they're there.

Other than that, good stuff. I expect to see Plastic Beach in for March.

I'm not a fan of Johnny Cash, and the mere thought of the album didn't even come up once in the course of many conversations between Dylan and myself. Screamworks was cut out due to time constraints, none of us had the time to get around to it. I've heard it's decent though, and I'll probably check it out independently.

And I'm looking over to the soundtrack to Almost Alice right now, and it could've been something we could do if we wanted another album to pan. The Shinedown and Wolfmother tracks probably would've been the only decent ones on there. But hey, maybe the Avril Lavigne song would have surprised me. Now hold that thought while I try to suppress raucous laughter.

Lastly, Plastic Beach was already on our agenda, but we'll pretend it was your idea. Smile


stl311 wrote:
Rob Zombie's new CD was god awful to say the least.

On that note...

*goes back to Educated Horses*

All the Rob Zombie CDs are pretty awful, save for a track or two.
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PostSubject: Re: The Rant - Feb 2010   The Rant - Feb 2010 I_icon_minitimeWed Mar 10, 2010 5:08 pm

*Note to self* Pull over to side of the road to listen.

Also, psyched for March.
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