Hey there everyone. Back at it for another week as us Canadians had the extra long weekend to relax and kick back before heading to the grind once again. This week's CD released don't seem to be great in numbers, but there are a few I have had the chance to preview and they sound mighty strong! So for all my hardcore readers, the rock and metal selection will do you just fine today. The odd album at the bottom (Marcus Miller) is a smooth bass album I previews this weekend and was the perfect album to have with a beer on the patio. After 14 previous solo albums and countless amounts of tracks with Luther Vandross, it's safe to say this guy has a formula that works with his listeners.
Anyways, most previews are available through an online retailer or you can make your way down to a local record shop on your lunch break to check out any of these great albums...
"The first single 'Backlash' segues from an echoing piano intro to Hasek's near-whisper on the verse before slipping into a massive scream of 'Run coward'. It's eerily prophetic and pronouncedly propulsive. 'Writing on the Walls' blends a folk-y acoustic guitar that wouldn't be out of place in the misty mountains with more heavy catharsis from Hasek. The album's centerpiece remains 'Dancing with the Dead'. It's a dynamic waltz with the dead, switching smoothly from more acoustic resonances and a heavy groove and a true standout in the band's catalog.
The ride builds up to the piano-driven 'Birth—Death' and an utterly epic closer '…And All the Colors', which could very well be the group's most beautifully heartbreaking song ever.
Minus the Machine stands out as the best album from 10 Years yet and one of the year's top rock records. All boundaries are gone and 10 Years stand victorious once again. We need more bands like them..." -Artist Direct
"Elsewhere, Document One transforms 'Let It All Bleed Out' into a creepy trance-i-fied trip, and Ki: Theory move 'Foxy Foxy' and 'Pussy Liquor' into club-pleasing territory. Kraddy brings bass violence to 'Superbeast'. Tobias Enhus turns 'Devil's Hole Girls' into a cyber freak show, while The Bloody Beetroots set "Burn" ablaze with a heavy dub-ed out brutality.
Closing out the record, Griffin Boice slips industrial grime, tribal percussion, and slippery glitched out guitars into a dynamic "Mars Needs Woman". Boice elegantly fuses all of this darkness together for the ultimate mind-fuck of a dance song. It's the perfect finale…
At the end of the day, Mondo Sex Head is the perfect record for a party in Hell, Vegas, or any of the electric rave things." -Artist Direct
"Still, for all the good and enjoyable here, there are some drawbacks. While Kobra is a great vocalist for what she does, her presence is a tad monotonous. While she doesn’t lack feel like the artless Ripper Owens, she certainly doesn’t have the dynamic presence of Huntress‘s Jill Janus or the versatality of Djerv‘s Agnete Kjølsrud or Symphony X‘s Russel Allen. Indeed, like Tate or Grant, her voice can sometimes border on grating and one wishes that she would approach the vocals with more dynamics in mind. And while the record is good and short, the last four tracks 'Sanctuary,' 'Lover of the Beloved,' 'No Rest for the Wicked,' and 'Aria of Karmika' kind of drag a bit more than I’d like. Combine that with a production that gets a bit loud and distorts some times (there’s a really weird section in 'Sanctuary' where it sounds like the drums get pushed all the way to the front of the mix and the whole shit just becomes a wall of fucking noise) and things could be a bit better.
All of that said, I still dig this record quite a bit. Particularly 'Nyana (My Eyes)' and 'Heaven’s Veins' stand out as pummeling, fantastic power metal tracks. The great melodies, hooky guitar work and dominating vocal performance make this one of the best trad or power records I’ve heard in a long time and I have listened to this album quite a bit since I got it. It might not be Record o’ the Year territory, but I think that Kobra and the Lotus have it in ‘em. Give these Canadalanders a shot, and get ready to hear a hell of a lot about this band in years to come as I believe they have been dubbed The Next Big Thing™." -Angry Metal Guy
"There are many upsides to this album when listening to it, I already mentioned them above. I would consider them to be one of the better 'genericore' bands out there right now. Yet I struggle because I know that it is in no way a game-changer, nor is it something that will earn a massive amount of replays. Both of those factors are becoming more and more important to me, as I’m surrounded by an obscene amount of music daily. There were times when I was listening to Polarities and it was over before I knew it (which could be due to multitasking… or sheer numbness to the genre). While during other listens I enjoyed nearly every moment. It’s a tough choice to make.
In the end, I have to go with my gut. Considering how much I enjoy the vocals on this album and the many good headbangs that it provided me with, and taking into consideration the amount of improvement that I see from their first release, I have decided to land my score on a 3.0. I went back and forth with that and 2.5 but considering that I very much enjoyed this album and despite its drawbacks, it is worthy of a positive rating. Fans of the genre should give this a listen and form their own opinion on it. I know for a fact those who are already fans are in for a treat." -The New Review
"This is bass-guitar star Marcus Miller's UK-tour repertoire of last month, plus a few bonuses, including the finely spun vocals of young New Yorker Gretchen Parlato and the rasping ones of Dr John on two tracks. For jazz-funk fans, it's paradise – Miller's arrangements have the clamouring horn parts, snappy basslines, raw guitar fills and whipcrack backbeats of this style meshing like a racing engine, and, of course, there are plenty of jawdropping bass solos. Creative obliqueness (of the kind Miller brought to Miles Davis's Tutu and Amandla albums in the 1980s) isn't always apparent. The assertive foregrounding of the bass guitar doesn't exactly enhance the potentially mysterious Brazilian feature Setembro, with its vocals by Parlato and Ruben Blades, and horn-punching groovers such as Cee Tee Eye veer to the formulaic. But the exhilaratingly funky Detroit, the lyrical (and Tutu/Amandla-related) Redemption, or the Headhunters-like Slippin' into Darkness confirm Miller's mastery of his particular world. Solos from Lincoln Centre trumpeter Sean Jones and excellent regular saxophonist Alex Han spark fireworks, sly quotes from Dizzy Gillespie and Bob Marley classics add spice, and there's a poetic solo-bass finale on I'll Be There." -The Guardian
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