NEW RELEASES: Them Crooked Vultures - Them Crooked Vultures

Released November 17, 2009

What will probably be one of the highlights of 2009 has finally unleashed their first project to the world. Them Crooked Vultures released their self titled debut in November to great acclaim and a successful first week selling 70,000 copies. Of course, this is no surprise. This band is a super group of epic proportions being composed of Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters, ex-Nirvana), Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), and John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin).

Undoubtedly there were high expectations for this project since it was announced. Upon listening to the album, however, it seems the band probably didn't feel that pressure, making an all around fun album with a nostalgic rock Americana feel. The songs rock on a level that only your parents could understand but still stay within familiar territory for the youngins and modern rock enthusiasts alike.

There is lots of simplistic guitar playing,but it carries such an incredible level of energy that it really makes you forget what decade you're actually living in.

"No One Loves me and Neither do I" is such a trademark rock tune that it's hard to imagine any rock enthusiast who isn't compelled to move or bobbing their head along to the straightforward guitar riff that dominates the song. The subtle bluesy tinge really defines this song and gives it a very lively and energetic color. The song is without a doubt one of the best this group has written.

"Mind Eraser, No Chaser" almost tricked me into thinking I was listening to a White Stripes song until Dave Grohl's voice came in to save the day. Even so, the vocals on this song to a large extent resembles Brandon Boyd from Incubus which is probably the best part of the track. The song seems to have a lot of potential but falls just a bit short of what probably was intended.

The album is replete with bluesy rock riffs and power chords and very strong 4/4 time signatures stomped out by the drums.

The music proves itself to be larger than life, much bigger than this brand new musical project still gaining notoriety even being a super group. Songs like the single "New Fang" really emphasize that point to a great extent, taking the standard rock formula and flirting with a little bit of progressive rock.

"Dead End Friends" is another song with a strong nostalgic feel adorned by Grohl and Homme's harmonized vocals in the catchy verse that tends to bleed into the rest of the song. There is little structural similarities between this song and the styles that influence it. The straight 4/4 time disappears and they ditch the verse-chorus-verse-chorus structure.

One of the more odd songs on the album is "Elephants" which stands out because of its odd drum rhythm that is played during most of the tune. The song starts strongly with an almost Iron Maiden-esque riff that definitely recalls the rock of days and years past. After the odd drum rhythm the song goes into a very emotionally driven harmonized vocal line that really emphasizes a sort of 'dark' feel that the song has. The song clocks in over six minutes-one of the longest tunes on the album. The length is due to yet more deviations from conventional rock structure going back in forth between new and repeated segues which when put together makes one of the better tunes of the album.

In "Scumbag Blues" the band yet again takes off from normal structure. Within the first minute you hear a lackluster solo, yet finely placed and timed. Much of the song features Homme trying to play the blues solo of his life but it ultimately falls short and affects the song fully.

"Bandoliers" is one of the strongest pieces of the album. The guitars have a slight Spanish tinge which sometimes cause the vocals to feel inappropriate. This is rectified when the guitars and vocals harmonize, giving the song a feel of completion and well roundedness. At that point the vocals really begin to take directions from the music, making the song a big success by its end.

There are moments on the album that feel kind of off, such as "Reptiles" which starts off with an awkward guitar lick that reminds you of bands that are no longer relevant such as System of a Down or U2. It's apparent the direction they took in an effort to really make something modern, but this tune in particular really fails and seems way too playfully simplistic that it becomes hard to take serious.

"Interludes with Ludes" has similar issues. It almost sounds like a reject or B-side to an album by the band Tool. The vocals are simply bad and the music is lazy. This song immediately calls for it to be skipped. It has no resemblance to anything else on the album and feels terribly misplaced.

"Warsaw or the First Breath.." is another song that traverses sounds reminiscent of the past. The problem is that this tune borders on the cheesy with it's incessant flood of church organs and other synth sounds that just don't feel called for in this song. The song's speed kicks up a notch near the end when the song focuses on a strongly effected guitar solo that again feels a little inadequate on top of its musical support.

Probably the best track on the album is "Gunman". The song is a very modern tune that uses a more conventional structure. It's directed by a 'boing' type bass guitar effect that defines the song in a way that gives it an almost dancy feel. The dark and catchy chorus line really augments the almost seductive feel of the vocals during the verse. It truly feels like this would be a song that would play well in a nightclub and require no remix by some obscure DJ or dance band.

"Spinning in Daffodils" is perhaps the most straight forward song on the album. The vocals are anthemic and bear a resemblance to Rob Halford of Judas Priest. There are few deviations and as a result the song has a very defined direction, almost repetitive. However, that doesn't seem to affect the quality of the song, making for a strong toe tapper until the song finally does deviate into a rhythm guitar feature section.

The album has such strong moments that it's hard to understand how anyone could not enjoy this album. The low points on the album on their own are significant but when considered with the rest of the whole it loses its importance. For the reason that it does begin to let down near the end, a perfect score is probably too generous to grant for this release.
Score: 4.5/5

NEW RELEASE | Flyleaf: Memento Mori

RELEASED: November 10th, 2009 by INO Records

In 2005, Flyleaf broke out into almost instant success with their first full length, self titled album. Songs like “I'm so Sick”, “Cassie”, and “All Around Me” have become synonymous with the band name and were huge radio and music TV hits.

Their success was understandable. The material in their first album was refreshingly new and sufficiently different from all other mainstream rock acts out there that it caught relentless fire quite quickly, bands like Evanescence and Paramore likely a little put off at how quickly Flyleaf became part of the mainstream as opposed to their own lengthy climbs to the top.

It's taken them almost half a decade to release a follow up, although mostly at the blame of a seemingly unending tour schedule the band embarked on which has raised their notoriety to unthinkable levels.

In the midst of all this, somehow the band found time to record a follow up to their first record, “Memento Mori”, meaning 'remember, you will die'. The lyrical content continues to have Christian overtones similar to lines like “Do you believe in God” on their song “Cassie”, but this isn't the least bit surprising from a band that wears their faith strongly on their sleeve but probably a turn off for the heathen unbelievers like myself who take the time to listen to it.

One thing that is apparent quickly is that this band has grown a bit in their sound, as much as the entire album still wraps itself around the formula that made their first album so memorable.

Despite scathing reviews, there's redeeming qualities of the opening track, “Beautiful Bride”. The song rings like a true female Metallica incarnation around the Reload era. The bluesy metal riff in the verse is repetitive but it meshes well with Lacey Mosley's bluesy vocal style in the chorus. If anything the track seems like a big shout out to their influences, something that you can't really dock the band points for, especially on a sophomore album.

The lead single truly highlights this band's strengths, which inevitably lie in the vocal melodies and great melodic accompaniment in all the instruments-however simplistic they may be at almost all times. “Again” begins with a very strong synth lead played in a way that is almost defining of the modern alternative rock sound, forming what is probably the strongest track on the album.

Certain tunes on the album like “Chasm” have a forced aggressive feel. This song specifically feels like an attempt at emulating Alice in Chains, however it fails with forgettable vocal lines and a guitar riff that only slightly changes for the chorus, making the song dull.

“The Kind” has an almost post hardcore/post rock feel being composed of spacey guitar delay and straightforward 4/4 timed drums, at times feeling a strong Radiohead influence. The song really doesn't have a strong melody, but the song overall is cohesive, perfect in its balance of aggression and melody and not steering too strongly into the problems they ran into in songs like “Chasm”.

“In the Dark” attempts to repossess some of the aggression their debut album had, but the results are disheartening. The band truly succeeds when they stick to the chorus and delay drenched guitars smothered with harmonic vocals but fail when they try to implement palm muted metal riffs that end up sounding no less disappointing than albums like Reload were for Metallica.

“Set Apart this Dream” is like many of Flyleaf's ballads in that they lack much musical direction. They heavily rely on the lead vocals and the vocal melody and tend to leave the band as being nothing but filler. While this is not unfamiliar territory for this band, this is a flaw that tends to leave these types of songs without a cohesive direction and end up being forgettable at best. It's also the type of thing that ends up in 'Evanescence syndrome', where the vocals completely overshadow the music to a degree that makes the musicians completely unimportant.

“Swept Away” is a song that is a lot less melodic and a little more dissonant than what we're used to hearing from the band. The result ends up being a little interesting, but the singer's spoken rants during the verses truly take away from the song that it almost borders on being a song easily dismissed, but it's saved by a fleeting chorus that could be quickly forgotten if not given more than one listen.

A blast from the past is found in “Tiny Heart”, a ballad in the strong 4/4 rhythm section style that the Beatles and others are known to write in. However, while the song has bits of interesting pieces, the song fails like most of their other ballads in being attention grabbing. By this point in this album I get the feeling that if I hadn't had a favorable view of their first album or if this were the first time I was hearing this band, I would probably have given up listening to the album by around this track-the best tracks coming and going quickly during the first half of the album.

“Treasure”, “Circle”, and “Arise” are more forgettable ballad additions to the album. Their debut album was full of ballads as well, but the melodies were hooky and easy to remember, as cliché as the backing music might seem for an alt rock ballad.

The three songs truly highlight the biggest problem with this disc. There is absolutely no real focus and without a doubt no intent on breaking the mold that made them such successes on their last album. The songs seem to have been recorded and written with the intent of being melodic like their last album, but the skill in writing interesting and immediately recognizable themes is almost completely gone for this album.

Almost every band suffers from “sophomore slump”, meaning that the second album tends to not live up to the debut. This band is no exception, as much as it is easy to see that the effort was definitely put into avoiding a slump.

Hopefully this album is a learning experience for a band that has so many possibilities and a likely bright future. Overall, the album is a huge disappointment and I cannot honestly give this album a good score.

Overall Rating: 2/5

Incubus - S.C.I.E.N.C.E.

(This is a previously written review, so the rating scale and review style is different than the usual out of 5 scale)

RELEASED: September 9th, 1997

SCIENCE is by far one of my favorite albums of all time. This album mixes in relatively simplistic distorted guitar work that is a trademark of 90's numetal with jazz, funk, and latin elements that very few bands have been able to do without sounding ridiculously cheesy or forced. They do well with the type of styles most of us musicians play in high school jazz bands, which is a large part of the Incubus fan base.

Redefine – Tries too hard to be heavy hitting. Staccato notes aren't enough to really keep your attention all the way through and neither does the over use of the turntables. Just kind of seems like a distorted guitar mess. 4/10

Vitamin – The phaser effect is put to good use. Really cool use of themes and gratifying use of synths in very appropriate places. Very trance like, conveys a certain state of mind that was likely the one the guys were in when writing it. 9/10

New Skin – Effective vocals that don't sound like a rap, but more of an incoherent druggie talking about how the media brainwashes us. Catchy chorus, more simple distorted guitar work that serves its purpose when it's being played. 9/10

Idiot Box – Funky jam. Really good transitions between musical styles. Really nice minimalist type bridge littered with sound effects, again, nicely transitioned into a heavy bridge. 10/10

Glass – Really great harmonization in the chorus. Really catchy while maintaining the trance like verses most of the album has. Great use of the 2-4 second heavy sections. Bass lines can't get any better than this on a rock album. 9/10

Magic Medicine - “On this page, you see a little girl giggling at a hippopotamus..I wonder why?” All that needs to be said..

A Certain Shade of Green – More simple distorted guitar riffs, this time littered throughout. A little boring most of the way through. Vocals really aren't all that exciting and the music doesn't carry this song. Relatively catchy chorus. Bridge solo is the most redeeming quality about the song. Decent fade-away ending. 6/10

Favorite Things – Fan favorite for good reasons. Good guitar work with nicely mixed in synths that provide a nice sustaining background for the entire song. Vocals, lead guitars, and lead synths insanely catchy all the way through. “Too bad the things that make you mad are my favorite things” 10/10

Summer Romance – Vocals are just so perfectly performed for this type of music. Funky, spanish, just overall the type of feel you would expect from kids that played for their high school jazz band. Very well put together musically with obvious attention paid to detail that makes the song and its individual components as stylistically appropriate as you could possibly imagine them being. Saxophone solo at the end of the song is remarkably fitting for the song that the first time you hear the song it's almost expected, although, I really would've preferred a better choice for sax player. The section could've been much more epic that way. Very very nice song. One of Incubus' best. 10/10

Nebula - Very interesting feel. Almost hypnotic at times. Staccato vocals again add a depth to the style that they're going for that any other vocalist might've made this song completely ineffective. Definitely seems like its another tune that tries to translate a state of being. Synth and guitar work definitely seem to be played with that goal in mind. 10/10

Deep Inside – Another funky jam. This is another stylistically well performed song. This song is really indicative of the direction these guys should've taken with their music rather than the messes albums like "Crow" was. They definitely excel with a funky, more free flowing jazz feel. Cliché guitar work and vocals for this style mixed in with a couple of very short heavy spots are surprisingly effective. Great bridge solo. Deep inside we're all stoned and can't see straight, apparently. 10/10

Calgone - Incredible piece rhythmically. Uses virtually all the same elements of the rest of the album, but seems this song has more emphasis on rhythm and rhythmic changes. It's essentially what you would get if you put the entire S.C.I.E.N.C.E. album into one song, although not as memorable as some of the other tracks. 8/10

Overall 9/10

NEW RELEASES: Atreyu - Congregation of the Damned

RELEASED: October 27th, 2009

Atreyu has been a powerhouse since their breakthrough album "Suicide Notes and Butterfly Kisses" and "The Curse". This band is often mocked and dismissed as 'emo' but those criticisms often fail to see that Atreyu hasn't exactly been pidgeonholed into one style since "The Curse". From then on, the band's style has taken a turn to the power and glam metal side and at times even a southern metal side, as seen often on "Lead, Sails, Paper, Anchor", where the band came out with a more polished, radio friendly sound.

The album was highly successful yielding hits such as the anthemic "Becoming the Bull" and the bouncy pop track "Doomsday". The biggest problem with the band tends to be in the lyrics, which undoubtedly still take on 'emo' characteristics in describing broken and bleeding hearts and grown men crying, but, the band musically has gotten much sharper and their direction has become much clearer.

Now, we have this new album, "Congregation of the Damned".

Immediately off the bat, the guys seem to have taken a step back from the overwhelming power/glam metal feel to their last album, although done at their peril. The music right away sounds more hardcore and loyal to the original Atreyu sound, as well as it shows to be an appeasement to fan discontent over their last effort, deemed too mainstream by most fans.

The downfall is that the first 5-6 tracks on the album are dead weight. They seem empty and uninspired, akin to the feeling some people expressed about Metallica's new album.

"Bleeding is a Luxury" runs through with the same catchy chorus lines that Atreyu is known for, but while it is one of the albums better songs, the same uninspired feeling runs deep. The track is dull and musically offers nothing new except perhaps the interesting little "Phantom of the Opera" segue backed up by a wall of strings.

"Congregation of the Damned" falls short of being a great song, starting off with a dark but hooky verse that sort of pumps you up for a song middle that falls short of what the verse set you up for. This song especially suffers because the chorus is dead, without feeling, and made up of two power chords played alternately.

"Coffin Nails" has a similar feel, but it is simply sprinkled with decent guitar licks and a good vocal melody here and there, but much like the rest of the album, the tune lacks something defining. This tune has a defect that many of the other tunes on this album has, and that is that they feel like the songs might be better coming from a different band.

To round out a bad first half of the album, "Black Days Reign" attempts a bluesy entry into the album, similar to the song "Blow" on their last album, but again, the song simply falls short. "Throw your hands up in the air" and the rest of the lyrics are just terribly cliche. The music is weak and only offers the bluesy feel in the eighth note triple or 6/8 time feel that the song has until the solo at the bridge that once heard immediately takes you back to Metalica's "Reload" days.

"Gallows" is a song that attempts to nail down the Atreyu sound all in one tune, and they definitely have a measure of success on this one. The song again falters in its lyrics on the "beat, beat, beat, beat, beat, beat, beat me down", making you wonder if it's an Atreyu or Michael Jackson album you were listening to.

"You were the king, now you're Unconscious" feels like a b-side to their last album. It is as listenable as any of the songs on "Lead", but the musicianship seems to be almost lazy in a song that seems to call for more aggression.

"Insatiable" pulls out strong as the best track on the album. It takes their flirting with the power metal sound to a new level and offers another one of those great anthemic choruses, "Nothing's good enough, I'm insatiable", preceded by an intensity building verse. This turns out to be the most cohesive song recorded for this album.

One of the few soft moments for the album, the song "So Wrong" is one of those hard rock ballads done with a slight hardcore edge, pulled off quite rightly although it can at times feel like one big hardcore cliche.

One of the heavier and more hardcore pieces is found on "Ravenous", heavily supported by that unmistakable thrash/hardcore drum rhythm and decorated by one of those short poppy drive by choruses that are gone before you had a chance to really double check what you had just heard, yet still happy you had heard it. This is also another one of the highlights from the album making the second half at least twice as good as the first.

"Lonely" is a laid back pop song that also ventures in and out from borderline cool sounding to cheese central. The song almost has an Avenged Sevenfold self titled feel to it, which at times is kind of disheartening, but of course, the comparing has been done before.

Overall, the album is heavily lacking a cohesive feeling. It sometimes gives the impression of confusion about whether or not they wanted to appease both older and new fans by not straying from either sounds. At the very least it feels heavily forced and not done because of a national progression of their sound.

Overall, I'd give the album a 2/5