Review: Between the Buried and Me - The Great Misdirect

Here it is folks, my last (for the most part) review of an album to come out in the year 2009. Just in time to be done with 2010. Ah well, maybe someday I'll be all caught up. I wouldn't hold my breath though. This is going to be a short review today too mostly because I don't have the chops or the patience to really parse out enough from songs this long (three break double digits for minutes and a fourth is nine and a quarter).

Between the Buried and Me have always distanced themselves from the rest of their progressive/metalcore peers through their extreme technical proficiency and their willingness to flaunt their disparate influences (they're named for a Counting Crows lyric for god's sake). The Great Misdirect is characterized by switches back and forth between brutal metalcore and examples of the other, mellower and diverse genres the band is capable of playing. Sometimes these diversions are entire songs, like the mellow quiet first track, 'Mirrors' or 'Desert of Song' which has an Americana sound (complete with wind/highway noises in the background) that wouldn't be out of place on a Murder by Death record. Other times songs contain both aspects such as 'Obfuscation' which cycles between ambient music and all out hardcore or "Disease, Injury, Madness' which punctuates its frantic riffage with breaks featuring Weather Report-esque bass solos. The best example of this though, is the, um, differently titled 'Fossil Genera - A Feed From Cloud Mountain.' This track starts with a carnival, almost calliope sounding, bar room piano riff and maintains that feel throughout the track. Then at regular intervals, the band comes in for lots of screaming riffy goodness. Even when the main focus becomes the hardcore maelstrom, you can still hear the waltz beat going on underneath.

In other news, I got in a car accident three days ago so I'm going to wrap this review up early, because my ears are still ringing and the last thing I want to do is go back and re-listen to a metalcore album to see if I missed anything. I've said it before and I'll say it now, if you like hardcore music you'll find this to be a challenging (in a mentally stimulating kind of way) listen. If you don't like hardcore music, this probably won't be your gateway band. Though now that I think of it, if you're really into music and technical proficiency, interesting time signatures etc, BTBAM kind of have the goods to make you see beyond the screamy bits (which are a bit hard to deny, dude can growl, scream and bree with the best of them) and to recognize this for the impressive and adventurous album that it is.

I was also going to write in this post about how I just saw the two Scorpion King movies. Let me just say, don't make my mistake. The first one is technically a prequel to the movie The Mummy but was made before the most recent Mummy movie (you know, the one set in china that they couldn't get anyone except Brendan Fraser to come back for? I'm sorry, once Rachel Weisz was gone my interest dissipated rapidly). I tell you this because it was also subtitled The Mummy 3, which was presumably a bit of a snafu when they decided to actually make a third Mummy movie, but I digress. The first SK is not totally mind numbingly bad. Anyone who has heard me talk about Van Helsing, The Brothers Grimm or the Transporter franchise knows that I am a big fan of the bad but entertaining action movie. They have huge budgets, lots of special effects, and everyone knows they aren't taking home an Oscar at the end of the day. If you go in not expect much, it can be a great use of a couple hours. Obviously, the first SK is toward the bottom of that category, presumably hanging out with XXX. It's kind of fun watching The Rock run around pretending he can carry a real movie all by himself since he has two whole years before Walking Tall proves unequivocally that no, no he can't. In the end spoiler alert bad guys get jacked up, the good guy ends up with what could charitably be called the 'hot chick' and the fair citizens of whatever backwater Greek? Egyptian? Macedonian? city get a new and more just ruler who some how is going to turn out to be the asshole in the second installment of The Mummy. Sumbitch doesn't pass the Bechdel test (though weirdly enough the second one kind of does) but it won't make you cut your eyes out.

Which brings me to the second one, which apparently and unsurprisingly went straight to DVD. First of all it's prequel to the first SK which makes it a prequel to a prequel to an only moderately watchable trio of big budget summer action movies which, and I can't stress this enough, STARRED BRENDAN F***ING FRASER, heir the Nick Cage-school-of-Drama- Valedictorian robe. Where was I? Ah yes, Scorpion King II. This is an abomination. I think it should suffice to say that probably the best acting in the movie is done by former UFC fighter Randy Couture. That's right, a man who used to get beaten around the head for a living, is the most convincing actor in this movie. And don't get me wrong, he's awful. But everyone else is so much worse. Our main character looks like the most ethnic of the Jonas brothers but then has this freakishly huge chest and keeps hitting poses like he's going to be on the cover of a romance novel, which to be fair is probably right up his alley. His supposed love interest is so caught up in trying to be the convincing wannabe- warrior tomboy while at the same time avoiding anachronism (HA!) that she never really does anything. Sample dialog:
Girl: I could easily beat you. I could be a warrior, you know I can fight.
Boy: Yes, but you can't ever be a warrior because you are a girl.
Girl: This is true.
She's so busy not being empowered she even forgets to establish any sort attraction to our dummkopf hero until right toward the end of the movie. Even then she never says she loves him, she instead yells to the goddess of death that our hero would never choose said-goddess because he is in love with her. This is literally the first we've heard about it, since other than simply being differently gendered, presumably heterosexual people of similar ages there is little to no chemistry between them. As for the aforementioned goddess of death she shifts back and forth between trying to be frightening and trying to be seductive and fails wildly at both. I'm afraid this makes me sound like a shallow person but I find it hard to believe we couldn't have found attractive people for these roles, since talent clearly wasn't a requirement.

Ok I've run out of steam on what might be my longest post ever, So I guess I'll just put up the video from BTBAM and call it a night. Sorry no mp3 on this one since there were only 6 tracks on the album and I don't like giving away that high a percentage even if it is for sampling purposes only -wink- (that's going to get me in trouble). Anyhoo... here's hoping everyone had a good new years, has a better next year and that the ringing in my ears goes away soon.



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Between the Buried and Me

Review: Converge - Axe to Fall

First of all, let's get through the obvious: Sorry I abandoned the blogosphere (sp?) for almost an entire month. But I'm back now with a vengeance. Literally. And what better way to return than with a band that for my money (little as that may be) sets the curve for all contemporary metalcore: Converge. Almost every band talks about trying to push themselves from album to album but I don't think any band accomplishes it like Converge. Every album they put out is the most brutal and out there album I've ever heard, until their next album. Axe to Fall fits right into this pattern, a little harder and different than 2006's No Heroes.

Which isn't to say that there isn't plenty for the old-school Converge fan to love. The title track especially should take anyone back to the halcyon days of Jane Doe and You Fail Me. 'Dead Beat' is another throwback especially vocally. Other tracks vary widely from the more straight-ahead metal of 'Reap What You Sow' to the driving thrashy riffs in 'Cutter.' A more sludge-y side of the band reveals itself on 'Damages' as well as the delightfully named 'Worms will Feed/ Rats will Feast.' The album opens with furious guitar riffs that, to me, sound like nothing so much as Horse the Band synths.

Speaking of other hardcore bands, this album saw a great deal of collaboration between Converge and various other bands and artists especially Cave In. Two of the songs on the album, 'Effigy' and 'Cruel Bloom' were adapted from a shared project Converge had done with Cave In. While 'Effigy' fits fairly seamlessly into the album, 'Bloom' is going to out to most listeners with its piano intro and sung vocals (courtesy of Steve von Till of Neurosis). It's a good warm up for the closing cut 'Wretched World' though, with its long plodding build and heavily layered instruments and vocals. It's overall effect could best be termed unnerving.

Converge - Dark Horse

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Converge

Review: Cheap Girls - My Roaring 20s

My Roaring 20s, the sophomore release from Lansing, MI's Cheap Girls was at first a little hard for me to pin down. It was Punknews that first brought them to my attention but they certainly aren't a punk band. They also don't really fit in the current (twee-ish) indie rock scene. Instead they're kind of throw-back indie rockers combining plaintively voiced songs of liquid excess and despair with musical grit and bombast borrowed from heavier genres. To me this echoes indie stalwarts the Weakerthans or even more impressive godfathers of the genre like Superchunk or The Replacements.

These guys could be on the brink some well deserved success with this album. They have that universal appeal to a broader audience that you can see (certainly in a much larger degree) in the currently skyrocketing Gaslight Anthem. Every song on the album is head-nod and toe-tap inducing in the extreme. More than that they sound as if they'd be just as at home playing to a few bar-flies at a corner dive as headlining at an SXSW or a Bamboozle. I'm just saying that if these guys get a toe hold, don't be surprised to see them climb and climb quickly.

Every song on this album is catchy and you'll have the choruses to most down by the second listen. The themes are pretty easy to get into as well. These are tales of languishing in your small town, ('Modern Faces') with big dreams ('Ft. Lauderdale') watching your friends leave you behind ('All My Clean Friends') while you sit around and drink heavily (pretty much all of them). Even the last song on the album, 'One & Four,' is insanely catchy and could probably be a hit on commercial radio RIGHT NOW. 'Ft. Lauderdale' however, is the one I think they'll ride out of here. They think so too I'm assuming which is why they made it the single. Now often I think the single is literally the worst song on a given album (Senses Fail I'm looking at you. 'Buried a Lie' was terrible. Just terrible, but I digress) , but on this one they got it just right. This song is one tenacious sumbitch. Hear it once and you should probably just go buy the album because you're not going to stop singing it to yourself until you do. And on that note, the video:

Cheap Girls - "Ft. Lauderdale" from TCSG on Vimeo.

Cheap Girls - Ft. Lauderdale

Cheap Girls - All My Clean Friends

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Cheap Girls

Review: Owen - New Leaves

Musically, Mike Kinsella doesn't have to prove anything to anyone. His roster of former bands reads like a Pitchfork list of the best experimental emo bands: Joan of Arc, Cap'n Jazz and American Football. His solo project, Owen sounds like he knows that. There's no reinventing the wheel here, just a guy and his guitar, with some light orchestration, playing guy-with-a-guitar songs. And doing it well I might add.

This is a soothing album. Kinsella's voice and his finger picked guitar are like a blanket that surrounds you with warmth that smells vaguely of whiskey. The drums are sparse and low strings make up a good portion of the instrumentation. Lyrically the songs range from paeans to poetic intoxication to odes to his current love like the strangely beautiful 'Amnesia.' It seems to me though that the theme tying the ironically named New Leaves together is one of looking back. Missing your old friends, or who you were when you were younger or the place you used to live. Unless you've stayed in exactly the same your whole life, I defy you to listen to 'Good Friends, Bad Habits' without missing at least one person or place that you've left behind. Lest you think this album is a total sap-fest, I would like to direct your attention to the penultimate track "Ugly on the Inside." An acid bitter recrimination of someone we can only assume to be a former lover. If you like a little snarl to your haunting beauty then this is the song for you.

In all though, this is a lushly beautiful sounding album with lyrics that will help it stand up to plenty of repeat listens. Put it on in the background to set the mood on date night but when things go south, it's time to dig into the lyrics. Plus, if you've ever had a friend, the video for the single will make you want to spend more time with them.



Owen - Good Friend, Bad Habits

Owen - Ugly on the Inside

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Owen

Currently Listening To......

I won't write a review because it's a bit of a conflict of interest, but I wanted to make a post about Tom Hamill's new solo album Cosmic Consciousness. In addition to doing half the guitar work for Britney's Spear, Tom has quite an extensive catalogue of solo work (I'm pretty sure I mentioned this in a show review) . This album seems a lot different from his previous work to me. So far there's less emphasis on layered guitar work. In fact it seems the guitar has given away completely to synth, samples and atmospherics. What hasn't changed is the calming combination of ambient and instrumental music that would appeal to fans of bands like The Books. The album can be downloaded for free at Tom's website.

ed. note: Ok I jumped the gun a little bit, I just hit the first track with guitar. Feel a little foolish. This is another reason I didn't do a proper review. Haven't listened to the whole thing yet.

Review: Teenage Bottlerocket - They Came From The Shadows

If I had written a Top Ten Albums list for last year, this album would have battled Dear Friends and Gentle Hearts for the top space. Of the 14 songs on this album 12 are absolute home runs. Out-of-the-park, onto Landsdowne Street, home runs. I know that certain people think that Teenage Bottlerocket are too poppy and I won't deny that these guys certainly put the pop in pop punk. But it's that awesome kind of pop punk that takes it cues from the Ramones and lives in the great tradition of The Queers, Mr T Experience, and Cletus. Actually if you like the Ramones, there is no excuse for you not to own at least 3 albums by Teenage Bottlerocket and They Came From the Shadows is probably as great a place to start that collection as any.

I talked before about the song 'Skate or Die' and great I thought it was. Remember that? Well it's just the opener on this album. Some of them are more offbeat and goofy
like 'Bigger than Kiss' while other seem to tackle real issues like lead singer's body image problems in the amusingly named 'Fatso Goes Nutzoid.' That song also has the greatest departure from the pop-punk song of the record with the band lapsing into 80's hardcore style riffs on every chorus. Another thing TBR shares with bands like The Ramones and The Misfits is their obsession with horror and B movies. Both the title track and 'Forbidden Planet' typify this with their descriptions of extraterrestrial invasion. Seriously though, they're all fun and tongue in cheek as opposed to creepy (Jerry Only I'm looking at you).

But the real surprise on this album, and it is a pleasant, is how capable they are of poignancy. There are songs from both sides of a break up and a love song that are as good as anything a more serious band would write. I should say that when I say serious band, I mean in terms of lyrical content, not dedication to craft. Don't be offended guys from TBR, I feel like we would be awesome hang out buddies if we met. Anyway, if you just got dumped and you want to be angry about it, 'Not OK' is the song for you. If on the other hand, you want to wallow and be sad, then go with 'Without You' or the absolutely perfect 'Don't Want To Go.' For all the break-up angst though, the album wraps itself up with the closing track 'Todayo.' If the last song I recommended for all the punk rock couples out there didn't float you, then this one will. It also ends the album on a fun note with a false ending that then builds into a sing along outro.

When I first posted about these guys (for my smash hit STBYM series) I called them pitch perfect pop punk (I think, I'm too lazy to go back and check). I stand by that description as well as the stellar alliteration it contains. This is exactly what pop punk should be. Every song, every riff, every subject. So if you like your punk a bit pop-y then you need this album. If you don't (i.e. you aren't a fan of sunshine, happiness or fun) then you should still give this a shot and see if it can't brighten your day at least a little. And by brighten I mean make exponentially more awesome.



Teenage Bottlerocket - Don't Want To Go****removed by 'request'

Teenage Bottlerocket - Todayo ****
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Teenage Bottlerocket

Quick Poll (s)

I'm probably going to do a review later tonight, but I wanted to make this its own item. I need some feed back on a couple of changes I'm thinking of implementing.

The first is pretty minor, I was thinking of making the album art at the beginning of every review another link to where you can buy the album. Putting the buying links at the end makes them kind of possible to miss.

Another thought I'd had is that I want to get more adventurous in my culinary exploits, and I was thinking of documenting some of that progress here. Would all four of my readers be fine with finding food descriptions clogging up their mp3s and music rantings or should I thinking about expanding my brand into another blog which would be just about food? The lead singer of The Riot Before has a blog where he muses about life, and then a completely separate one where he mostly talks about food so I feel like I would be in good company in this venture. Please let me know in the comments your thoughts on these changes.

Thanks
Keegan