Iron Malden's gonna get you
How are you? I'm freaking bushed. Other than transcribing and cobbling together an interview with MC Chris for Friday, I covered Ozzfest on Saturday. Read about it here, prefaced by a review of the new As I Lay Dying product. Our free seats were amazing - I haven't been that close to Iron Maiden since I first saw them at age 15, and that includes club shows during the Blaze Bayley "lean years." It was almost 12 hours of roasting skin, guzzling lukewarm water and rocking ass under the hot Willennium sun, this after a late night with The Olivia Tremor Control on Friday. So I'm a little concerted-out at the moment.
At least until Gigantour. Then ProgPower, if I'm even still going. And just in case that trip falls through and I somehow sell my ticket, the back-up plan is the Day of the Equinox, the lineup of which is so aligned with my current taste and mood it's as if I booked it myself. It's possibly a great trip: I could finally see Agalloch while investigating proper steps for defection to Canada, as my reasons to become an expatriate expand daily...
Ah, yet another controversy-free post, courtesy of Unexpect's "Novaë". Kisses.
At least until Gigantour. Then ProgPower, if I'm even still going. And just in case that trip falls through and I somehow sell my ticket, the back-up plan is the Day of the Equinox, the lineup of which is so aligned with my current taste and mood it's as if I booked it myself. It's possibly a great trip: I could finally see Agalloch while investigating proper steps for defection to Canada, as my reasons to become an expatriate expand daily...
Ah, yet another controversy-free post, courtesy of Unexpect's "Novaë". Kisses.
posted by SoulReaper at 11:38 PM
3 Comments:
As I Lay Dying, "Shadows Are Security" (Metal Blade) ¤ ¤
Impeccable skills, strong production and striking imagery are expected of any melodic metalcore band today. But a parallel expectation is that your average subgenre record is going to be too similar to countless others to have much impact on a listener.
For instance, see San Diego's As I Lay Dying. After one well-marketed 2003 album ("Frail Words Collapse"), the competent Christian metalcore quintet with its name cribbed from a Faulkner novel is hyped to high heaven, although these guys are not doing anything different from their peers. "Shadows" features lots of lost-love lyrics, rhythmic ferocity and guitar harmonies, some of which actually stick in your head ("Meaning In Tragedy," "Morning Waits").
But take away the typical pummeling hardcore breakdowns and bland emo singing ("The Darkest Nights" is obvious radio bait), and you're left with a pile of hummable riffs and larynx-shredding roars not too different from what AILD's Ozzfest tourmates In Flames and Arch Enemy cranked out in Sweden a decade ago. (As for newer bands, Himsa and Dead To Fall simply do it better.)
The standouts here are "Repeating Yesterday," with its meditative tempo and slow-burning melodies, and the somewhat harsher "Illusions." While the former evokes the grimy bliss of Germany's Heaven Shall Burn, the latter resembles dissonant stateside Godcore heroes ZAO. What was that Commandment? Oh, yeah. Thou shalt not steal!
• As I Lay Dying perform as part of Ozzfest 2005, beginning at 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Tweeter Center, 19100 S. Ridgeland Ave., Tinley Park. Tickets are $34.50-$87. (312) 559-1212.
Ozzfest at 10 - still rocking
Ozzfest celebrated its 10th anniversary at Tinley Park's Tweeter Center on Saturday. Although its founder, Black Sabbath singer and erstwhile reality TV star Ozzy Osbourne, appeared aged beyond his 56 years, his annual heavy metal festival tour entered middle age looking admirably young at heart.
The long day's highlight was in fact not headliners Sabbath, but fellow Englishmen Iron Maiden. Arguably as important an influence on young metal musicians as Ozzy's gang, Maiden never had radio success in America. Their legacy instead came from records played by older brothers or friends, theatrical concert spectacles and clever branding via millions of T-shirts featuring the ghoulish mascot named Eddie.
Playing to fanatics as well as to the uninitiated, singer Bruce Dickinson leapt and cajoled the crowd with youthful energy, his opera-trained pipes still soaring with passion and force. The three-guitar harmonies navigating tricky twists in "Phantom of the Opera" or the moody anthem "Revelations" were all one needed to explain the band's deserved legendary status.
Black Sabbath followed Iron Maiden's boisterous set with a curious selection of album cuts stuffed among hoary staples like "Iron Man" and "War Pigs." Guitarist Tony Iommi's ominous drone in "Electric Funeral" and upbeat melodies in "After Forever" scored points, but the band seemed lost and fatigued, especially drummer Bill Ward and, of course, poor Ozzy.
[NOTE: Due to Mr. Osbourne's "hay fever," Sabbath canceled their performance for the previous and following dates. Those crowds got double the Maiden. Bastards! And before the tour is even over, the Oz camp has announced he will be retiring from the grueling outdoor rigors of Ozzfest after this year. - SR]
Rob Zombie headlined the second stage, drawing an enthusiastic early crowd. His dumb but inoffensive disco-metal hits didn't hold much musical weight among the day's performers. But Zombie's lowbrow charm, fashioned for strip clubs and car stereos, was preferable to Mudvayne's musical mess, a pretentious, petulant nu-metal racket, which made the downstate quartet come off as more dated than Sabbath.
For fans of prodigious musicianship at maximum volume, Atlanta's Mastodon ruled, their shifting, intricate belligerence highlighted by Brann Dailor's busy drumming. New-school superstars Shadows Fall confirmed that they're the closest this generation has to the young Metallica, their complex yet accessible thrash packed with furious melodic riffs and shout-along choruses. Killswitch Engage one-upped them in the populism department, turning the title track of their "The End of Heartache" into a perversely effective blend of mosh pit and power ballad approaches.
SF and KsE also demonstrated why they're considered leaders among their peers. As I Lay Dying and "Battle for Ozzfest" winners A Dozen Furies played in a similar style but without their songwriting prowess. The Black Dahlia Murder did without the hardcore elements, but still didn't rise above the template drawn by melodic death metal icons like Carcass or At the Gates - not a smooth move when members of those bands were also playing.
In the most vitriolic performance of the day, AtG founders Anders and Jonas Bjorler unleashed The Haunted's lethal thrash on an unsuspecting noontime audience. Former Carcass guitarist Michael Amott was buried under a terrible bass-heavy sound mix, but his morning set with Arch Enemy was received well due to their charismatic looker of a front-growler, Angela Gossow.
The day's other female vocalist was actress Jada Pinkett-Smith, debuting her vanity act Wicked Wisdom. Toned and shaggy, she looked pretty "metal," but her atonal yells bogged down the band's generic thrashcore. At least hubby Will "Hitch" Smith appeared to enjoy it, bobbing his head from the side of the stage in a celebrity moment too surreal to be properly described.
Heh. Sounds like fun. Would have loved to see Maiden.
As much as I like Maiden though, I like Bruce's solo projects more than the re-united Maiden. He and Smith seem to be the ones who are really into it and I think they'd be better off leaving Maiden and just cutting albums with Roy Z.
I hate NuMetal with a passion. It's whiney and had none of the qualities that make metal cool.
Ozzy was losing his voice for years. The guy has a lot of charisma, but I think it's time of him to take a long rest, maybe try to get back in shape or something. Plus, I fear Ward will drop dead while playing. The guy can drum, don't get me wrong, but he's already had one heart attack.
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