Music Review: Megadeth - Megadeth (2026)

The seventeenth and final album by thrash metal pioneers Megadeth has dropped.  Simply titled Megadeth (and boasting one of the band's coolest-ever album covers), the album is pretty much exactly what I expected - a guitar riff-o-rama that's unfortunately hurt dramatically by Dave Mustaine's very limited vocal range and lack of lyrical invention.  

This has been an issue with Megadeth's music for me since 2007's United Abominations.  Mustaine's trademark snarl worked when he was a young, angry, troubled soul.  His music had a sense of danger about it and his voice had the range and intensity to match the molten rage of his lyrics.  You really got the sense that he meant what he was saying, good or bad.  There was real conviction behind it.  But from his mid-forties on he was no longer able to hit those signature screeches and wails, and thus the melodies lost the urgency they once had.  Similarly, Dave's sardonic lyrical nihilism felt genuine in the early days, but began to feel performative as he aged.  Somehow he never learned to replace that outmoded tone with wizened vulnerability and introspection, like James Hetfield did on 72 Seasons for example.  Thus the subject matter of Megadeth lacks an emotional connection, particularly in the album's closer "The Last Note."  What should be a poignant swan song is just another Megadeth track; there's no sense of melancholy or bittersweetness, it's just over.  Then there's "I Don't Care," whose lyrics sound like a teenager wrote them and not a 64-year-old grown-ass man.  After a certain age the youthful rebellion schtick becomes self-parody.  

Music Review: Avenged Sevenfold - Life Is But a Dream...

Avenged Sevenfold's long-awaited eighth album is a fearlessly wacky roller coaster of musical and artistic influences centered around themes of life, death, and the meaning of it all.  Bewilderingly fast-paced and full of abrupt time and tempo changes, Life Is But a Dream... is dizzying, thought-provoking, often beautiful, and at times confounding.  It's hard to know exactly what to make of it.

The album starts right off with a curveball, as strains of delicate chamber music ease the listener in (similar to how we ease into life, according to singer M. Shadows) before heavy guitars come roaring.  The song is called "Game Over" and it's a brutally frank, truncated account of a man going through various stages of life before deciding to exit this seemingly meaningless existence - "And here I swing from my family tree/Say goodnight."  Like several songs on this album it's very well-written but feels short and perhaps under-explored.  This sets the trend of each track being part of a larger whole rather than a proper standalone piece of music.

Music Review: Metallica - 72 Seasons

Welcome to a special album review piece here at Enuffa.com!  Now that the long-awaited 11th Metallica album 72 Seasons has dropped and my esteemed colleague Mike Drinan and I have had ten days to fully digest it, we thought we'd give it the same discussion treatment we gave Hardwired all those years ago!  Get ready for a deep dive...

JB: Michael, before we dig into the individual tracks, what are your high-level thoughts on 72 Seasons?

MD: It's a good, solid Metallica album that should satisfy fans of all eras of the band, whether you prefer their thrash style or the blues based rock of the Load era, it's all on this album. The production is really polished on this, James's vocals sound incredible and his lyrics seem to be more evocative and introspective, which I kind of felt was lacking on Hardwired. Rob's presence on this album is really at the forefront and I love what his playing brings to these songs. 

My biggest issue with this album that kept coming up was how they struggled with transitions and outros. There was a lot of starts and stops when going into a new section of the song, almost as if they didn't have any other ideas on how to bridge the sections together. The ending of the songs were even worse for me, especially on "Shadows Follow" where the song was over and they kept doing the same thing over and over and over until they finally ended the song. Those were my two biggest nitpicks. 

Other than that, I really enjoyed the album overall and felt it was exactly what I expected of the band at this stage of their career.

JB: I think this album is a big step up from Hardwired.  It continues that direction stylistically, bringing together elements from every era (minus St. Anger, though lyrically it harkens back to the early aughts as James worked through a recent bout with his personal demons).  But everything just sounds more confident on this album and it feels much more like a collaboration between all four members.  Kirk thankfully gets some songwriting credits again (the main riff of "72 Seasons" is probably his most front-and-center contribution, and it's a great one), and his soloing is the strongest it's been in probably 30 years.  His lead work is much more surefooted this time around and it's great to hear him playing to his strengths again after years of him just sorta being there.  Also like you said, Rob Trujillo's bass is very present on this one, featured more than anything they've released since Load/Reload and the songs are so much stronger for it.

Lars once again defies his age with laser-precision drumming and machine-gun double-kick parts on the fast stuff, and four-on-the-floor solid grooves on the Black Album-esque tunes.  He sure does love those snare fills.

As always James is the backbone of the band, supplying even more evidence why he's maybe the greatest rhythm guitarist of all time, while also pouring his heart out lyrically and making the songs much more relatable than on Hardwired, where they often felt at arm's length.  There's some really nice vocal production on here too that reminded me of the Bob Rock era.

The transition stuff you mentioned didn't bother me; I actually like some of the stop and start touches they added (the outro of "72 Seasons" for example - Lars' fingerprints are all over those bits I think.

Overall I consider 72 Seasons their strongest work in many years - it could've used maybe a bit more variety but they were obviously going for an exhausting, relentless metal journey and on those terms this is a really successful effort from where I sit.  There's a real maturity on display here, from a group of guys hitting their 60s (that just seems wrong to me), combined with early-era exuberance on some of the tunes.  It's an album that definitely rewards multiple listens, which is generally my favorite type of album.

What are the standout songs for you?

Music Review: Mastodon - Hushed and Grim (2021)

Man, this album is a doozy.  Prog/sludge/psychedelic metal maestros Mastodon are back at long last, with their eighth studio album Hushed and Grim, a double-disc, 86-minute marathon dedicated to their manager Nick John, who passed away from cancer in 2018.  As the title suggests, the album is steeped in melancholy, a cathartic exploration of loss from a band all too familiar with the subject (As you may recall drummer Brann Dailor has written numerous lyrics about his sister Skye who committed suicide at 16, and the band's 2011 album The Hunter was named after guitarist Brent Hinds' deceased brother.).  Mastodon's signature offbeat guitar riffs and Dailor's Buddy Rich-esque percussion are present but more muted than usual; the songs here tend to be driven by emotion and sentiment rather than trying to dazzle you with metal acumen.  The result is a sprawling 15-track opus creating something beautiful out of tragedy.

Early tracks like "Pain with an Anchor," "The Crux," and "More Than I Could Chew" ease the faithful listener in with familiar-sounding Mastodon compositions, Brann and bassist Troy Sanders supplying the vocals (oddly Brent Hinds only sings on two songs).  Things get a bit proggier on the odd-time "Sickle and Peace" (one of Sanders' best-ever vocals) and veer into Southern rock on the jangly "The Beast" (one of Hinds' heartfelt appearances on the mic), before moving into more pensive territory on "Skeleton of Splendor" and "Teardrinker."  The first disc closes with the stripped-down first single "Pushing the Tides," a song chosen for its middle ground status, representing a little of everything on the album.  Disc 1 boasts nary a miss in its eight tracks, its 43 running time cruising by at an incredible clip.  

Top Ten Things: Corrosion of Conformity Songs

Welcome to another edition of Top Ten Things, here at Enuffa.com, where I rattle off a list of things I dig.

Today I'm talking about a band of unsung stoner metal heroes that began in the early 1980s as a hardcore punk trio and evolved into thrash, groove metal, sludge, and southern rock, along the way becoming a quintet and then a four-piece.  These guys were briefly in rotation on FM rock radio in the mid 90s but have unfortunately spent most of their career in relative obscurity despite always putting out quality, iconoclastic molten sludge, I'm talking about Corrosion of Conformity.

I first became aware of COC thanks to that great old staple of MTV, Headbanger's Ball, which presented three hours of metal awesomeness every Saturday night.  In early 1993 I happened upon two videos featuring this surly group of southern hicks pounding out groove-oriented guitar dirges and barking anthems of revolt and rebellion, and I was hooked immediately.  I went out and bought their third album Blind, and was knocked squarely on my ass by the sledgehammer rhythm guitars and righteous rage-infused lyrics.  In late 1994 they followed it up with Deliverance, which featured a major lineup change (guitarist Pepper Keenan had taken over on lead vocals from Karl Agell, while original bassist Mike Dean had returned in place of Phil Swisher) and a turn to Sabbathy, pothead alt-metal, yielding some well-deserved mainstream attention.  From then on COC was a staple around my house, and I've been groovin' to them ever since.  This band doesn't get nearly enough love.

With that, let's take a look at the best of Corrosion of Conformity!

HM: Damned for All Time

After the evil-sounding instrumental "These Shrouded Temples..." kicks off the Blind album, the late Reed Mullin's (RIP Reed!) syncopated drums transition us into a midtempo groover called "Damned for All Time," a scathing rebuke of politicians and their warmongering, that shifts feels from section to section.  Karl Agell's narrator reels in disgust at the crimes against humanity perpetrated by America's ruling class on a daily basis, fearing that we are all, like Judas in Jesus Christ Superstar, damned for all time.



HM: Clean My Wounds

Maybe COC's best-known song is this simple tune from Deliverance, lyrically a toned-down thematic cousin to "Damned," as Pepper Keenan laments the violence around him, his cries for absolution unanswered ("Help me Jesus, help me clean my wounds/He said he cannot heal that kind").



HM: Seven Days

This melancholy dirge over a shuffle feel seems to be from the point of view of Christ, trying to make sense of his obligation to a human race he isn't sure is worth saving, while acknowledging his own human shortcomings.  It's one of Keenan's most powerful vocal performances and contains some of his most poignant lyrics ("Well I'm the one/I face the change I know that stands before me/Believe in me, cuz I damn sure don't believe in you").



HM: Dirty Hands and Empty Pockets/Already Gone

One of COC's most unusual tunes is this two-part shuffle that stars with just bass and drums, over which Pepper's sandpapery spoken verses eviscerate America's exploitation of third-world countries ("As we bleed another nation so you can watch your favorite station").  The lyrical perspective then changes, giving way to a high-energy guitar boogie from the point of view of the exploited soldier ("One day you will see when you're six feet down like me/Remember me when you're safe at home/I'm already gone").  This song also shows off veteran drummer Stanton Moore's bouncy chops.

Music Review: Kesha - High Road

Kesha's fourth album High Road is sort of a mix of her early party pop sensibilities and her more poignant, introspective material found on 2017's Rainbow (her first record free from the abusive contract she'd signed with Dr. Luke).  Where that album was a cathartic, often heart-rending purge of personal demons, High Road (as the title implies) attempts to get back to a sense of fun and carefreedom while still exploring a bit of Kesha's thirty-something maturity.

The album's first third is lighthearted pop fare - "Tonight," "My Own Dance," and "Raising Hell" are all about going out and having a good time, albeit with a tinge of Kesha's debaucherous self-awareness ("I'm getting so drunk/I haven't seen my boyfriend in a few months").  "Tonight" is the best of these, with an anthemic, Nate Ruess-esque chorus (Ruess co-wrote a couple of the other tracks in fact) and evocative word-pictures.  The fourth and fifth tracks, "High Road" and "Shadow," seem to indicate Kesha's intent to move past the struggles chronicled on Rainbow and just worry about the future, critics be damned.

For me it's the second act where High Road really comes alive.  "Honey" is a scathing rebuke of a former friend, featuring layered R&B vocals over a Weezer-esque guitar loop.  Songs like this one showcase Kesha's admirable directness and free-flowing spontaneity.  My two favorite tracks are next, both understated, folky, affecting laments of missed boats and eroding love.  "Cowboy Blues" is a sweet and sad duet about a fella she met at a dive bar and never saw again, while "Resentment" (featuring Brian Wilson and Sturgill Simpson) deals with being taken for granted by a longtime lover.  These two songs are quite beautiful and I'd love to hear Kesha do more of this.

Theater Review: Jagged Little Pill

Dear Hamilton,

You are and have been the single greatest theatergoing experience of my life thus far.  I regret to inform you however, that your soundtrack's position of "music I choke back tears to on the way to work" is about to be usurped by the forthcoming soundtrack to Jagged Little Pill, the latest Broadway sensation based on the songs of Alanis Morissette.  

Sincerely, 

Justin


What an emotional gut-punch this show is.  Jagged Little Pill uses Alanis's milestone album (plus several of her other tracks) as the inspiration and backbone for a family-centric drama that tackles issues of race, gender, sexual orientation, sexual assault, drug addiction, and marital strife.  That one show is able to juggle this many sociopolitical themes without stumbling over itself is remarkable, but book writer Diablo Cody (of Juno fame) weaves them over and around each other effortlessly, while introducing and developing an ensemble of relatable but flawed everyperson characters.

We open on an affluent suburban family.  The parents, Mary Jane and Steve, have a strained marriage, partly due to his being a workaholic and her behavior growing erratic after a car accident a year earlier.  Their son Nick is an overachiever (largely thanks to Mary Jane's incessant pushing), while their adopted African-American daughter Frankie is a high school activist who resents her parents' overcompensation at treating her as if she were white.  Tension ratchets up after Nick's best friend is accused of raping one of their classmates, while Frankie jilts her girlfriend Jo for a new boy at school.  What results is an emotionally and politically charged exploration of all these hot-button issues as each character is forced to confront their choices and relationships.

The performances by this extraordinary ensemble cast are all wonderfully poignant, and the arrangements and execution of Morissette's music are true to the spirit and brutal honesty of her original recordings.  Marveling at how effectively and seamlessly the songs are incorporated and repurposed, I was reminded why I fell in love with Alanis's megahit album in the first place.  These songs resonate well beyond their mid-90s timeframe, examining universal subjects and emotions with a stunning, raw frankness almost unheard of in pop music.  Their application in this show adds new layers of empathy and relevance, providing numerous choke-up moments as these characters are cracked open and spilled out.

Music Review: Jason Hawk Harris - Love & The Dark

by Mike Drinan
@mdrinan380

So, I’m in Vermont one weekend, sitting on the couch and drinking some of the best beer ever made (from the auspicious Hill Farmstead) and surfing through my Instagram feed when I stop at a video posted by Bloodshot Records. The video shows a young man with a guitar performing in front of a small group of people in what seems like some kind of small showcase. His band behind him is churning through a raucous Americana number and the young man is moving his leg emphatically with the beat. He sings at a level that demands your attention, with such fiery passion and urgency that a guy in the audience can’t stand still. The band fades a little while this man sings his verse before reigniting, the bass player has her back to the camera but shows her hand walking down the neck of her bass and the drummer just pounding away at his snare and hi-hat. The rhythm of the song is rollicking and infectious. I thought to myself, Who the hell is this?

The answer: Jason Hawk Harris.

I immediately downloaded his debut album Love & The Dark, released in August on Bloodshot Records, and was absolutely devastated by it. It was so fucking good. It’s country, its Americana, it's rock ‘n’ roll, it's punk and it's orchestral. His voice is smooth and poignant and the album has themes of death, love, the unknown, addiction and religion. Each track seems effortless, as if he came into the melody, rhythm, sound, timing and delivery of each song as cool and natural as walking into a room full of friends and family. He’s right where he wants to be.

The album kicks off with the stunning “The Smoke and The Stars”, a redeeming love song about a man struggling to fight off his demons until his love comes back to him, freeing him of the struggles he’s facing. The song builds slowly until he pleads “Let me live in those green eyes of yours”. It’s an emotionally crushing song with beautiful instrumentation and an arrangement that wonderfully sets the stage for the rest of the album.

Top Ten Things: KoRn Albums, Ranked

Welcome to another Top Ten Things, here at Enuffa.com!  This edition has bonus entries because today we're ranking the albums of nu metal innovators KoRn!

With the release of their 13th album The Nothing, I figured it would be a good time to finally follow up the Top Ten KoRn Songs list with an album ranking.  As I said before, my journey to get to KoRn was an unusual one; I hated their music with a palpable passion for years before finally coming around, and then they immediately became one of my favorite groups.  Their unconventional focus on groove and grit over flash and precision was a very acquired taste, but once acquired I was insatiable.

So let's cut to the chase and count down the studio albums of KoRn!


For our Top Ten KoRn Songs list, click HERE...

14. See You On the Other Side

KoRn's seventh album for me is their weakest.  For a long time I considered Take a Look in the Mirror, their unnecessary "return to our roots" album, as the band's nadir, but the years have been pretty kind to that album, less so for this one.  While See You On the Other Side was a pretty logical next step from Untouchables, the band experimenting with gothic, industrial and electronica elements, the songs just didn't come together, and this album in hindsight feels like a dry run for Untitled.  Guitarist Brian "Head" Welch had left the band and the remaining four members decided to reinvent themselves on this album, with very mixed results.  I appreciated SYOTOS more than its predecessor at the time for the risks being taken, but they hadn't quite found the new formula yet.  

Key Tracks: Throw Me Away, Coming Undone, Souvenir

Music Review: KoRn's The Nothing is a Return to FoRm

Nu metal pioneers KoRn are back with a new album, The Nothing, and since we did this for their last album, my colleague Mike Drinan (@mdrinan380) and I are back to discuss its merits.  Maybe an argument will ensue, who knows?  

Justin: The Nothing is a moody record (as really all KoRn albums are), made more poignant by Jonathan Davis's lyrical focus on the loss of his ex-wife, who passed away last year.  This theme of despondency and loss permeates every song on the album and somewhat returns KoRn to the "music as therapy" vibe so prevalent on their early records.

Mike, what is your take on The Nothing?


Mike: Oh man, I really enjoyed this album. Knowing what happened with his ex-wife, I went into this album expecting it to be dark but I was a little caught off guard by just how dark it was, thematically speaking. Jonathan's weeping at the end of the first track really sets the tone for this project and I was ready for all of it. Everything I love about KoRn is on this album, even if there is a real prevalent late 90s nu-metal sound and feel to it, the band sounds fresh and invigorated. Ray Luzier's drumming is incredible, the riffs are really good, especially on "The Ringmaster," and Jonathan's vocals sound amazing from the deep, gutteral growl to the spiny, sing-songy style that has become his trademark over the years. Fieldy's bass adds muscle and provides the emotional punch to the music that ties the album's theme together. This album is a huge step up from their previous album, The Serenity of Suffering, and it's not even close for me.


Justin: Right off the bat, Luzier and Fieldy's presence are felt much more on this album than on Serenity.  Fieldy's trademark percussive bass attack is back, and Luzier's grooves are rock solid (I've said it before but Ray is miles ahead of Dave Silveria as a drummer).  As unfortunate as his thematic motivation on this album, Davis actually sounds like he means it this time, where TSOS sounded like a once angry guy going through the motions just so it would still be a KoRn record.  I do feel like he hasn't quite recaptured the visceral sandpaper screams of Life is Peachy, but maybe that time has passed.  Still his melodies are head and shoulders above those on TSOS, I love that he's rediscovered major keys, and the bridge of "This Loss," brief though might be, is probably my favorite stretch of music on the album.  It's the most soulful singing of Davis's career and I wish they'd built the entire song around that section.  Maybe that can be a blueprint for the next one.

I don't think I'd call any of the songs truly great, but The Nothing is a very easy album to listen to and its 44 minutes fly by.  Every song has at least something to bring you back for repeat listens and the bulk are very well-crafted.  Highlights for me include "Can You Hear Me" (a welcome Untouchables throwback; my only complaint about this song is it's so short), "The Darkness is Revealing," and "The Ringmaster," all three of which have very memorable chorus hooks.  With TSOS I was bored by the end.  That's not at all the case this time.

Music Review: Avatar - Avatar Country (2018)

I first became aware of Swedish metal band Avatar around the time their 2016 album Feathers & Flesh was released.  Right away frontman Johannes Eckerstrom's outlandish appearance and wildly energetic charisma caught my eye, and the band's mix of melodic and death metal elements coupled with their general sense of humor hooked me in.  I'm generally not much of a death metal fan, but Eckerstrom's approach to that style of singing is uniquely visceral and he uses the technique to punctuate the vocal melodies as opposed to relying on it completely.  The band's quirky guitar riffs and harmonized double leads also set them apart from similar groups, giving Avatar a blend of thundering brutality and comical eccentricity.

Avatar's latest album Avatar Country runs a lean 43 minutes and contains a number of very good songs.  Unfortunately of the ten tracks only six feel like fully fleshed-out ideas.  The concept album about a fictional king (who is mentioned in every song title) opens with a sarcastically funny anthem of sorts, "Glory to Our King," which features layered vocal harmonies over symphonic backing tracks.  My ears perked up when I first heard the melodic strains, but at a mere 51 seconds the song ends before it can really get going.  I would've liked this idea to be further explored and run maybe two or three times as long.

The first real track is an 8-minute epic called "Legend of the King," which features Avatar's signature melodic metal sound, with a harmonized guitar riff serving as one of its main hooks, plus a lofty, operatic chorus.  This is probably the album's strongest song and feels like a band stretching its prog-metal legs.

Maybe the most instantly grabby tune is the AC/DC-esque title track, "The King Welcomes You to Avatar Country," a bouncy midtempo blues rocker on which vocalist Johannes Eckerstrom channels a bit of Brian Johnson while also providing some super catchy harmonies on the chorus.

The other two standouts are the European power metal-infused "Statue of the King," which has probably the strongest chorus on the album, and the de facto closing song "King After King," an uptempo tune with a bittersweet tone (Its lyrics deal with the king's death and remembrance).

The record finishes in anticlimactic fashion with a pair of rather forgettable instrumentals that seem like they were added to artificially extend the album to full-length.  Avatar Country is essentially a six-song EP stretched out to ten songs.

Overall despite its strong points, this record feels like a bit of a disappointment after the hugely satisfying Feathers & Flesh; with not enough meat on its bones and several promising ideas left partially unexplored.  It's fine as an interstitial release, a la Anthrax's Attack of the Killer B's, but it leaves me hoping Avatar gets back in the studio sooner rather than later.

I give the album *** out of *****.


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Music Review: Sleater-Kinney - The Center Won't Hold

by Mike Drinan
@mdrinan380

Sleater-Kinney has been one of my all time favorite bands since their 2002 album One Beat absolutely changed the way I listen to punk with raucous guitar licks, extremely unique and intricate drum patterns from the incomparable Janet Weiss, and the back and forth exchange between vocalists Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein. Then, in 2005 they released The Woods, an album that remains in my Top 5 albums of all time. The Olympia, Washington trio were unafraid and unwavering in their political and social commentary. They even took aim at the indie rock scene of the mid-2000s. To them, everyone and everything was fair game. On their ninth studio album, The Center Won’t Hold, while the political and social commentary is still a big topic, they also put themselves in the crosshairs.

The Center Won’t Hold stands in stark contrast to the rest of Sleater-Kinney’s catalog by shrugging off their style of punk and moving into the arena of art punk pop (I don’t know if that’s a thing but makes sense to me) with the help of St. Vincent, a brilliant songwriter in her own right. This new aesthetic is at times jarring as much as it is suspicious. Personally, I dislike this new sonic direction the band has taken, but that is based more on preference than anything. My first listen to this record was tough. I felt that this new art pop sound was drowning out the forcefulness of their voices, their presence. It was only with multiple listens that I started to come around.

In fact, some of the best tracks on this album are those in the art pop persuasion. “Bad Dance” is easily my favorite track. It has an infectious rhythm as it embraces the end of the world caused by a reckless leader, with lyrics as elegant and precise as they are politically frustrating, “My truth is slack and loose/My morals are unsound/But I'm amusing, I'm amazing, I'm impure/Dip your toes into the chaos/It'll feel just like a cure”. The sound and style is different, but the band remains the same.

Music Review: Korn - The Serenity of Suffering

Well it's been about a week and a half since Korn's new album The Serenity of Suffering was released, and it's mostly been getting solid reviews as a return to the band's heavier roots.  My esteemed colleague Mike Drinan and I have each listened to the album multiple times and thought we'd discuss our respective takes on the record.  So here goes....

Justin: Ok, now that we've had some time to really digest it, what are your thoughts on the band's 12th outing?


Mike: I like it a lot. This album suits my preference on how I like Korn to sound. I love the deep, bass-heavy guitar riffs and Jonathan Davis' guttural screams mixed with his scratchy scatting. In fact, I love Jonathan's vocals on this entire album, with the exception of "Take Me" where I didn't like how he enunciated certain syllables in a weird way (Instead of singing "me" he'd stretch it to sound like "may" and continued doing this throughout the song). For the most part, he sounds intense, melodic and violent, really fitting the musical tone of the band, especially on the track "The Hating". He rarely went quiet on any of the songs and that's just fine with me. On their last album The Paradigm Shift, he didn't sound as emotionally committed. I saw an interview with Head and Munky where they said Jonathan had to fall back in love with heavy music after the direction they went in prior to The Paradigm Shift.  I thought this disconnect came through on that album which contributed to me feeling indifferent toward it. It's nice to hear Jonathan sing with that same power again. Musically, the band sounds like they're firing on all cylinders on this album. The guitars give each song a great backdrop to support Davis' vocals and on a few songs are pretty melodic. Fieldy has sort of taken a step back in the sense that his bass isn't as featured as on previous albums. I still hear it but not as prominently.

The highlight of this album for me was the buildup in "Everything Falls Apart" where Davis sings "There is nothing in my head" over and over, louder and louder until the band just breaks through and opens the song up with that constant heavy pounding. Holy shit I loved it!

All in all, I loved this album and think it's their best since Untouchables.

Favorite tracks: Insane, Rotting In Vain, Black Is The Soul, Everything Falls Apart


Justin: I am very underwhelmed by this album.  It's slickly produced, competently written and well-performed, but it feels to me like a band going through the motions.  It doesn't have the emotional punch of their early albums; there's only so far you can take the "I had a fucked up childhood" thing once you're a millionaire rock star without it sounding forced.  I much preferred the variety of The Paradigm Shift and Untitled, where each song stood out from the rest and had divergent hooks and grooves.  Sure some of the results were mixed, but at least with those albums I could easily identify each song.  On TSOS I feel like every song blurs into the next, with the exception of "Rotting in Vain" and "Take Me" to a lesser extent.  Most of the riffs sound stock to me, unlike on TPS where Head's return to the band seemed to ignite a creative spark.  In terms of heavier recent Korn I liked Remember Who You Are much better than this album; again, it was uneven but on songs like "Pop a Pill" (one of my all-time favorite Korn songs) and "Oildale" I felt like Jonathan actually meant what he was saying and the raw emotional power was there.  I'm not sure if it's just that slick production doesn't really fit Korn's musical style, or if it's the fact that almost every song on TSOS is in a minor key, which for me makes them feel logey and drab (Initially Korn separated themselves from every other heavy band by almost exclusively writing chorus hooks in a major key).  But aside from the two aforementioned tracks, plus "The Hating" and "Everything Falls Apart" there isn't much on this album that excites me.  I miss the urgency of "What We Do," the quirkiness of "Spike in My Veins," and the power of "Prey for Me" from The Paradigm Shift.  I'm pretty sure every song on TSOS is also in the same key and close to the same feel/tempo, which doesn't help separate them from each other, and Davis doesn't stray much from about a five or six-note mid-range, where on "Pop a Pill" for example he really belted out some higher notes.  In terms of the "death growl" vocals, they sound too polished for me.  In the Life is Peachy days his screamed vocals had a real visceral quality and rawness, but here I think the glossy production robs his screams of their teeth.  For me all these factors just make this album kind of a drag to sit through, despite the lack of any truly bad songs.  I find the whole album just middling.

For me this album ranks solidly below TPS, Remember, and Untitled (but just above The Path of Totality and certainly ahead of Take a Look in the Mirror and See You on the Other Side).

Also, where have you been, Jonathan's always pronounced "me" as "may" or occasionally "muuuy."

Music Review: Babymetal - Metal Resistance

Japanese "idol group" Babymetal is a band whose music should be nowhere near as skillfully crafted or sonically rewarding as it is.  Considering the group was a producer-assembled offshoot of a J-Pop vocal group comprised of 12-year-olds, I was almost ready to dismiss them as a disingenuous corporate creation.  But then I listened to their new album Metal Resistance.  Dammit, this thing's good.

The band's music pays homage to numerous metal bands and subgenres, notably Dream Theater (For backing instrumentalists to play recreate such a complex style is no small feat, incidentally), Sevendust, Slipknot, power metal bands like Helloween, and even some dubstep here and there.  Atop this molten barrage of guitars and drums are the hooky, saccharine melodies of three teenage girls.  These two elements should not mix well at all, but somehow they do.  The album's twelve tracks fly by, containing enough radio-friendly choruses for a Bieber record but enough machine-gun speed metal destruction for the Rockstar Mayhem Festival.  Almost all the lyrics are in Japanese, but don't let that deter you.  The melodies will be stuck in your head for days regardless.

The opener "Road of Resistance" is one of the most driving tracks on the album, assaulting the listener with blast-beats and background death vocals before lead singer Su-Metal jumps in with that sweet melody.  The Helloween influence is felt most strongly on this track.

One of the standouts is the second song "Karate," which features a snaky midtempo nu-metal groove I could easily hear on a Sevendust record.  The chorus is one of the strongest on the album and one of most instantly memorable hooks I've heard in a long time; this is some professional songwriting.

Track 3, "Adawama Fever," is equally hooky but in a more simplistic way.  The vocals dance over a syncopated beat before settling into a goofy but undeniably fun chorus having something to do with bubble gum.  This song is super high-energy.

One major stylistic departure is the piano ballad "No Rain, No Rainbow," which shows off Su-Metal's increasingly self-assured vocals.  For an 18-year-old she can really belt out these tunes and I look forward to hearing what she can do as she matures.  Evidently this one was written a while back but Su-Metal didn't feel comfortable recording it until after she'd extensively performed it live and could emotionally get inside of the song.  The wait paid off; she sings this one like she means it.

The Dream Theater influence is front and center on the late-album song "Tales of the Destinies," a track full of odd meters, start-stop riffs, and numerous time changes.  But then the chorus explodes right out of a Helloween album, the band pounding out impossibly fast riffs while Su-Metal's uplifting chorus melody soars.

My favorite track is the album closer, "The One," which is the only song delivered totally in English.  The lyrics seem crudely written (probably due in part to the translation), but this is an anthemic prog-metal masterpiece that would serve very well as the grand finale to a rock opera.  It's got one of those rare choruses you can hear on a loop and never tire of, and when it eventually fades out to close the album you can't wait to start over again.

Metal Resistance has a little something for everyone who likes loud, energetic music.  It's slickly produced, expertly played heavy metal with some of the most hauntingly catchy hooks you're likely to hear.  The impetus behind this band may have been one of commercialism, but when it comes to creating a deceptively challenging hard rock album with strong re-listen value, Babymetal is the real deal.  This is one of the best albums so far this year.

I give the album **** out of *****

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Music Review: Haken - The Mountain (2013)

I just became aware of acclaimed English prog-metal outfit Haken about a month ago, having researched them upon seeing their new album Vector in a Newbury Comics weekly "new releases" email.  I consider myself a fairly casual prog fan.  For me the genre is like horror films; I tend to ignore most of them but when someone does something really special with the form it's spectacular.  Being desperate for some new music, I went right over to YouTube to check out Haken's latest singles, "The Good Doctor" and "Puzzle Box, and was instantly blown away, not only by their musicianship, but more importantly by the band's uncanny songwriting ability.  Haken use their incredible technical acumen in service of crafting the best possible songs, something I find many prog bands seem to forget.  Instead of just being a showcase for blazing chops, Haken's music consists of great songs that just happen to include the bells & whistles of prog music.  I pretty quickly digested Vector (its 45-minute running time positively scant for a progressive rock album) and its predecessor Affinity, before settling on their third album, 2013's The Mountain.

It's this conceptual masterwork I'm here today to talk about.  The Mountain is a loose concept record about overcoming life's struggles, rising and falling, etc.  Hardly novel subject matter, but the music on this album is simply fantastic.  Listening to Haken's first two records - impressive in their own right but stylistically similar to Dream Theater and other bands of that ilk - gave me a full appreciation for how much the band stretched their legs on The Mountain.  This record has many of the usual prog-metal hallmarks but also jazz influences and choral arrangements, plus far more mood swings than you'll find on most albums.

The Mountain begins gently with "The Path," a piano/vocal introduction centering on the start of a daunting journey, which then gives way to the soaring, hopeful "Atlas Stone," a lofty 7-plus-minute piece about rising to the challenge.  Things get quirky on "Cockroach King," with its seeming nod to the music of Danny Elfman, before a pair of excellent 4-minute tracks.  "In Memoriam" is a powerful dirge in 7/8 time with one of many brilliantly infective chorus hooks found on this record, while "Because It's There" begins with a haunting jazz a capella intro before settling into a saccharin acoustic ballad.

Mass Music Review #3: The Modern Lovers

Welcome to another Mass Music Review here at Enuffa.com, where our friend Chris Gillespie looks back at a seminal Massachusetts-based band of yesteryear.....

The brainchild of Natick native Jonathan Richman, The Modern Lovers ironically was born of his failure to make it as a professional musician in New York City while living on the couch of Steve Sesnick, the manager of the band with whom he was infatuated: The Velvet Underground. Richman spent nine months in New York and would go on to live in the infamously poorly kept Hotel Albert, but would later return to his home state and settle in Boston following a trip to Europe and Israel.

The "classic" lineup from left to right: David Robinson, Jerry Harrison, Ernie Brooks, and Jonathan Richman

Deciding to organize a band modelled after the Underground, Richman recruited his childhood neighbor and friend John Felice on guitar. Following this, the duo quickly recruited drummer David Robinson and bass player Rolfe Anderson to the newly christened Modern Lovers. In September of 1970, the group played their first date with another local band called the Sidewinders only a month after Richman had returned home. From the beginning, it was clear that Richman had a unique manner about him during performances: he had short hair while wearing a tie and jacket and would often improvise new lyrics and monologues for different shows.

Young Jonathan Richman during the band's heyday

Mass Music Review #2: Dinosaur, Jr.

Our newest contributor Christopher Gillespie is back with another look at an influential Massachusetts band - this week it's Dinosaur Jr.!

Traditionally considered to be the best of Dinosaur Jr.’s albums, 1987’s You’re Living All Over Me was much more successful than the band’s first album, 1985’s Dinosaur, and is also considered much more influential than their initial outing. You’re Living All Over Me, much like Signals, Calls, and Marches proved to be an album with great importance in the alternative and indie rock scene in both America and Europe. My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields mentioned the album as an influence for their EP You Made Me Realize which was released during the beginnings of the shoegaze genre, and the album is said to have influenced ever-popular American grunge band Nirvana.

The band from left to right: Murph, Lou Barlow, and J Mascis

Mass Music Review #1: Mission of Burma

Welcome to a new feature called Mass Music Review, where Chris Gillespie, nephew of our own Dan Moore, takes a look back at some of the influential bands to come out of Boston.  Today it's Mission of Burma!

The debut release of Boston band Mission of Burma, the EP Signals, Calls, and Marches has quite the legacy in rock music, as everyone from Pearl Jam, Nirvana, R.E.M., Sonic Youth, and even Fugazi cite the band as an inspiration. Many critics laud it as a landmark in alternative and indie rock, citing its heavy instrumentals harkening to hardcore punk accompanied by thoughtful lyrics and musical sophistication not traditionally found in the fast and loud punk bands littered throughout America at the time (1981, to be specific). The EP features two of the band’s most commercially accessible songs: "That’s When I Reach For My Revolver" and "Academy Fight Song," along with underrated songs like "Max Ernst" and "Fame And Fortune."

The band from left to right: Martin Swope, Roger Miller, Peter Prescott, Clint Conley

Mission of Burma began as a trio with Roger Miller (guitar), Clinton J. “Clint” Conley (bass), and Peter Glen Prescott (drums) in 1979, with their first show being on April 1st of that year at the now-closed Modern Theater. Later that same month, Miller wrote a new song that he believed would be improved by a tape loop (loops of magnetic tape used to create repetitive, the rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound when played on a tape recorder) and contacted Martin Swope, with whom he had previously written some pieces for piano and tape. This led to Swope contributing to the band’s music more and more until he was considered an integral part of the band, receiving equal credit on the group’s recordings and appearing in group photographs along with the trio.

The band received a lot of help and support from the city, with local magazine Boston Rock printing a lengthy interview with the band prior to the release of their first record and MIT’s community radio station WMBR playing their song “Peking Spring” repeatedly in 1979 until it became their most played song of the year. The band even planned to release the song as a single but felt it had run its course by the time they had signed to Boston-based record label Ace of Hearts in 1981.

After signing with the label, the group released their first single “Academy Fight Song” written by Conley, with the Miller-penned “Max Ernst” (named for the painter) as the B-Side. The production on the single was much more refined and cleaner than the ragged and chaotic live performances of the band. Initially, they objected to such a drastic change but changed their minds after the single’s first pressing sold out quickly. By the end of that year, the EP would sell out its initial pressing of 10,000 copies.

Bob Dylan's "Blonde On Blonde" Revisited

by Michael Drinan
@thesurfacenoise

I was twenty years old when I first listened to the album. Dylan was a name I had heard before but never paid much attention to or gave him a listen. When you grow up in the 90s you don’t feel you need an artist like Dylan in your life because you already have so much to listen to as it is. So, when the 90s faded, along with the great music that came with it, I figured it was time to dive into the music of the 60s to see what the fuss was all about, and The Beatles and Dylan were the first artists to check out.

As a guide, I used VH1’s list of “100 Greatest Albums of Rock & Roll” to point me in the right direction. Before you roll your eyes I will tell you that it was and still is the best list on the subject I’ve seen. Sixteen years later and I still find myself agreeing with the albums listed, even though we can always quibble on placement. Of course, The Beatles and Dylan were littered all over it and so it seemed to be the most logical place to start. The Beatles were easy to listen to since my dad had many of their albums. Dylan, I had to go to the music store and buy his albums to hear them.

So, I bought Blonde On Blonde along with Blood On The Tracks, two works that many deem to be his best. I went to my car, popped in Blonde On Blonde and went driving around the back roads of Hampton Roads in Virginia and listened, preparing to be blown away.

I didn’t prepare myself enough. How could anyone?

The first track, “Rainy Day Women #12 and 35” I dismissed as being a playful little jam session where it seemed as if no one knew how to play their instruments. I still sung it out loud because I had heard it before off the Forrest Gump soundtrack. I began settling into the album on the second track “Pledging My Time”, a muddy, bluesy stomper with a soaring harmonica intro. My foot kept tapping, my head bobbing back and forth and my fingers drumming along. I was into it.

The clincher came when “Visions Of Johanna” came on and opened with one of the greatest opening lyrics I’ve ever heard, “Ain’t it just like the night to play tricks when you’re trying to be so quiet.” Mother. Fucker. What a line! I was instantly sold, not just on the album but with Dylan himself. I heard he was a great lyricist, the “poet of rock ‘n’ roll”, but you’re never prepared for when you realize it or when you believe it. That lyric was the one that sold me on that notion. He was the greatest lyricist in rock history.

Music Review: Ghost - Prequelle (2018)

After an ugly lawsuit between current and former members, Swedish metal band Ghost have returned with their fourth LP Prequelle, and the results are, well, underwhelming.  Feeling less like a fresh set of new songs and more like a plate of leftovers from Meloria (their killer 2015 album), Prequelle pretty much explores the same sonic territory but lacks the instant throat-grab of songs like "He Is" and "Cirice."  Where Meloria and its 2013 predecessor Infestessumam (my personal favorite Ghost record) were chock full of excellent 70s and 80s-esque hard rock that channeled bands like Blue Oyster Cult and even (gasp!) ABBA, Prequelle is just a slate of competently written and performed tunes that satisfy without dazzling.

Even minor standouts like the glam metalish "Rats" and "Dance Macabre" and the intriguing but incomplete-sounding closer "Life Eternal," with its numerous key modulations and emotive hook, sound like B-side material rather than album highlights.  The choice to put two full-length instrumentals on one record strikes me as odd too - the second of these, an atmospheric waltz called "Helvetesfonster," keeps my attention at least, but the first, called "Miasma," feels like a song for which they just couldn't come up with a vocal part (though I did like the use of saxophone toward the end).  Couple that with the truncated intro track "Ashes," and you're left with only seven songs that feature the band's frontman and primary creative force. 

That's not to say Prequelle doesn't sound great, it certainly does.  The slick, full-sounding production on Meloria is back on this album; the instruments all sound huge and thunderous, and Cardinal Copia's dense vocal harmonies provide plenty of ear candy as usual.  It's just that the prodigious songwriting of the last two records is missing here.  I don't hate any of these tunes, but I don't love any of them either. 

Prequelle is a decent effort, but unlike Infestessumam and Meloria, sadly doesn't feel like an essential Ghost record.

I give the album *** out of *****.


UPDATE, 10/24/22: Prequelle illustrates the difficulty of reviewing an album based on only a few listens.  Four years later and my opinion of the album has improved somewhat substantially.  "Life Eternal," "Witch Image," and the second instrumental are probably my three favorite tracks on the record, and while it still feels a bit skimpy as an album, Prequelle is a much more satisfying entry in Ghost's catalogue than I previously gave it credit for.

I'll up my rating to ***1/2 out of *****.


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