Time for something interesting - MUSIC. I'll be completely honest, I don't enjoy or even tolerate most the music that most students listen to these days. Diversity is the spice of life. Music is a teenager's life. Therefore, variety in your music allows you to become a more diverse, interesting, and all around awesome person. Let's begin.
Mastodon is undoubtably one of the more underrated metal bands around right now. Their discography spans various elements and themes and contains some quite brilliant guitar and vocal work. The drummer blasts out mind-boggling fills and amazes me constantly. Mastodon's Crack the Skye continues the legacy of albums that represent elements and feature magnificent cover artwork. Leviathan is quintessentially the water element, Blood Mountain subsists of earth themes, Remission is loosely based on fire, and finally Crack the Skye embodies a distinctly Airy, Astral essence. Call of the Mastodon, a collection of demo songs, is a mix of fire and water and the result is a sludgy, aggressive, and raw anthology of past sounds. Beginning with Call of the Mastodon and moving chronologically through the discography, you will be amazed at the evolution of sound and technique that the band has gone through. This evolution has culminated in the band's most polished and technical album yet. The most recent Guitar World has an article that goes into the technical recording and layering aspect of the album more in depth, so I won't go over that here.
Crack the Skye, give it a listen. Who knows, you may discover a new favorite band.
Expect a review of each song off of Crack the Skye this week and reviews/insights upon various other albums in a broad range of bands every week or so afterwards.
Now for the aforementioned and promised review:
Oblivion: The album starts off with a distinctly "Mastodon" sound. The alternating low notes with those on the higher strings give a spacy, drifting feeling unique to the band. Par for the course, vocals are completely unintelligible, yet they are quite powerful and haunting for the entirety of the album. Particular in the first few minutes the vocals shine. The words that you can make out from time to time provide a very lonely and lamenting sense to the song. These lyrics coupled with the wailing guitar work starting around 3:30 paint a barren, distinctly Eastern European, atmosphere. I'm not fond of the way this song ends if you are listening to it on shuffle or by itself, but when in conjuction with the remainder of the album it provides a nice transition.
Quintessence: It took me a while to notice the song had changed, the transition to this song from Oblivion was so smooth. Once again we have a Mastodon-esque sound coupled with the nasally vocals that are so unique and refreshing. I love the way the singer includes such variety in this song. The guitar is pretty typical of Mastodon in Quintessence; one guitar chugs along in contrast with another playing single notes that float along over the top. Although typical, the guitar work is very heavy and enjoyable. The drums are blasting out some pretty decent fills, yet I feel like they take a backseat to the vocals until the end of the song. Around 4:00 the drummer seems to kick it up a notch and start hammering away at your soul with absolute precision.
The Czar: The song starts out beautifully; the slow bass coupled with airy guitar excels at creating a magnificent atmosphere. The haunting vocals speak of escape from unknown horrors that allows the mind to wander and vividly takes the listener to a barren, snowswept land of tryanny. Keyboards are prominent from 2:-- onwards and smoothly create even more depth to this tapestry of imagination that the song coaxes forth. An effortless transition occurs at 3:40 from tale-telling to an formidable guitar riff. The tempo picks up a bit and the guitar work starts getting really good; very impressive detuned chugging alternating with some sweet technical riffs. The vocals weave in and out pitch with the guitar, giving a really nifty feeling. At 7:00 the tempo shifts yet again into a haunting melody reminiscent of the same themes as the beginning. The vocals, keyboards, guitar, and drums all coalesce into perhaps the most beautifully written and put together portion of the album for the remainder of the song. Although, the solo is a little unsatisifying. The outstanding composition more than makes up for this slight imperfection.
Ghost of Karelia: Drums are immediately noticed as more prominent than in previous songs and they remain so for the entirety of the song. The vocals have their shining moments, and although they are definetely not my favorite, they still remain proficient at what they do; conjure up astounding imagery. Guitars take a backseat until about halfway through when a magnificently heavy, detuned riff comes along and bashes heads for a few minutes before transitioning into yet more stratospheric upper octave work.
Crack the Skye: The track from which the album is titled after begins with suprisingly similarity to the other tracks, yet moves onto a distinctly unique tone and feel. Vocals soar in Crack the Skye, drums pound, guitars slay; yet all this begins to feel a bit stretched and repetitive. The song is simply too similar to the others until about 2:45 in which a single guitar wails over the hammering drums and recaptures the listener for a few minutes before the song transitions. The drums in the latter half of the song are simply brilliant, I don't know how the drummer does it.
The Last Baron: The Last Baron is by far my favorite song. The track immediately begins where Crack the Skye left off, providing a sublime transition that holds the listeners attention whilst the nasally vocals provide a excellent buildup to what may be my favorite riff of the year. The way the singer manipulates his voice in the first few minutes is simply magnificent and he soars above what you believe is possible for a typical "metal" singer. The guitars come in at 2:20 with a cutting, hard-driving riff, relax for a few seconds, then melt your face off. Drums like you have never heard before begin at 3:00, once again the drummer is proving his mastery over his instrument. My mind is blown simply trying to comprehend how he controls his motions to strike the seperate sections with the precision and speed at which he does. Amazing. Keyboards are used sparingly in The Last Baron, and unfortunately when you do hear them they are cliche "ahs" and are very disappointing. However, the cliche does little to detract from the overall song. At 5:45 a twisting-winding, ridiculously out-of-place little transition beings, yet for its sticking out like a sore thumb, it fits. I realize this makes little sense, I guess it must be heard to be understood. Furious drumming and guitar riffs consist of the next few minutes, punctuated consistently by keyboards and lamenting lyrics. Beginning at 8:00 is my favorite riff of the album, the strikingly playful yet heavy sound is absolutely marvelous.
Divinations: Divinations begins with a serpentine guitar twisting underneath ridiculously complex drums, transitioning into a overwhelmingly moving riff coupled with aggressive vocals that I have come to love and expect from the vocalist. This track won't disappoint those listeners looking for a technical, aggressive song for 'rawking out man'.
There are also instrumental versions of Oblivion and Divinations. I actually enjoyed the instrumental version of Oblivion more than the original.
-Dr. Reeves
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Joe Satriani - Surfing With The Alienvia
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