Circle of Rage

Ah, yes!  Do you like post-Maiden-like guitar riffs, clearly articulated bass lines, occasional groovy breakdowns, active drums, and unusually melodic screaming vocals?  How about songs that speak to political alienation, government corruption, and the need for radical political and social change?  If any of the above, you are going to love what London’s loud and passionate hardcore band Circle of Rage (COR) has to offer.  I’ve been following these guys for awhile, admiring their commitment to making music that is accessible, heavy, and politically significant.  I am currently listening to their tune Unnatural Selection, which gets my already raging brain into a deeper tizzy.   Tommo is a tireless voice, literally and figuratively, that blows away most vocalists’ delivery of energy and profundity.  You can’t help but want to talk with him (which I have done, by the way) about social issues once you hear his vocal rage.  Mark, one of the the guitarists, shows tasty form and substance in this and most other COR tunes.  At times as I listen to his riffs I smile and think of a modern iteration of Glenn Tipton, Adrian Smith, and Dave Murray.  Not bad company!  This is not your typical double picking drop D mindless chord-playing hardcore punk guitarist – his sweet flashes and knack for nailing quick hammer-ons and pull offs are just enough to balance otherwise speedy and funky chords.  The rhythm guitar, bass, and drum work by Scott, Jackson and Xander move the feel of the songs along fantastically (although I’d like to hear wildly beaten open high hats a bit more).

Circle of Rage holds a special place in time and space.  Not many artists I know of can combine melody, heaviness, rhythmic diversity, and political consciousness as compellingly as COR.

Download Unnatural Selection here for free.

Visit their webpage for more music, exceptional videos, and other information on the band.

REBELFEST Volume 1: A Rebel Time Records Compilation

Want a really good Canadian punk compilation filled with progressive and radical leftist songs?  Want it for free?  You are in luck because the awesome Canadian label, Rebel Time Records, has recently released a burning and critical fifteen song album that has had regular rotation on my phone for months.  Rebel Time and their artists always fight the good fight, speak of things that most if not all of the major labels are afraid of, and is run by two awesome dudes.  You are not much of a left punk if you don’t at least give these tunes a listen.

My favorites on this album are Broadcast Zero’s On Freedom, The Decay’s Cigarette Burns, and The Rebel Spell’s It Can’t Just Be Me.    

Get any single or the whole album for free, no strings attached, right here: http://rebeltimerecords.bandcamp.com/album/rebelfest-vol-1

Also make sure to check out the expansive collection of music and merch at Rebel Time’s main website here: http://www.rebeltimerecords.com/

Various Hands, This Party Will Be Fun

Every once in awhile I step outside of the political punk genre for this blog and give some props to independent bands worth a mention.  This week I’ve been treated to two pre-release tunes by the Saint Louis band Various Hands. Their debut EP, This Party Will Be Fun, is being released in a month or so and I was lucky enough to get some advance singles. The tunes, especially Blackout Weekend, stir up my often hidden but still somewhat operational happy and fun sides. Vocalist Jeff Nations has a pleasant and sincere delivery with moments of impressive passion and energy.  The songwriting and musical performances are equally pleasurable.  I especially like the breakdowns, shifting melodies, and guitar parts. For me, the vibe of the songs bring forth a feeling of strolling around a beautiful park on a low humidity 80 degree summer day with the people I love smiling all around me.  Not much music moves me like that nowadays.  Various Hands has a certain happy go lucky aura without all the clichés that makes me want to listen to them more.  They really do deliver the goods.

Like them on facebook and/or check out their debut EP release party at Saint Louis’ The Firebird on November 26.  I just might be there, and I'd be willing to wager that I'd leave pretty happy.

Rise Against, Foo Fighters, and Mariachi El Bronx. Scottrade Center, Saint Louis, September 17, 2011.

An almost sold out Scottrade Center in Saint Louis was very loud for about four hours last night, especially during the almost three hour long set by headliner Foo Fighters.  It is true what they say:  The volume and quality of the mix improve pretty dramatically as you move from openers to headliners.  Mariachi El Bronx, the alter ego band of punk hardcore aficionados The Bronx, opened the night with a tight half- hour set of well written and upbeat tunes (although I think the references to Jesus is dead was lost on most of the crowd).  Throughout the set singer Matt Caughthran showed he has chops, which is no small feat for a hardcore singer.  He smiled, swooned, and left the impression that he couldn’t believe he was playing mariachi music in front of a couple thousand people.  The irony was not lost at all, but it didn’t take away from his presumably genuine delivery.  I did take offense to their suggestion that everyone was here to see the Foo Fighters.  More on that later.

Next was Rise Against, who absolutely killed it in their way too short of a set.  They delivered about nine songs spanning their last three albums, culminating with one of their top singles, Savior.  Lead singer Tim McIlrath was straight on with his vocals all night, as usual, and “lead” guitarist Zach Blair (poorly pictured above) was as animated as ever.  As with the first time I saw the band, drummer Brandon Barnes kept time nicely but is about the worst show person drummer I’ve seen.  He always looks bored, never makes eye contact with the crowd or his band members, and seemed like he needed a nap.  The mix sounded fuzzy for the last couple of songs, like the guitars were peaking out,  which was really disappointing.  Also disappointing is that Tim said nothing political, or even mildly controversial, other than how everyone loves the Foo Fighters (again, more on that below).  Rise Against’s radical left politics were probably lost on most people who listen to their somewhat top 40 friendly songs, and that is just a shame.  Maybe they are trying to code everything too much.

Headliners Foo Fighters emerged exactly at 9 p.m..  Armed with three guitars along with a keyboardist and the usual rock rhythm section, Grohl spastically and enthusiastically showed he loves his music perhaps more than anyone else.  Good for him.  He also took great pains to tell everyone how many songs the Foo Fighters have and how they could play about 120 of them.  Wow, impressive.  Any musical writer over the age of 20 has a hundred songs written.  Anyway, Grohl and his men plunged through several dozen songs representative of their past studio efforts.  The crowd was at times wild with energy at others times sort of confused, especially on some tracks from their new album and some b side tunes from years ago.  I was perplexed throughout the show, mostly because the Foo made about every other song into a boring Bachman Turner Overdrive sort of mess.  Here’s how it went:  Starting a song as the studio version was recorded, then cutting it in the middle, and then Grohl looking around for some support for a major musical tangent, then various cacophonies of substance less instrumental boredom.   None of those dudes are excellent musicians (especially the wildly overrated drummer Taylor Hawkins) – they should leave that hack kind of stuff to those that are. The funniest part of this show was the so-called dueling guitar event.  Grohl,  hamming it up to the tee for yet another hour, was at one end of the venue on a catwalk while another guitarist Chris Shiflett was at the other end.   They went back and forth in a series of pedestrian pentatonic hammer ons and pull offs any second year guitarist could do in her or his sleep.  The crowd went wild throughout all this, despite the fact they could have heard better soloing by musicians at local venues Lemmons and The Way Out Club that night.    And for like five bucks.    Dave Grohl likes his music, likes to ham it up, and likes to show off, even when he isn’t really doing anything.  These are not bad things, but when packaged with lyrics about nothing but his weird feelings (which are narcissistic and uninteresting) and super boring musical tangents reminiscent of old guys in a garage playing the 12 bar blues quite poorly, it is not a good combination.   

Blink 182 and My Chemical Romance, Saint Louis August 20, 2011.

I certainly hope people are not stupid enough to go to a Blink 182 show and expect much musicianship, tightness, maturity, and anything resembling on-pitch vocals.  Here’s what you should expect:  Travis Barker showing he is one of the most talented drummers around who is surrounded by mediocre talent.  Now, I am not sure if he is all that great in an objective sense, or if the clunkers and missed guitar notes along with the out of key vocals of his bandmates simply make him seem like a percussionist to admire.  Either way, I found myself locked in on Barker throughout the set.   He’s super active, dramatic, fill-ridden, creative, and always fast and busy.   

Mr. Hoppus surprised me throughout the night.  It’s pretty clear from most of Blink’s studio recordings that the guy is a baritone who has problems being on pitch.  That’s hard to believe in this day and age when correcting vocal notes in a studio is as easy as copying and pasting a sentence from a peer reviewed journal article to plagiarize into your college research paper.  Live, at least last night, Hoppus didn’t embarrass himself all that much.  He hit most of the notes, and even showed he could sing one note on two octave levels.  That’s pretty impressive for these guys.

Now, Mr. Tom.  This guy is the epitome of sloppy in every sense of the word.  His guitar playing is actually pretty insulting.  Clunked notes, missed timings, strange cut-outs, and some unfortunate spontaneity at the end of a few songs which stood out like a pimple on a baby’s bottom.  Vocally, he hit some correct notes, and many that were not.  He dropped octaves several times.  I am actually glad he did that:  an out of tune low E note sounds much better than a high one.  Yeah, treble always comes through more than bass.

The crowd seemed to love it all, though, and I got into the show as well.  Those dudes compose some catchy songs and do produce high energy riffs on occasion.    

Co-headliners My Chemical Romance put on a fairly tight set, and Gerard was pretty spot on the first half of the show.  Fatigue appeared to set in later as he was dropping octaves like crazy.  The mix was low on guitar, which sucked since those dudes are pretty decent on their six strings. 

Opening act Manchester Orchestra was intolerable.  Possibly the most boring set I have ever heard at a hard rock show.  The guitars were annoyingly high in midrange (a bandwidth I hate with a passion by the way). Lyrically, these guys are lame: everyone has feelings, and I didn’t really care about theirs.  Performing songs with boring feelings mixed in with boring tempos and ripped-off Zeppelin hooks should be a crime.  Judging by their reaction, the crowd would agree with me.

It Might Get Loud (but certainly not entertaining or meaningful)

A poorly executed rendition of Take a Load Off Annie ends this thing?  Seriously? Contrast it with the only good part of this movie, the beginning wherein Jack White puts together a nail string “guitar,”  plugs it in and wails with insane amounts of distortion with a slide.  In between, we see a lot of boring imagery pretending to be artsy and textured, find out The Edge is a talentless and self-conscious hack who covers all that up with millions of effects costing millions of dollars, that Jimmy Page is now about as nimble around the fretboard as Bonzo the Chimp, and that Jack White likes pretending that he is way cooler than he is.  I mean, this thing is a mess.  Nothing about songwriting at more than a superficial level, stock film footage of shows I’ve already seen dozens of clips from, and staged “jamming” that I could see better performed at an open mic night anywhere in the Saint Louis area.  If you idolize Page, The Edge, or White, by all means waste your time with this.  If you are a musician, forget this – it’ll make you mad that they are adored, famous, and rich.  If you are neither, you certainly won’t get this film.  What a disappointment.

It Might Get Loud (2009)

Directed by Davis Guggenheim

http://www.sonyclassics.com/itmightgetloud/

Not political, but whatever: New Blink 182 Single.

OK, so I am sick of trying to find political bands worth reviewing.  Therefore,  I am resorting to some commentary about the band I hate to love, Blink 182.  Full disclosure:  I have always loved Travis' creative and interesting drum patterns.  Most songs in Blink's catalog would completely suck without his active fills and smackage (you may already think all their songs suck anyway - go to hell then).   I feel the same way about Tom's vocal tone.  He can't sing worth a crap (just try to listen to any of his live performances:  It's just impossible), but there is something about his tone - perhaps the weird way he enunciates (sort of like a Brit from Sweden who has a slight speech disorder trying to order a hot dog in Finish).  Hoppus has always sucked on bass and his silly little baritone vocals are so laughable, but whatever. 

Their new single, Up All Night, is a messy little cliche of lyrical worthlessness.  This is true of all their songs, sure, but at least their previous sophomoric substantive content was pretty funny.  I mean, Enema of the State is one  of the best album titles ever, eh? You also can't tell me there have been many punk songs with a better title than Dysentery Gary.  Anyway, the new track starts sort of heavy but with annoying vibrato effects that presumably are setting us up for the  main song.  I have always hated long introductions to songs.  I have also always hated effects too.  Just play the notes.  No one cares about your phaser or vibrato pedal. They are not artsy, they are boring.

OK, so the rest of the song continues with some passable guitar riffage any 2nd month guitarist could play, a so-so breakdown, and a very predictable chorus.  Oh, and let's not forget the sort of decent pre-chorus.  You know, like the appetizers at Denny's that get you warmed up for stale and slightly suspicious "entrees." Just like everything on the radio, right?  Anyway, there are a few nice little tricks on this track that any real producer of mainstream music would love.  Drums silent, repeat instrumentation, add snare.  Repeat instrumentation, add double time drums, then change the riff and  repeat the percussion formula over again.  Not bad.  At least it is not the unbearable monotony of Social Distortion type songs.  Hey, Mike Ness is  cool, but when is he going to get a real  drummer?  Better off using a drum machine - at least it doesn't use heroin. And, hey, Blink 182 is not cool but at least they have a real drummer.  That's about all there is.  Oh, I'll be seeing them on tour this August.  How's that for a paradox? Listen to the song here: http://www.blink182.com/upallnight/