 MONTE
NEGRO – Cosmic Twins (Feed The Hungry Records)
Monte Negro blends a nice mix of eerie darkness with catchy
upbeat melodies within their new album Cosmic Twins.
With their Latin-based, dance-like drumbeats and active,
upbeat guitar work they remind me of a Spanish version of
Minus the Bear at times. I say a Spanish version considering
their vocals vary between Spanish and English lyrics from
track to track. Although the Spanish lyrics take some getting
used to for a native English-speaking listener, it can be
very refreshing to hear something different sung over instrumentals
that otherwise do not seem to have too strong of a Spanish
influence behind them. This also enables listeners to focus
on other aspects of the songs like their catchy vocal melodies,
diversely textured guitar riffs, and creative use of effects
rather than focusing primarily on lyrical content. Loaded
with big drum tones, guitar riffs soaked in reverb and delay,
and bass-lines layered with various distortions, Monte Negro
brings a lot of different textures to the table. Although
sometimes too many different sides of the band come to the
table, they sporadically jump from different genre sounds
on certain tracks. I feel the album is already too long
at an overflow of 14 tracks and the songs are not short
either. If their sound on Cosmic Twins was defined and streamlined
a bit, losing the “odd-ball” tracks, to create
a more consistent sound between tracks and leading to a
shorter album overall, the attention of listeners like you
and me would be caught and kept easier. Overall, I give
Monte Negro’s Cosmic Twins my respect; they definitely
have something to be proud of in this album. Recommended
for fans of Minus the Bear, Dredg, Closure in Moscow, etc.
– Chris Blatchly
 THE
FIENDZ - Commit To Memory (Black Pumpkin Records)
Only two weeks into 2011, and I think the album of the year
has already been released. It's been six years since Jerry
Jones, the man behind the name The Fiendz, had assembled a
band to record and release Redemption, an album that
was a statement of intent, a clarion call to New Jersey and
the world at large that they were back, and still a viable
entity. Truth to tell, however much I liked the album (and
I did,) it felt like "a piece". "A piece"
you ask? Yes. Let me digress: Redemption felt as
if it was only one part of a grand plan, akin to Frank Zappa's
fabled Project/Object, where everything the artist
does (the project) is a part of a larger whole (the object),
an immense design that the individual albums only represent
puzzle-like pieces to. What that "object" is can
be anything, at any time, for any reason at all (another Zappa-ism).
In the last twenty-plus years since We're The Fiendz
was released, it seemed as if Jerry and Co. were looking for
a way to put all of the pieces in their very own Project/Object
together. In Commit To Memory, everything that this
band, and more so Jerry himself, has grasped for, has come
to fruition. He has found all the parts, put them together,
and released an album so epic in scope, ambition, and feeling
that it should rightfully be required listening to anyone
that has a passion for music, not just rock and roll.
The parts, you ask? Let's start with what The Fiendz brought
to the table themselves: The soulful vocals from what I once
considered their crowning achievement (the original version
of WACT), the adventurous nature of Dreams,
the punk energy of We're The Fiendz, the intricate
riffage of Redemption all mixed together with a veritable
walk through all the best of what music has had to offer since
the Beach Boys begat Pet Sounds back in 1965.
Pet Sounds, you say? If you peel back the layers
(of which there seems to be an infinite amount, the kind of
thing that is manna from heaven for music nerds, geeks, and
journalists to wax upon for years to come) you'll find not
only the harmonies akin to the aforementioned gentlemen from
Hawthorne, California, but you'll hear Ramones-like speed
and accuracy, ELP-like keys, heavy riffage a la Iron Maiden,
intricate Zappa-esque interludes, a proclivity for different
instruments to express different moods in an Elvis Costello
manner (no one is going to confuse Armed Forces with
The Juliet Letters, but you still know it's Elvis.
Much like you're not going to confuse “Living Dead”
with “Giant”, but you still know it's The Fiendz
- the voice pulls it all together, no matter if a saxophone
is on the song, or a fuzzed-out guitar). The songs themselves
are some of the best ever written, by any band, let alone
comparing it to their past oeuvre.
In closing, to say this album is indispensable is doing it
a disservice: it's NECESSARY. You NEED to own this. This one
is going up on the shelf next to Pet Sounds, Rocket To
Russia, Tim, and Otis Live In Europe. A perfect
album, indeed.
Rating 20/10. Perfect. - Jay Mazeffect
JerseyBeat.com
is an independently published music fanzine
covering punk, alternative, ska, techno and garage
music, focusing on New Jersey and the Tri-State
area. For the past 25 years, the Jersey Beat music
fanzine has been the authority on the latest upcoming
bands and a resource for all those interested in
rock and roll.
|
|
|
|