Tag: heavy metal

Album Of The Week – September 19, 2022

On By bigbadburchIn Album of the Week5 Comments

This week’s pick is a notable album from 1993 that marked a major lineup change for a long-running group as well as a shift in sound from their standard thrash to a more fit for the times alternative metal approach.

Anthrax – Sound Of White Noise

Released May 25, 1993 via Elektra Records

My Favorite Tracks – Only, This Is Not An Exit, Black Lodge

Anthrax had parted ways with longtime singer Joey Belladonna and replaced him with renowned Armored Saint singer John Bush. Bush’s visceral style fit the new songs well and put the band in prime position to remain afloat as thrash metal was falling out of public attention.

Anthrax did not sacrifice heaviness on this record but they did set the standard thrash formula aside for a more straightforward attack. While “grunge” influence is often spoke of when discussing the album, it seems more like just a very heavy metal album to me. I don’t really hear grunge on this. It fit the times but there was a lot more going on in metal than just people aping grunge back then.

This set runs at just under an hour with 11 tracks, so let’s jump right in to this beefy offering.

Potter’s Field

The blistering opener presents the view of a person mad at his mother for having been born, the troubled guy would have rather been aborted than left to live his crappy life. The song is a harsh, straightforward pummeling through the angry rant towards the mother. John Bush’s raspy and powerful delivery enhances the sharp sting of the lyrical content.

Only

The album’s lead single also serves as its most-known track and one of the highlights of the Bush Anthrax era. The song gets into dealing with someone who is clearly batshit crazy.

Only was a calling card for the new era of Anthrax right out of the gate. It saw consistent MTV play and has gone on to be widely considered the top track from this period of the band. It is also the only “Bushthrax” song that Joey Belladonna has performed after returning to the group.

Room For One More

This is something about a person seeking to use someone with a checkered past for something probably not good. The subject matter of these songs is far beyond the typical thrash offerings and suits the higher intellectual period of the early ’90’s very well.

Packaged Rebellion

A look at how the concept of rebellion was commercialized and put on display as a scene rather than an actual revolutionary movement. A very fitting song that strikes at the heart of music and culture of the time period. Rebellion was sold to the alternative crowd and was bought up just like food on a buffet line.

Hy Pro Glo

This is some kind of “callout” song that doesn’t specifically offer what or who it’s getting into. Many of the songs on the album have lyrical fare that keeps a certain distance and fits the music well yet doesn’t offer an open, literal interpretation that’s easy to digest.

Invisible

Another sort of “you suck” song, this one deals with the friend who is never around in times of need. This one’s meaning is easier to pick up on than some of the others.

1000 Points Of Hate

A title twisted from the famous “1000 points of light” phrase that George Bush the Elder uttered as president. The album’s most aggressive track, this one spells its points out clearly and is a true beating of a song.

Black Lodge

A dark, plodding “ballad” of sorts that was inspired by the Twin Peaks TV show, this was issued as a single and stands apart from the pounding that the rest of the album delivers. It deals with a person living with some kind of demons that aren’t spelled out – it could be mental illness, drug addiction, perhaps even terminal illness. The song is a well-crafted and creepy tune that uses John Bush’s voice to highlight the plight at hand.

Sodium Pentothal

The track listing spells out the actual chemical formula for this compound, I am not attempting to type that out or even copy and paste it into my document and declare war on my formatting. The drug has been used in lethal injection executions but also saw some limited use as a “truth serum,” and that is its application in the song.

Burst

Another pounding of a song that gets into how opinions are just that and really don’t hold much meaning when put up against each other. Sadly a lesson unlearned as the years have gone on.

This Is Not An Exit

The album closes with this extended number that gets back into the creepy vibe explored on Black Lodge. The song deals with the idea of immorality and the mental toll that living forever would actually have on a mortal being.

Sound Of White Noise would be a highlight album for Anthrax. It charted at 7 on Billboard, the band’s highest position. It went gold in the US and Canada and the singles Only and Black Lodge landed in the Top 40. The album received well among critics and it is often featured toward the top of lists of fan rankings.

It was a gamble to reinvent musically and also part with the groups signature singer in Joey Belladonna, but the gamble paid off as Anthrax entered the revamped ’90’s metal scene with a relevant sound and approach. Future albums with Bush would not see the same fanfare, though some highlights are around.

Anthrax would go through some silliness with vocalists for awhile before eventually reuniting with Belladonna and joining the Big 4 of Thrash tours. And while the signature Anthrax era will always be Joey and records like Spreading The Disease and Among The Living, there is no doubt that Sound Of White Noise and John Bush left a huge mark on the band’s career.

Incantation – Deliverance Of Horrific Prophecies

On By bigbadburchIn collecting1 Comment

Today’s single is a relic, both of my collection of the death metal renaissance of the early 1990’s. I originally purchased this record via mail order in 1992 or ’93, not sure exactly. And it’s in my collection today, though it spent a very long time not in the collection. It’s a story I’ll tell after getting into the songs.

Incantation are a US East Coast death metal band, having been at it since 1989. While never a chart-topping act with radio play, they have had a huge influence across the extreme metal scene with their blend of death and doom elements. Their 1992 debut Onward To Golgotha is hailed 30 years later as a classic of death metal and it’s the album from which the songs on this 7 inch single are drawn.

There’s no need for me to get to long-winded about the songs. I’ll post them both here. The A-side is the title track and the B-side is Profanation, both songs are from Onward To Golgotha. The single was released in 1991 before the full length came along in 1992. Both of these are prime cuts of what’s known as “cavernous” death metal, like the kind of shit you’d hear if you were locked in a medieval dungeon.

I originally came into this record in 1992 (I think…), it was a part of my very first mail order of underground metal stuff. I got the record and the full-length album on tape, as well as the first album and another 7 inch single of Amorphis. I was pretty stoked to have this kind of stuff in my collection, there was only one other person in my pissant little hometown who was into this kind of music.

Fast forward a few years and I shipped off to the Navy. In fact I was in Europe for a bit over three years. My music collection, including all of this, sat at my mom’s house and survived a move (thankfully just a few miles away). I got back from the Navy and reintegrated my old crap, including this single, into my existence.

A few years after that in what I think was 2002, I met a friend who was very, very into metal in all its forms. He and I are very good friends to this day, in fact. I mentioned having this single as well as the Amorphis record and he was interested in buying them. Given that I didn’t really care about them at the time and was also pretty hard up for money, I cut the deal.

Now on to late 2006 – we went a few hours away to an Incantation show on Black Friday (the day after US Thanksgiving for those unfamiliar). My buddy took this record with him and Incantation mainstay John McEntee signed the cover for him. There was also a newer 7 inch single running around at that time that John also signed for my friend and which is now also in my collection, we’ll get to that in a few weeks.

Fast forward to, uh, 2019 or maybe even 2020, or hell 2021, I don’t recall exactly. I think it was 2020 but I don’t know, the hell with remembering stuff. Anyway – my buddy and I were doing as we often do on Friday nights, drinking beer and listening to metal. We were shooting the shit about the price of records and we wound up going through his 7 inch singles collection to see what the prices of things were. Well, it turns out the Discogs median on this Incantation record was pushing $50, as was the 2006 single he’d bought at the show.

So, after slamming a few more beers and discussing a price that was fair and saw my pal rake in a tidy little profit but also kept me from having to shell out median prices, I am once again the owner of my old single as well as the other one. The stuff you’ll do after a few beers, that could be a blog all its own.

And that is the story of this single, which is kind of beat to hell but still playable and very nice to have, as I honestly don’t have much stuff now that I did in my childhood.

A Perfect Circle – Judith

On By bigbadburchIn S-Tier Songs1 Comment

This post was part of a series that I called S-Tier Songs. I later decided to abandon the series in favor of a simpler Song of the Week format. I am keeping these posts as I wrote them but removing the old page that linked to the list of S-Tier Songs, so that is why these posts might look a bit odd. Enjoy.

Today I visit a song from 2000. Not a hotbed year of music, at least what I and many others who read this listen to. But this band and this song would rise up from the muck and gain widespread notice, becoming a hit single in the mire of post-Woodstock ’99 fatigue and a beacon for the way for alt-metal to go forward. It only helps that the song involves highly charged personal affairs and features the lead singer of alt-metal’s biggest band.

A Perfect Circle – Judith

To begin with, a Cliffnotes version of the formation of A Perfect Circle – guitarist Billy Howerdel had been a guitar tech with Nine Inch Nails and Tool, among others. The latter band is very important, as Tool singer Maynard James Keenan would offer Billy a place to crash in L.A. After Maynard heard Billy’s demos, Maynard offered to sing on them.

Billy Howerdel wanted singer Elizabeth Fraser of the Cocteau Twins to sing on it originally, but was rebuffed and Maynard sang on the demos. The pair assembled a band and got a record deal, signing with a group apart from Tool’s label so that the band would be taken seriously as its own entity.

Well, no problem there.

A Perfect Circle would hit well on the early millennium, with the debut album Mer De Noms debuing on Billboard at number 4 and hitting platinum before year’s end. The band hit on the charts and also toured extensively, initially opening for Nine Inch Nails in the summer of 2000 – a show I caught and detailed here.

It was fairly quick success for APC, and it wasn’t entirely because the singer of Tool was involved. There was a rich, deep song composition to the band and that was evident on the lead single, which is the song we’re discussing today.

Judith hits with a monster riff that isn’t something that could be easily replicated by a band, rock or metal, that I know of. It’s not “complex” in the vein of Dream Theater or Yngwie, but it’s something not of our usual world and gets set apart. This song, for all its lyrical complexities, is a banger. This throws down and slams, and goes very mainstream in a weird 2000’s world where we’re still trying to define the new rules.

And then there is the lyrical content. This is a highly charged, personal song for Maynard James Keenan. The song bears the name of his mother, Judith Marie Keenan. It is directly influenced by her, but not in a way that would be considered a fitting tribute by many (don’t worry, that’s to come)

Judith Marie Keenan suffered a stroke when Maynard was roughly 11, and would live in a debilitated state until her death in 2003. Her devotion to the church through her life and the backbiting talk of members of her church would inspire Maynard’s lyrics for this song.

And the song is not, in any terms, kind to the Christian institution. While “shock rock” had been played out by 2000 and “shock rapper” Eminem was rising to superstardom at this time, it was a different scene to have such a blasphemous song so blunt and upfront on record. Lyrics like “fuck your god” weren’t reserved for much of rock, beyond a bit Nine Inch Nails used on a secondary track on The Downward Spiral in 1994. But A Perfect Circle would slot right in to a very weird early 2000’s MTV and radio scene and score a big hit that charted well in the US and abroad.

But the song is far more personal than just a rant at religious institutions. Judith was struck down by a stroke, left to linger for 10,000 days in a paralyzed state. The song bearing her name takes aim at the gods she deifies, who Maynard holds responsible for her state. The song is really a question, why are you venerating this deity that left you in this position for damn near 30 years?

The combination of complex riffing and instrumentation, as well as the massively charged personal lyrics, mark this song as a dark highlight of the year 2000. It would be a herald for more to come from the band, as 3 Libras would also chart well and The Hollow would be one of the best songs anyone has heard from whatever scene, ever. APC’s second album would bring The Outsider, another banger and very strong performing track.

But Judith was the lead that brought us to the dance, and its mix of uncategorized banging and personally-fueled lyrics were what put the band on the map in the first place, and also separated the work from Maynard’s main gig in Tool. It was a messed up hit single to have, but it worked in the time and place. It gave fuel to a fire no one really saw coming, that was a mesh of an unheralded talent and a known singer that had something else to say.

Why is this an S-Tier song?

The combined simple, headbanging qualities of the track along with its more complex underpinnings make this a worthwhile endeavor on its own. Combine it with some very, very personal lyrics that transcend the typical fare of rock and metal hit-making, and you have a song that sticks out like sore thumb among the rest of what the hell ever we were doing in 2000.

And, as shitty as it is that it resulted in the death of Judith Marie, we get a spiritual sequel to this song next week. Maynard logged time at his day job to pay homage to his since-departed mother a few years later. He doesn’t like talking about it (understandable), but I’m not going to let that masterpiece of a song go.

Upcoming Releases – Labor Daze

On By bigbadburchIn Upcoming Music5 Comments

I’ve been up against it on posts lately, but the old reliable upcoming releases rises again. We are about to enter a holiday in the US, which I actually don’t have off. I’ll get paid handsomely for my time so it’s all good. I might even buy records with my excess money. Or, with the price of vinyl these days, I might buy record. We’ll see.

Anyway, there is some cool stuff lined up and some of it is straight out of a shotgun and coming out very soon, so let’s get into it.

Clutch – Slaughter Beach

I remember being “in” on Clutch in the beginning, which I guess was around 1993 and their full length debut Transnational Speedway League. They have always been a different and interesting proposition, and now here we all all these years later with the quasi-title track to their 13th studio album Sunrise On Slaughter Beach, due just around the corner on September 16.

This is a very accessible version of Clutch, who I think are one of time’s less heralded and, dare I say, underrated bands. I very much like what I’m hearing here and will be on the lookout for the new album just a stone’s throw away. The second half of the year is picking up steam in a big way.

Nita Strauss – Summer Storm

The badass shredder, apparently having stepped away (but now down) from Alice Cooper and linking up with Demi Lovato, has released a new instrumental song. Nita has a 2018 solo album but this new single does not offer any new album info, at least at this time.

This song is straight fire, it’s a monster guitar track and a showcase of someone who knows how to fly on the frets but also compose a listenable song. Whatever is going on, I’ll assume a full solo album would be a 2023 release, Nita nails everything here. A fantastic tune.

Autopsy – Skin By Skin

In 2022, many of the masters of death metal have departed or gone on to other things. Autopsy, who gave up in the mid 90’s when shit got bad then came back to us in the 2010’s, are back in the new decade. Also I just talked about them a bit yesterday.

This is a lead single from their upcoming album Morbidity Triumphant, due on the 30th of this month. This is a total banger band for me and I’ll be totally at attention when this hits.

Ellefson/Soto – Vacation In The Underworld

Here is the title track from the long-awaited collaboration between Jeff Scott Soto and Dave Ellefson. The project was in the works for a long time but got delayed in the wake of Ellefson’s scandal and dismissal from Megadeth last year. The album sees the light of day on October 7.

The song is suitably heavy, this project seemed destined to shade that direction. I’m curious to see if we get more of a “grab bag” of songs and styles or if the album has a more unified focus, press material leads me to think it’ll be the first one. Not long before we find out.

Witch Fever – I Saw You Dancing

This band is totally new to me, I found them a bit ago when this song and video released and came across my radar. The group have been working out of England for roughly five years now and are about to release their full-length debut Congregation, out October 21.

The band have been described as coming from the punk scene, but this song is total doom/noise and also totally amazing. Their earlier singles do seem more punk in nature but still backed with a massive fuzz in the riffs. At any rate, this awesome song and very well done video accompany the new album that is now very much on my want list.


That does it for this shorter but still impactful list. I feel like I forgot something but quick scans of music sites don’t seem to offer anything. Still no word on Kerry King’s post-Slayer project yet, I expect something in the near future with the information that’s been trickling out the past few months. Maybe next time.

Autopsy – Horrific Obsession

On By bigbadburchIn collecting1 Comment

Today’s single is from one of the heaviest bands in the world and is a very interesting prospect – the group had split 14 years before the single’s release. The single marked the return of a death metal institution, with the band still going today.

Autopsy were an early force on the death metal scene and released two classics of the genre with Severed Survival and Mental Funeral. The band split up in 1995 after poorly organized tours and the grim prospect of death metal not paying the bills. While drummer Chris Reifert and guitarist Danny Coralles ended Autopsy, they took a side project called Abscess and focused on it for several years.

In 2008, news came out that Autopsy were recording new songs to offer as bonus tracks for a deluxe reissue of Severed Survival. Those songs would be on a second disc of the reissue but were also made available on their own in the form of this 7 inch single.

Autopsy would go on to tour again and release new music in the 2010’s and once again become a significant force in death metal. But for today we’ll focus on the two track single from 2009.

Horrific Obsession

The return of Autopsy is hailed with a fitting tune about grave robbing. Not taking material items from graves as grave robbing is generally concerned, but the bodies themselves. This is death metal, after all, this won’t be a treatise on economic relations in the 1800’s. The band keep a doom-laden tempo for much of the song but let it rip a time or two, almost as if easing back into the brutality.

Feast Of The Graveworm

Another simple premise here – a person is killed and their body left to rot. The graveworm, or maggot, comes to get its fill. The song is short, noisy and brutal – just how Autopsy is supposed to be.

That’s about all for the single. Nothing rare or anything here, both songs have been readily available on a few different releases over the years. Autopsy themselves are still running strong and are preparing to release new music this fall.

Bruce Dickinson – Tears Of The Dragon

On By bigbadburchIn S-Tier Songs2 Comments

This post was part of a series that I called S-Tier Songs. I later decided to abandon the series in favor of a simpler Song of the Week format. I am keeping these posts as I wrote them but removing the old page that linked to the list of S-Tier Songs, so that is why these posts might look a bit odd. Enjoy.

Bruce Dickinson – Tears Of The Dragon

Today’s song is from Bruce’s second solo album Balls To Picasso. It was also Bruce’s first album after his infamous exit from Iron Maiden in 1993. Bruce had made a few attempts to start the record with other bands and producers, but he scrapped those efforts and hooked up with Roy Z and Tribe Of Gypsies. That band would back Bruce on this effort and the partnership with Roy Z would yield great results over the ensuing years.

Tears Of The Dragon is generally viewed as the best song from Balls To Picasso. The song has over 40 million streams on Spotify, which basically obliterates the totals from any other Dickinson solo tune. While none of the solo catalog did massive numbers sales-wise and The Chemical Wedding is widely hailed as a masterpiece, it is Tears Of The Dragon that is the first song recalled when talking about Bruce’s solo career.

Our song today is not a blazing metal scorcher. It would fit quasi-ballad territory – the song opens with soft, somber verses that build to a powerful chorus suiting The Human Air Raid Siren’s voice. It is replete with the standard fare you’ll find in any good hard rock/metal song, including a fast-paced solo and also a jazzy sort of interlude that, well, I guess you don’t find in every hard rock or metal song. And yeah, the very first time I heard the song I was really thrown off, but I’ve gotten used to the bit and now I can’t imagine the song without it.

Lyrically the song deals with the idea of overcoming one’s fears to “throw myself into the sea” and see what happens. The song revolves around Bruce’s decision to leave Iron Maiden and throw himself into the sea, to experience what else might be out there that he was missing. I can’t readily access the source material for this, but Bruce gave the info in an interview with Rolling Stone when he was promoting his biography in 2017. It was a huge gamble to cast off from Iron Maiden and go at it alone. And while it might not have been a lucrative prospect, in the end Bruce does have an acclaimed solo catalog from his endeavors.

And the song’s greatest strength is that it wasn’t specifically couched in the terms of him leaving Maiden – it was a song for anyone who was unsure about a course in life, who needed that push to go ahead and jump into the sea of doubt. I think music in general will grab people at places and times, be the right song in the right place for someone. That much doesn’t consider genre or form – people have benefited from a song bringing the right message at the right time.

But I think we know rock and metal have long been the refuge of the loner, the doubter, the unsure of foot. And Tears Of The Dragon is a call to anyone feeling those kind of emotions – metal is often at its best when it appeals to the outcasts, and this is a song for those on the margins that need a push for that motivation to succeed and overcome when the odds aren’t good or even known.

It’s the overriding reason why many of us chose this kind of music as our own. We didn’t fit, we didn’t like the same things as those around us, or whatever it was, we faced life with doubt and trepidation. It was shit like this that got many of us over the hump, just as this song did when I was just before the age of 17 in 1994.

While life wasn’t exactly great for Iron Maiden-Bruce Dickinson-hard rock and heavy metal fans in 1994, we still found our own way. And a fair bit of that had to do with the mainstays like Bruce offering viable product, updating with the times yet still staying the course. It would only come to pass years later that staying the course was the true line to walk, even in the turmoil of the early 90’s, and the greater turmoil of the years beyond.

Why is this an S-Tier song?

Tears Of The Dragon is a magnificent ballad of conquering self-doubt that offered its artist an early signature hit in a period of great uncertainty. While charts and sales figures weren’t entirely kind to Bruce’s solo efforts, the talk of the time and also the retrospective analysis paints his work away from Maiden in a fantastic light, and Tears is one of the main calling cards for his time in the 1990’s wilderness. It’s a song about conquering fears and embracing the unknown, which Bruce did by word and deed in a period where many thought rock and metal as we knew it was lost forever. Yet, by simply executing what he knew, we would be led back to a new legacy we couldn’t even begin to imagine.

You might recognize the guitarist here

Album Of The Week – August 15, 2022

On By bigbadburchIn Album of the Week9 Comments

This week I want to have a look at an album that was commercially successful, has some divided fan opinion though is generally looked on fondly, but is completely disavowed by the artist.

Ozzy Osbourne – The Ultimate Sin

Released February 22, 1986 via Epic Records

My Favorite Tracks – Lightning Strikes, The Ultimate Sin, Shot In The Dark

Ozzy’s fourth album saw the return of Jake E. Lee to the guitar spot for his second and final work with Osbourne. Bob Daisley was out of the band for this one (at least the recording), replaced by Phil Soussan on bass. And Randy Castillo would join the group on drums, a position he would hold up until the mid ’90’s.

Of course the personnel and especially writing credits are murky for this album, as they often are in the shadowy world of Osbourne rights and finances. Bob Daisley did extensive work on this album before splitting from the band when Ozzy took time to prepare for a one-off Black Sabbath reunion in 1985. Drummer Jimmy DeGrasso was also involved in the early sessions, though he too would leave for Y&T and later Megadeth. Daisley was omitted from credit on the initial presses of the album but his contributions were noted on later pressings.

The controversy over writing credits would lead to issues down the line and are the true likely reason this album is slagged by the Osbourne camp, but we’ll get to those issues after running through the songs. 9 tracks at 40 minutes to go through here.

The Ultimate Sin

The title track opens the record with some super sick riffing from Lee, one could be forgiven for thinking that Ozzy’s next guitarist was the one shredding on this. Ozzy and sin go together like peanut butter and jelly and this song works exceptionally well.

Secret Loser

Another rocking track that offers up pretty much what the title says – Ozzy looks cool and all but is really a loser, or whatever. It’s probably something like that but honestly it’s not that deep and is a really nice song.

Never Know Why

Enough of the “inner loser” thing, here Ozzy and company are back out to rock. The detractor, of which Ozzy had many around this time, will never know why we rock. It’s not hard to figure out – just listen, how could you not rock?

Thank God For The Bomb

The pace comes up a bit for this song that is far less nihilistic than the title suggests. Here Ozzy is offering that the threat of mutually assured destruction is keeping nuclear annihilation from happening. It is not a “pro-nuke” song like, well, the 100 million pro-nuke metal songs out there.

Never

A tune about fate, the great mysteries of life, the various beliefs people hold about all that, and so on. Ozzy offers a pretty fatalistic and down to earth approach to the song. Lee’s guitar gets to go off a bit more here than on other tracks too.

Lightning Strikes

A listener could find that the songs on this album, while quality, aren’t necessarily holding up to the sterling reputation of Ozzy’s past work. Here we have an entry that fits the more melodic sound of this record but also puts itself out there as the star of the show. This track is Jake Lee-era Ozzy at their best. They turned stuff up to 11 and slammed this one home.

Killer Of Giants

Another song about the bomb but this time a mournful account of the sheer power and potentially apocalyptic consequences of nuclear warfare. It could be called a ballad but it doesn’t stray into the saccharine territory that other ballads of the period got into, the song holds its place with the harder rockers on this album.

Fool Like You

A pretty simple one, Ozzy is having a go at someone he doesn’t like. No idea if it’s personal or if it’s aimed at one of society’s adversaries.

Shot In The Dark

The album closes with the home run track that was the signature hit. It is also a pre-existing song offered up to Ozzy by bassist Phil Soussan, which is likely a massive contributing factor to the song and this album being disowned by the Osbourne camp.

The song is a total winner, a very somber yet still rocking track that fits 1986 Ozzy like a glove. The song became Ozzy’s most successful single at the time and is a long-cited fan favorite from across his entire catalog.

Shot In The Dark also might as well not exist in the Osbourne version of history. It has generally been left off of greatest hits collections and was replaced later on the one it did show up on. It is on the 1993 live album Live And Loud, so something must have happened later on to dissuade Ozzy and his handlers from messing with the song anymore. It is presumably arguments over the actual songwriting credits, as Phil Soussan’s prior bandmates had worked up the original version of the song. There are enough shady dealings in Ozzy’s writing credits history to fill a book, so I would have to guess that the actual origins of Shot In The Dark keep it out of Ozzy’s lexicon.

The Ultimate Sin was a smash success for Ozzy. The album charted well in many countries and hit platinum in the United States within a few months of release. And for a number of reasons not entirely clear to the public, the album is persona non grata as far as its creator is concerned.

Ozzy has been on record with his criticisms of the album – they involve the production of Ron Nevison. Ozzy felt that the songs all “sounded the same” and that the recording could have gone better.

And in that I think Ozzy is right – there is a samey quality to many of the songs. A few do stand out, like Lightning Strikes and Shot In The Dark, but the presentation of the record as a whole could be called a bit sterile. I do think it’s a fair take.

But in the end I have to believe that the overriding issues are that of writing credits. No legal issues have ever presented themselves regarding Shot In The Dark, though obvious matters of uncredited writers are there. And even outside of that one, this album was written mostly by Bob Daisley and Jake Lee while Ozzy was away. Lee was fired after the tour cycle for this album in a shocking decision, while Daisley has long had legal issues with the Osbourne team over his contributions to several records.

It’s no secret that Sharon Osbourne has spent a great deal of time and energy in consolidating the rights to all of Ozzy’s music. She secured control of the Black Sabbath catalog from Tony Iommi and has ruled over that with an iron fist, and the buffet of issues surrounding Ozzy’s solo work make for juicy gossip any time they’re aired out in public. Bob Daisley, Jake Lee, and Lee Kerslake are the more prominent members of the “I wrote a song for Ozzy and all I got was this lousy t-shirt” club. Sharon’s battle to control Ozzy’s catalog credits has been long-ranging and largely successful, though with gross missteps along the way, like the ill-suited idea to re-record parts of classic albums in 2002 to remove Daisley and Kerslake.

One casualty of that battle is The Ultimate Sin. The album hasn’t been reissued since 1995, leaving collectors to scramble for original editions, especially on vinyl. If the album is mentioned by Sharon at all, it is with venom and spite. The album was even deleted from the Ozzy catalog in the early 2000’s, but curiously was submitted for streaming services once they became a thing. I guess money is money after all.

Whatever the issues held by creators and rights-holders, The Ultimate Sin is still an excellent statement from Ozzy that slotted very well into the sound of the latter 1980’s. Even with noted production faults, the album still delivered a quality selection of songs. And no matter the attempts to erase history, it’s an album that can’t and shouldn’t be ignored by anyone seeking quality music.

Tales From The Stage – Crowbar and Spirit Adrift

On By bigbadburchIn live music6 Comments

Back on Tuesday, July 26th, I took in what was – uh, I guess it’s actually my first metal show since the pandemic. Probably since some time in 2019. Some kind of metalhead I am, right?

Anyway, so I drug my poser ass out to a show. There was no way to ignore this one – Louisiana sludge legends Crowbar were in town and they brought one of doom metal’s hottest current names with them, Spirit Adrift from Texas.

I was all about the show when it was announced, but then the realization set in – it’s a weekday show and I’m in my mid-40’s. It wouldn’t have phased me in my 20’s or even 30’s, but dammit I’m old and cranky and need my sleep. Yes, yes, I know that people older than I do the road warrior shit for shows to much further extremes than me going to a place that’s honestly 2 miles away from my house, but that didn’t stop that weariness and dread from setting in a few hours before the show.

But alas, I manned up and went to the show. Two local acts played – being unable to tell time, I missed the first one. The one I did catch was named Martyaloka, they are a newer act local to Springfield and this was my first exposure to them. They do a very noisy and nasty take on death metal with sludge-like riffs that were very much at home at a Crowbar show. I haven’t been in touch with the local metal scene since the pandemic hit and tore everything apart, I’ll have to keep an ear out for these guys in the future.

It was straight into Spirit Adrift after a quick line change. It does amaze me how quickly even small clubs execute their gear changes now – back in decades past it could take eons for gear to get swapped on stage, now it’s like a Formula One pit crew.

Anyway, Spirit Adrift are a band I’ve been jamming out to the past year or so and I was really excited to see their name on this tour. While plying their trade in doom, this isn’t the slow and downtrodden “everything sucks” kind of doom. Instead it’s a riff-filled journey that hits the right groove and translates very, very well to a live stage.

Spirit Adrift played a great set from songs pulled from their four studio albums and handful of EP’s. There was no “big hit” or anything like that, the group is very consistent and the set was killer from start to finish. The band got their set in despite time running a hair long, but we’re talking a matter of minutes, no Axl Rose drama here to delay anything for hours.

Below is a full set video from a SA performance earlier in the year. I haven’t found any suitable video from this specific tour.

After Spirit Adrift it was on to the main event. Crowbar are celebrating over three decades in existence and continue to pound eardrums with their heavy-as-hell sludge and doom. While never “famous,” Crowbar is known the world over as masters of the metal scene and they retain a solid fanbase after all these years plugging away from coast to coast.

To anyone’s knowledge, Crowbar had never played in Springfield before the show a few weeks back. Kirk Windstein had been through town as a member of Down, but this was the first time Crowbar had been booked here.

Crowbar ran through a career-spanning set, including stuff from their latest album, 2022’s Zero And Below. They are at that point where they have to make some choices, having 12 studio albums to construct a set from.

The band ran through tunes old and new in the death-dealing heat of southwest Missouri in late July. It was stupid hot, both inside and out. I had to duck out once or twice to catch some air but thankfully I remained upright for the set’s duration. Even Louisiana native Kirk Windstein commented on the heat, and it’s something he’s probably used to.

It was a great show from Crowbar and one that the crowd ate up. I’ve noted a lack of energy and movement from Missouri concert crowds over the decades, but the lot at the Crowbar show that night was into it and having a good time. It’s pretty easy stuff to get into when you can literally feel the riffs pounding through you.

Seeing Crowbar and Spirit Adrift was a great way to get back into the show scene, something sorely lacking from life since COVID changed all the rules two years back. (And no, despite being in a small room with a lot of people, I or no one I know fell ill to it or anything else). I might not have caught a ton of sleep that night, but hey, sacrifice is what life is all about. We don’t get a ton of shows our way these days, or at least stuff I’d like to see, so having this one was pretty awesome.

Here is a performance from Crowbar on the next night of the same tour.

Voivod and At The Gates – We Are Connected/Language Of The Dead

On By bigbadburchIn collecting2 Comments

Today’s single is another split release. It features two bands both well-known and heralded in metal’s lexicon, though in different aspects. Both bands were labelmates with Century Media Records in 2015 and that is the likely reason for this single being in existence. (Both still are with CM, as far as I can tell). One band is a Canadian group revered for their strange yet masterful takes on music, while the other group is a Swedish outfit hailed as a pioneer on the melodic death metal front.

The single was released in three versions – 1,000 copies on black vinyl, 500 on white and 500 on red. Red is what I went for, and now trivia time – red is my favorite color. If you press a record on red, I will go for it. Overall I’m cool with whatever vinyl colors and I dig the wide variety of stuff available, but just like Sammy Hagar, I’m gonna go for red when it’s out there.

I pre-ordered this when news of the split first came down and I’ve had it since release. Slapping At The Gates on a record is a sure-fire way to get me to buy it.

Voivod – We Are Connected

This 2015 song was initially a standalone release. The song would appear a year later on the EP Post Society. Voivod has also aired the song out live.

I won’t even bother trying to describe what Voivod sounds like. It is a useless task and words, especially mine, won’t do any justice to Voivod’s music. They are one of the most unique entities in metal and really all of music.

We Are Connected is a nice jam that extends over seven minutes, not a common runtime on the 7-inch/45 release format. It is weird, in keeping with the band’s traditions, but yet this one doesn’t go to any really challenging places and can be taken in without a ton of effort. There’s a bit to chew on and digest here but it’s a well-presented package.

At The Gates – Language Of The Dead

This song from the Swedish death metal legends was originally available a year prior to this single, as a bonus track on a deluxe version of their 2014 comeback album At War With Reality. It was the band’s first album since 1995, the juggernaut Slaughter Of The Soul that still casts a large shadow over metal to this day.

Language Of The Dead is the case of a bonus track song that people ask “why the hell was this a bonus track?” I mean, don’t get me wrong – I love At War With Reality. Hearing ATG be able to record viable music decades after their moonshot album was a thrill.

But this song is just absolutely great. It has the old-school feel that calls back to the band’s glory days while still sounding fresh and new. I don’t know how or why bands and labels choose songs to be on a record or to be cast aside for bonus material, but I agree with many others that the song could have easily slotted on to the album.

But hey, it doesn’t matter. I have the album and I have this single also, it’s all there. The two bands seem an unlikely pairing but both are revered in many circles and the end result works very, very well. This is one split that offers something a bit more than the sum of its parts, even if it was born of the convenience of having both bands on the same label.

Motörhead – Ace Of Spades (the song)

On By bigbadburchIn S-Tier Songs4 Comments

This post was part of a series that I called S-Tier Songs. I later decided to abandon the series in favor of a simpler Song of the Week format. I am keeping these posts as I wrote them but removing the old page that linked to the list of S-Tier Songs, so that is why these posts might look a bit odd. Enjoy.

Motörhead – Ace Of Spades

This homage to gambling would not just serve as a band’s hit, it would become the signature song associated with one of heavy metal’s most influential acts. Motörhead would not find massive commercial success, but after decades of recording and tearing up the pavement all the world over, they would become a stud in the crown of metal music.

Ace Of Spades was a single release a month ahead of the band’s fourth album of the same name. The song got noticed and hung out on the UK charts for a few months, it would also receive a UK gold certification for sales in excess of 400,000. The album Ace Of Spades would chart modestly well throughout Europe and also go gold in the United Kingdom for sales over 100,000.

And those fairly modest sales figures would be one of the biggest commercial successes of the band’s 28-year career. Motörhead were never a super popular or financially successful act, yet they endure as one of the heavyweights of the metal genre. Bassist and vocalist Lemmy Kilmister, praised in many circles as God, would make far more money writing songs for Ozzy Osbourne than for his own band.

Yet, when all comes due, it is Lemmy’s vehicle Motörhead that remains as a bastion of heavy music.

And even among the “great unwashed” who aren’t radically familiar with the music of Motörhead, it’s a damn safe bet that a lot of people have heard this song. It’s known far and wide as one of heavy metal’s greatest tunes.

The song is pretty simple in its premise – it is a buzzsaw, but with enough subtlety to distinguish it from the later-to-come death and black metal. It embodies rock, punk, speed and thrash, the latter two terms not even yet existing when it was released in 1980. Motörhead were already an edgy gambit in the few years leading up to this release – this song would cement a young legacy.

The tale of the song’s construction is fairly simple, and told in great detail in this 2017 article by Louder Sound. Drummer Phil “Philthy Animal” Taylor and guitarist “Fast” Eddie Clark were jacking around in the studio with producer Vic Maile, who was familiar with Lemmy from the latter’s time in Hawkwind. A series of riffs had been thrown around and the band worked them up while Lemmy was out on the prowl.

The lyrics would come from Lemmy later – he truly just slammed a bunch of gambling references together. It might have been in the back of a van while speeding along a freeway as he recalls, or it might have been on the shitter, as Phil Taylor would guess. Either way, the band had their title track down.

And in the wake, one of heavy metal’s immortal songs was born. Again, there is no mentioning Motörhead without Ace Of Spades. And there isn’t a lot of what we call heavy metal without Motörhead – everyone was influenced by the speedy, punkish outfit. This blend of nasty, noisy rock would give way to thrash in just a few year’s time, and by the end of the 1980’s, extreme metal was well on its way to being more than just a footnote in history. And much of all this noise owes its presence to Motörhead and principally Ace Of Spades.

It’s fair to say that this is Motörhead’s most famous song. Hell, their second most famous song is probably a pro wrestler’s theme song that the band didn’t even write. The group never really “got their due” in terms of huge success, yet they are almost without exception mentioned as a forefront influence on the music that has come from the decades since 1980. And while the band have a hefty catalog with several worthy albums and songs to choose from, there is little doubt that Ace Of Spades is the calling card that rallies all points home. When anyone mentions Motörhead, no doubt it is this gnarly riff and Lemmy’s gruff vocal delivery about losing your ass at cards that first enters one’s mind.

Why is this an S-Tier song?

Ace Of Spades is the banner by which Motörhead flew under for decades. It is a barnstormer of a song that both used and defied the music of the time to offer a new construct upon which much of the heaviest music of the ensuing years would be based off of. Everyone knows that Lemmy and Motörhead kicked ass, and everyone knows that Ace Of Spades is the signpost for the ass kickings.