Hard Rock and Metal Review
Picked up some CDs by old guys playing hard rock and metal. Here's a quickie review:
How can I put this? It's awful. Honestly, I can barely listen to it. It's all slow and draggy and ponderous. It's everything you fear a concept album is going to be.
But at least they tried something different, for them.
It sounds like every AC/DC album since Back In Black. Which means it sounds fine, sounds just like AC/DC, but is utterly forgettable. Just dig out Back In Black.
Ah hell, let's do one more, in a totally different vein...
Butch Walker - Sycamore Meadows
To understand this album, you need to know what happened to Butch. He was renting a house in California (from Flea, although that's not important to the story). And there was one of those California wildfires. And it burned down the house and destroyed absolutely everything that Butch owned. Everything, including all his master tapes of all his work.
Given that, alot of this album is understandable. Doesn't make it that good. But you can see where he's coming from.
The problem with the album is two-fold. First, it's filled with a load of oh my I know what's really important in life now
stuff. And I understand why. Losing your every possession is going to have that effect on you. But it's a pain to listen to it. It's like hanging out with a freshly ex-alcoholic. They just can't shut up about how great life it now. And you feel bad when you get tired of them saying so. But, still, you get sick of it after awhile.
It's the same thing with this album. And I hate saying so. But, I really don't need to hear it over and over. It sounds callous. And I hope Butch never stumbles on this blog. But it's true.
The second problem is that Butch is moving towards the dreaded singer-songwriter
phase. That's the one where an artist fills an album with lots of heart-felt acoustic numbers. And that's not good. Partially because songs like that tend towards the mawkish. But, with Butch, there's something even worse: It gets in the way of the big-ass rock anthems that he writes so well!
Here's the problem. Butch writes great rock anthems. The kind of anthem that Def Leppard kinda managed, but much much better. No one in the world of rock can do them like Butch can. No one!
But, and here's the tragic part, any guy or girl with a guitar can pump out earnest acoustic ballads. It's not that friggin' hard to do. Butch is wasting his unique talents churning out stuff that dozens of others could do just as well.
The only really great song on this album is Ponce De Leon Ave. (The Weight of Her is okay.) Butch could do a whole album full of this kind of stuff. But he isn't. He's putting out earnest pablum instead. And that's a shame.
So there!
