|
Rating:
4.5 |
Catch 22 - Monumetal
11 March 2011
01. Power Revolution Mad
02. Contained?
03. ...And the Fire Still Burns
04. Killing Time
05. Igniter
06. Exciter's Lust
07. Downward Spiral
08. Switchblade Hate
09. Against The Grain
10. Twisted, Ruined And Black
11. Catch 22
I'm starting to realize what a black hole of excitement is. This is it. My soul has finally found something boring enough to crawl into and die. There's no expressing how ironic a title like Monumetal is.
Words to describe this album? It's a heavy metal album. An extremely amateur sounding heavy metal album. The first thing that jumps out it is how horrible the recording on this is, it's demo quality, and by demo quality, I mean high-school-garage-band-on-a-4-track demo quality. It's almost impossible to believe this band has already put out several albums. Don't get me wrong, stripped-down can be an incredible direction to go, the first few Danzig albums are a testament to that, Catch 22 on the other hand are a testament to the fact that you shouldn't attempt "stripped-down" unless you can pull it off. Monumetal just sounds incredibly awkward and imbalanced when it isn't overwhelmingly bland. Just picture a compilation of the most basic Iced Earth segments being played by a bunch of drunks, recorded through a $20 4-track tape deck.
If your fingers aren't racing to the "stop" button out of annoyance over the inconsistencies of the instrument tracking, then the wretched boredom will definitely claw at you. The riffs and lyrics are so unbelievably generic, the band almost comes off as some kind of heavy-metal parody. In fact, when listening to this, it's hard not to believe that these guys are some type of virtuosos with an edge of comedic genius and a hatred of heavy metal fans, so they concoct something so unbelievably flavourless as a kind of science experiment to see how many people will actually buy into it.
If you can manage to hold your attention onto to something like this for longer than perhaps 5 minutes, chances are drowsiness will set in, followed by that starchy feeling you get in your mouth after a long nap.
|
|
Written on 04.04.2011 by
Doc Godin
Former EIC, now semi-retired.
|
|
|
|
|
Comments
|
|
| Comments: |
7
|
|
|
Users visited:
|
219 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Lol. Its 'monumetal' ! Not 'monumental'! 
i am going to give this album a try!  |
|
|
|
Written by atma vichara on 04.04.2011 at 10:53
Lol. Its 'monumetal' ! Not 'monumental'!
i am going to give this album a try!
Woops. I noticed that when I first had it sent to me, then I totally forgot when I was typing up this review!
Fixed. |
|
|
|
The singer sounds like a horrible parody of Jack Black  |
|
|
|
| You guys just don't understand this. This is trve and you're not. /sarcasm |
|
 cam - 04.04.2011 at 18:32
|
|
|
| I paused Symphony X to listen to the stuff on their MySpace. I want my mouse clicks back. |
|
|
|
"Just picture a compilation of the most basic Iced Earth segments being played by a bunch of drunks, recorded through a $20 4-track tape deck."
Sounds pretty accurate. However, If they were shit faced drunk, heavy slurring of the vocals might greatly improve their quality and make the experience more enjoyable on the whole. |
|
|
|
While I must agree on the quality of recording, it is stripped down. I disagree on the musicianship, as a musician I can honestly say they have talent. Perhaps the album does not measure up to that. This album appears rushed! I was not crazy about the vocals (someone needed to do more directing). Not crazy about the guitar tones either. The bass was high in the mix, more than most albums in this genre (GOOD THING). It was nice to hear the bass doing something other than simply always copying the guitar. The percussion was the bright spot for me. There were several patterns I enjoyed. And I even found myself rewinding to make sure I heard what I thought I heard. Especially on "Igniter" track 5! Then again on "Catch 22" track 11, those double bass accents were amazing. This album reminds me of parting out a car, some parts are worth more than others. But a good buy if you like 90's metal with good percussion
DP |
|
Advertise on Metal Storm
|
Similar topics
Hits total: 3889 | This month: 35 |
