February 10, 2010

Every month, The A.V. Club feels a brief tinge of regret for having spent all that time writing elegant, well-considered criticism of thoughtful, emotional music that brings love and hope to its listeners. That’s when Leonard Pierce—his ears ever attuned to the sounds of human suffering—shows up with an armload of the latest metal releases. Metal Box represents the cost of getting him out of the office so we don’t have to hear any more songs about bloody vomit. February is the shortest month of the year, but that doesn’t mean the box is empty: Here’s a look at some of the best in hard and loud from February 2010.
GET HIGH. It’d be an understatement to say that High On Fire’s Snakes For The Divine (E1) is merely one of the most anticipated metal releases in years. One of the few bands to keep its headbanger credibility while reaping lots of critical praise from mainstream music critics, High On Fire is in pretty rare air in terms of its reputation. Still, there comes a time when you have to stand and deliver, and Snakes For The Divine delivers like a UPS van on fire. It’s recognizably a progression from Matt Pike’s previous work—there’s nothing exactly shocking about it—but just the same, it has an edge that makes it clear that no ruts are being dug. It’s fiercer, sharper, and more aggressive than most listeners will expect, and while Jeff Matz and Des Kensel’s rhythm section is appropriately thunderous, Pike’s guitar playing and vocals have an extremely welcome snarling, nasty quality, expanding the band’s overall sound but not constituting a too-radical departure from its strengths. Greg Fidelman’s production might be a sour point for some; those who found his work on Slayer’s World Painted Blood and Metallica’s Death Magnetic to be all shimmer and surface aren’t likely to change their minds. But for those not bothered by his engineering work, Snakes For The Divine is the pinnacle of a career filled with high points.
OFF TO SEE THE WIZARD. Ozzy Osbourne doesn’t have a new record out, but as long as he keeps doing things, I’m going to keep writing about him, and I make no apologies for that. Anyway, his new autobiography, I Am Ozzy (Sphere), is a lot more entertaining than his last couple of solo albums. I’m not sure exactly how he wrote it, since he can’t read, but I’ve interviewed him a few times, and the book’s voice is distinctly his own. It’s exactly what you’d expect from one of metal’s most enduring characters: tragic (especially in his tales of years lost to drug abuse), honest (Ozzy is probably the only person on Earth who can talk shit about his wife Sharon), funny (he notes that if he’d truly realized the repercussions of bringing camera crews into his house 24/7 for The Osbournes, he’d have shot his balls off), and metal as fuck (he takes his songwriting a lot more seriously than people give him credit for). Speaking of solo albums, his next was supposed to be called Soul Sucka, but now it’s being reconsidered thanks to near-universal outcry from his fans, who clearly don’t want to walk around in T-shirts that might seem like they’re championing that horrible crazy rap music. Whatever it’s called, it’s likely to be released in advance of a rejuvenated Ozzfest this summer—once again planned as a traveling show, instead of the one-off Dallas megafest held in 2008. In that time, though, a ton of big tours from Mayhem to Carnage to Summer Slaughter have filled the Ozzfest void, leaving fans to wonder who exactly is going to play the thing. I don’t really care, myself, as long as Ozzy doesn’t do any more comedy skits.
ZOMBIELAND. I’ve always been a bigger fan of Rob Zombie’s work in theory than in practice. Both as a musician and a filmmaker, he strikes me as a guy who cares incredibly deeply about his craft, and puts a tremendous amount of energy into what he does—but what he does simply isn’t in my wheelhouse. His films are painstakingly made, but their subject matter and execution leave me cold; likewise, his records take an interesting approach, but their delivery is often diffuse and flat. That opinion isn’t entirely dispelled by his new album, Hellbilly Deluxe 2: Noble Jackals, Penny Dreadfuls And The Systematic Dehumanization Of Cool (Roadrunner); the Fiona-Apple-ish title aside, it still features the sampled bits of cult film dialogue, the choppy, groove-based riffing, and the love-it-or-leave it vocal delivery that makes it sound like Zombie just isn’t trying. However, there’s something that makes it worth listening to for me, and likely a must-own for fans: this is far and away the best band he’s ever worked with. Shedding the lockstep beats for some powerful drumwork by Tommy Clufetos, and letting John 5’s ever-improving guitar playing take the place of squealy synthesizers, Zombie is finally fronting a combo that sounds like a hard-ass metal band instead of a collection of cronies subservient to his vision. The song quality varies—for every knockout like “Jesus Frankenstein” and “What?”, there’s a retread like “Burn” or a dud like “Mars Needs Women.” The album, too, has a not-so-fresh feel, possibly due to the fact that it was some three years in the making. The ferocity of those moments when the band really comes together, though, is an indication that these songs will be absolute barn-burners live.
FEAR FACTOR. Speaking of sounding a tad dated, I had a bad feeling about Fear Factory’s return to the studio after four years of somewhat acrimonious inactivity. My, er, fears weren’t entirely unjustified. There’s a lyrical obsession with Alvin Toffler’s The Third Wave, its credibility as a futurist manifesto is somewhat tarnished by dint of its being 25 years old, and the spoken-word bits and washes of spooky-ooky keyboards in “Fear Campaign” aren’t what I’m looking for out of this band. But all told, Mechanize (Candlelight) is a roaring comeback; while there are a few missteps, the album can stand alongside Fear Factory’s best work from the past. Burton Bell’s vocals are in fine fettle on songs like “Industrial Discipline,” a track which also showcases what an absolutely unstoppable drummer Gene Hoglan has become. Dino Cazares’ return to the guitar slot is welcome; he hasn’t sounded this good in years. It isn’t a perfect album from beginning to end, but Fear Factory never put out such albums in its prime—it released occasional blasts of devastating brilliance peppered with a few stabs in the dark, just like on Mechanize. Focus on the distracting bits, and you’ll miss some pretty amazing metal when everything clicks.