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ALBUM REVIEWS Highway Jam: Grasslands |
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Recently Martin asked me to surrender my previous band’s EP (Bedlam – “Mounes Mors”) to the careful scrutiny of Kerry Hiles, a review which I am sure you will get to see soon. In exchange, he promised, I would get to review two discs brought forward by members of The Collective. So, as you can derive from the mere presence of this column, I agreed, and to my doorstep he delivered CDs of Kai’s band Highway Jam and Julian’s band Titus. And this is what I thought. Highway Jam: Grasslands I reviewed Grasslands on New Year’s Day itself. Of course, this did not seem like a good idea at first, but it turned out to be just the right kind of album to sooth the savage agony within my fragile head. Kai and his drummer, Davis Novis, work hard throughout the entire album and, in my opinion (the only one that counts in this review hahaha), succeed at laying down a foundation that would survive a nuclear holocaust. Not once do any of the songs sound ‘empty’ or even like there is ‘something missing’ on the bottom line; yet it never becomes overbearing. The bass and drums truly mould and set the scene for every song. Add all the frills of different percussion elements (ranging from bongos and cowbells to Masai ankle bells and goat hooves – say, how did you get the goats to do that?), excellent keyboards and sax, and of course some really awesome guitar playing (Mike Meiring), and you have yourself an excellent blues-meets-rock-meets-jazz album. Here are some highlights: The album kicks off with a song called Smoothies, which immediately tells you that these guys know exactly what they are doing. Really solid bass riffs drive the song, with excellent drums and percussion, allowing the guitar and sax to explore as many jazzy and bluesy avenues as they choose. Directly after this song, you meet Mongoose, a calmer track that presents a nice blend of an island-reggae-type-feel with some solid bluesy-rock, again driven by the bass and percussion. I started listening to track 3 before I looked at the title, and the first feeling I had was that of a hot sun burning down mercilessly in rattlesnake country. So imagine my surprise when I saw that the track is titled Paris, Texas. My heavy-metal based ignorance, unfortunately, makes me miss the ‘Paris’ part entirely, although I do get some visions of a smoky Paris night club (please help me out here!), but the part of me that is into bands like Cinderella immediately ‘got’ the slide guitar and feels-like-I-had-too-much-tequila bass riffs. Very bluesy, and one of my favourite tracks on the album. The long trip through the desert is briefly interrupted by the excellent Bacterial Witness, which to me would suit a fast-paced car chase through the streets of San Francisco. It is followed by Sun Dance, again, a very aptly named track, as it creates the vivid image of a Shaman and North American Indian tribe bringing honour to their sun gods, just like a (authentic) dream catcher blowing in the wind does. This track is beautifully crafted, with just the right audio-imagery to put you right in the middle of the sun dance. I think Jim Morrison would have liked this one. Blue Cigar Suit is up next, another aptly titled song, another song that is rich with sounds that create visual imagery: an up-beat blues room where the cigar smoke hangs thick and blue in the air; the kind of song that the band plays while waiting for a jazz diva to make her presence known on stage. To prevent myself from taking up all the space in this month’s edition before I even get to reviewing the next CD, I will stop here and leave you to explore the rest of I yourself – the five remaining tracks are all good - some fast, some slow. To single out one more, I enjoyed the last track - In a Sacred Manner I Live’– immensely, for the same reasons I like Sun Dance – it is mysterious and takes you to places you may never have been. In sum, even to a metalhead with extreme tunnel vision when it comes to what I listen to, this album rocks. Very well done. Titus: “Fade” And on to an album that falls more into my immediate frame of reference – Fade, by Julian’s band, Titus. Because people nowadays are so fond of categorising metal and rock, I thought I would start off by doing the same with this album. To me, Fade falls in the category of ‘Progressive Rock’, particularly due to the driving role of the keyboards throughout. I am sure these guys are fans of bands like Dream Theater, as they just as comfortably merge slow acoustic bits and melodic solos with chunks of grinding riffs and fast guitar shredding. Nevertheless, some of the riffs hearken back to the so-called ‘Old School’ bands – Priest, Maiden, etc. What follows is a brief overview of the album, as well as of a few things that stuck out for me. The album kicks off with a song called Breath of Life, which is introduced with a nice and eerie piece on the keyboards before the drums and guitars enter to let you know that something heavy can be expected. Like many of the other songs, this one also features a multitude of riffs and melodies in and among the vocal parts. These to me are often some of the most exciting elements of songs, stating that ‘we don’t need lyrics to tell a story’. Furthermore, they blend gracefully into verses and choruses, helping to create the mood intended by the lyrics. On to track 2, Myself Denied, where Titus builds on their keyboards-guitar combination into a very serene yet rocking verse that to me creates a sense of loss and despair (I might be wrong, of course!). This, however, gives way to heavier and faster bits quite soon, and also features a ripper of a melodic guitar solo supported and then surpassed by the keyboards. Whereas track 3, Litany, follows much the same formula as Myself Denied, the next track, In My Secret World, utilises more soothing piano along with more prominent bass to introduce a feeling of seclusion, almost like being under water. The guitar and vocals follow shortly to give more body to the song, somewhat compromising the initial feel but taking it into a more powerful direction. This effective piano-bass combination is again utilised to introduce the title track, Fade. I particularly enjoyed this track, which blends melodious rock with moments of both ballad-like and jazzy piano, as well as nice acoustic bits that feed into very funky gallop riffs. Despite these more up-beat musical moments, however, the vocal and a bleeding guitar solo succeed in maintaining the more sombre picture initially painted by the piano. Tracks 6-13 are titled The Chronicle parts I-VIII. These 8 tracks together tell a story that starts with birth and ends with meeting the Messiah, a story that is cleverly put together with a number of different riffs, sounds, and melodies. Three of the eight parts are instrumentals, each different yet similar enough to recognise it as part of the same story. I have always liked multi-song sagas (see Iced Earth!), so this was very interesting for me. What stands out for me is how Titus utilises excellent melodious elements to stay quite heavy without falling into either a pop sound or a senseless incoherent noise. So, if this sounds like your cup of tea, check it out. If it doesn’t - check it out anyway, you might just be surprised. |
