Metal Reviews

No? How the hell do justify calling them poseurs then? I mean, you're telling everyone that this band isn't being true to themselves, that they're playing this shit for reasons other than just playing what they dig. How do you know this?

You don't, of course. But it plays to your negative agenda.

You guys over-complicate things. Music is one of the world's simplest pleasures. Does Airbourne suck because they sound like AC/DC? Hardly! They kick ass despite this. But some people dislike them for that fact alone, though they'd be drooling over the album if AC/DC had released it. Does that make any sense at all?

Unless a band's individual songs are nearly identical to other bands' individual songs, I don't see the need to complain.

Wolfmother may not be original, but they're good. I didn't like the debut because it didn't feel inspired to me. I didn't think the songs were strong enough. Not a bad album, just...meh. I liked this latest album much more.

How are they trendy? I mean, was there a minimalist two-man band trend that I missed? Or does gaining a measure of success automatically make a band trendy?

Yeah, well, you're at least funny.

Four posts in a row, jeez.

Airbourne are doubly unnecessary. First, because AC/DC already exist. Second, because Jet already exist.

What's over-complicated?

If Airbourne sound exactly like ACDC, (I dunno, never listened) then I'd probably enjoy their music, but I wouldn't think it was especially interesting or exciting.

I don't understand your perspective, really. We both listen to an awful lot of music- the more I listen to, the more I get really tired of bands that just do the same thing as other people. Sure, they are having fun, and listening to them is probably fun. But music ideally should be about something more than just that for me- something creative and exciting. If a band is going to be more than "good", then that's what they need to be, for me.

Yeah Zad comes across as a bit of dick in reviews like this one IMO

And only one directed at you. It hurts, huh?

Dude, Jet sounds nothing like AC/DC or Airbourne.

But how we, as fans, be so bold as to assume these bands are so worldly and knowledgeable of all the other bands that have played whatever style it is they play. Maybe the dude that fronts Wolfmother was inspired by his father's old, musty Led Zeppelin records, and that's where his musical influence comes from—just one band!

We assume these people know the ins and out of genres like we do. Well, we're fucking music nerds. Most people aren't like us, and most musicians spend more time writing music than listening to it. If you've know any serious musicians, I'm sure you've noted this.

I'm not saying every band is unaware there are tons of other bands that have played or are still playing that style of music, but I imagine many are entirely oblivious. Hell, I'm just now, in my thirties, getting into all those 70s rock bands. And I was born in the 70s! When was the singer for Wolfmother born, 1992?

My apologies if this sounds convoluted. I'm trying to make sense at work and I keep getting interrupted with phone calls. But all I'm saying is that music shouldn't be able what's been done before; it should be about whether or not you dig it. That's all. Just dig it. You're never going to constantly find bands breaking barriers and new ground. Some will do it, but most bands will be following a tried and true template that's been done a million times before.

If you love AC/DC so much, why can't you dig Rhino Bucket, or The Four Horsemen, or Airbourne, or Bullet? They all sound like AC/DC, and there are countless others that do as well. But they all have some great tunes! Hell, pretend they're AC/DC then. If you'd like a tune if AC/DC wrote, you should still be able to dig it if Airbourne wrote it.

Four more in a row, just for Zadcok.

Die.

But that's not really so different from what's in the review. Sure, I dig a ton of bands that are completely unoriginal. There are plenty of good bands that simply replicate a certain type of music. But, my point is that all they are is good bands. So Airbourne make fun music that basically repeats ACDC. Sounds fun, no doubt I'll listen to it and enjoy it. But, they aren't in the same league as, say, Cynic and don't deserve the same level of diggitude.

Now, I suppose, if they do sound identical to ACDC, then technically it makes no difference whether I listen to one or the other. But I still say ACDC are a better band. If you wrote a poem, and then I wrote one that used exactly the same style and was a perfect imitation, then technically it wouldn't matter which one somebody read. But you would sure as hell deserve more credit for it.

I have known a few musicians, and you are right that often they play more than they listen. I went to music college myself and for a few years (deludedly) tried to make it as a pro musician, and that certainly applied to me at the time, without question. But the musicians I know that I most admire, even if they don't listen to music 24/7 as we do (actually, I think a few of them probably do), they are still at pains to locate and develop their own style. They won't listen to a band and think "I want to play like that", but instead they will think "that inspires me to generate my own sound". And again, that's the difference between Wolfmother, Airbourne and Cynic.

Again, nothing to say that their music isn't enjoyable- and it's worth them making it purely because it is enjoyable. But it doesn't energise me as much as something really interesting would do.

Oh, fuck off, moron. Next time I review a band that you happen to like, I'll be sure not to say anything even in the slightest bit negative just so you don't turn into sodding street-teamer of the year, and everyone doesn't have to watch as you pull the forum into yet another slough of despond with your constant whining and inability to treat a band you don't love with the same extremist defensiveness that you spew out for whatever shit you've pulled from the bargain bin that day.



Point to the exact sentence you find offensive. Wolfmother are exactly the sort of iPod-selling hipster music that I vaguely accused them of being, inbetween all the remarks about how they're enjoyable and people will probably like them if they give them a go that you nitpicking freaks are ignoring.

(I ended up just kinda talking about the review in general. The dickish parts are mainly where you sound ashamed of liking them, call them unoriginal about 50,000 times and kinda bring up Bigelf out of nowhere. Bringing up less known bands than the one being reviewed is a bit of a nono and makes you sound like a hipster dick imo. Srry if I was mean. Writing is very hard and I'm pretty amazed by the amount you do for this site and even in this post I wrote 'This was probably the sentence where I really went "blurgg" because' when I could have just written "blurgg.")

However much I try, I just can't get that cover art out of my head whilst listening to the cannily-named Cosmic Egg, keeping that eerie hovering presence at the edge of my consciousness whilst I run through the album. <-- Says the same thing twice. You even used "whilst" twice. It's a cool thought but I don't think I'd want to read more than five words about it.

Like many, the first time I heard of the band was thanks to Mike Patton and his ridicule of them in that infamous YouTube video, and whilst every particle of my body holds nothing but respect for the man, <-- Another whilst? Srsly bro. Also starting to overdose on the "I" here. Just get in, describe the music and state your opinion about it like it's fact (preferably do both at the same time!) and get out.

just because Wolfmother are about as original as an AC/DC cover band doesn't mean they can't be appreciated for what they are, right? <-- This was probably the sentence where I really went "blurgg" because not only is "as original as a cover band" is a phrase I've heard a gajillion times before, but then the sentence as a whole gives off a whiny "lol they suck but are kind of OK dudes should check it out but well fuck it I'm really just telling you to listen to your Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple albums one more time and ignore this trash but if you're forced to listen to it like I am because I write reviews then it's actually more tolerable than having your toenails removed." Just say you like it! Guilty pleasures are for pussies and reviews that don't say "this rocks" or "this sucks" and opt for middle ground are kind of boring to read. Unless you write them like this.

Start of the second paragraph: Yeah, we get it, they're unoriginal, we saw the Mike Patton video too. And you call other people nerdy when you used "whilst" 5 times in a music review on a metal website.

"For some, maybe, but it becomes harder to sell Wolfmother to an audience who have heard more than one Black Sabbath song and who generally listen to enough Metal to know that these guys barely register as Stoner Rock" <-- Erk. Awkward genre argument/whiny stuff. That paragraph is otherwise solid though. Also don't look at reviews as "trying to sell something" or even worry what other people will think about the music. Just write your opinion.

I liked this stuff:

"Dude, it's a giant, floating egg!" <-- Should have started the review.

"Although I can't quite shake my suspicion that the music here was written to outperform hateful wankshafts Jet in the songs-made-for-adverts stakes - (just say they're dicks who sell ipods or something instead of writing a hyphen-overdosed clause that's hard to read) - it's not hard to hear that Wolfmother are much better at the simple art of being enjoyable than Jet. Songwriting here is breezily catchy, as smooth and shiny as an oil slick, and even frontman Andrew Stockdale's vocals are less Indie-esque and offensive to Metallic ears than you'd think. Squint a little, or listen whilst less than sober, and you may even mistake this for something actually from the seventies."

"Cosmic Egg is generally full of rocking songs, packed with riffs virtually guaranteed to make Josh Homme scowl as mainstream music journalists forget that Queens Of The Stone Age have been around since 1997 and fall over themselves to pronounce Classic Rock back in fashion, baby!"

"the album is full of such three-to-five minute songs, seemingly designed specifically to massage those sections of your brain that appreciate music made before 1980."

(Also worth noting is that all three of these sentences get across "they're not very original" without driving the point into the ground.)

"Yes, Cosmic Egg is repetitive, easy to get bored with and cynically aimed at the sort of people who think Muse are the last word in experimental music, yet it's far from the awful trash you'd naturally expect."

And tonight's autopsy was performed by Dr Noodles! I don't mean to be mean, but I simply can't be bothered replying to each point. Quickly, though: No shame in plugging Bigelf, they're far better at what they do. I'm trying to write about various types of music for a predominantly metalhead audience, and would probably write differently were this Classic Rock magazine. And eh, whilst I do generally keep a whilst eye whilst out whilst for repetitions and stuff, that must I I whilst whilst whilst have slipped by, sorries for that. I would defend the bits you criticised, but I realised that I prefer the bits you liked to them too, so whatever. Thanks for taking the time to put it down in a polite unwanky fashion, unlike someone I could name.

I also think that a good music review never needs to be longer than a paragraph or two, unless it goes very in depth into what key certain songs are in and the musician's history or whatever, so I'm pretty stingy about conciseness and whatnot. I guess if you're talking about Wolfmother being unjustly popular then mentioning Bigelf and whoever else works but just dropping a sentence with their name in it seems janky to me.

I really need to stop procrastinating and write my frigging analysis of the first 6 lines of The Ruin :(

Yeah, I can waffle, I'll be the first to admit that. I suppose it depends what you're looking for in a review, encyclopedic fact and opinion brought together in a speedy summary, as you clearly prefer, or a less focused but more entertaining read - I make an attempt at balancing the two, but with a heavy bias towards making it entertaining, which is one of the reasons I hate talking about songs in great depths because:

1) it's dull as shit to read if you've not heard the song, and if you have why bother to read it; and

2) reproducing music in written form is so impossible that a general idea of the album with mentions of stand-out parts is what you'll end up with anyways, so why not aim for that in the first place!

Probably another reason for my repetitions of words, on a tangent, is that I write as I talk, as in when I check a review I read it out in my head and make sure it sounds ok like that. So two "whilst"s in the same sentence must have sounded ok, and still somewhat does.

So your equating listenability with the band's "uniqueness" in playing style? I wonder if Cynic is the best band to use not that I'm trying to fight or anything, but there were other bands while Cynic was playing that run circles around the band. Atheist, Pestilence, Demilich I don't think its a stretch to say that they all had their unique elements. But in a music scene where "everything has been done before", why not go after entire music genres as opposed to certain bands? I'm anxious to see what you have to say.

I can understand Zad's dismay about Wolfmother though, and it's honestly shared by a lot of people listening to metal. Bands like Wolfmother, The Sword, and neo-thrash reinforce some elements of rehashing sound, but can't it be argued that that they are playing their own take on the style? One can't adequately make assumptions just because their are certain similarities in playing from band "a" to band "b". I don't think you can truthfully call a band a ripoff unless they are obviously just blatantly using the band's influence, trademarks, or stealing riffs (Trivium).

i don't think Cynic being in the same style as Demilich and Atheist is really the same thing as a band imitating another because while the bands have similarities, they've got a lot of pretty big differences. Personally I think that all musicians are just taking the sounds that influence them and putting them together in a new way. Once you're more and more familiar with two bands that at first sound similar their differences will seem bigger and bigger. Even The Sword aren't completely derivative of Black Sabbath because they do some stuff that Sabbath never would (eg they have a song with blast beats). Also a lot of time the "imitator" bands write better songs and make way better music, too.