Avenged Sevenfold produce a stellar tribute to their fallen drummer

Avenged Sevenfold produce a stellar tribute to their fallen drummer.

By Jamie Everitt

Type of Article: Album Review

After a somewhat disjointed self-titled album, Avenged Sevenfold took it upon themselves to produce an album that would emulate the quality of their previous work. This simple goal, however, hit a significant roadblock when the founder and drummer of the band, Jimmy “The Rev” Sullivan was discovered dead last December at the tender age of twenty-eight.

Although the Orange County boys had a nightmare of their own to contend with, they enlisted the services of the Rev’s favourite drummer, prog. metal legend Mike Portnoy, and were determined to put out the record they had started. The result of their effort is their fifth studio album, Nightmare, which proves to be an inspiring tribute to their fallen friend.

The first and most important thing to say about the album is that it doesn’t disappoint. With expectations from the fans and aspirations from the band members so high, it was important that even the smaller things stood out. In this respect, Nightmare sings a sweet tune; the cover art, for instance, is one of the best I’ve seen in recent times. Probably the most important thing for the band to achieve in this album was a demonstration of how much the Rev meant to them as a person and how much his passing has affected them. The Rev was also dearly loved by his fans, and the whole pantheon of emotions on display should allow the fans, as much as the band members, to come to terms with his death. From the wistful desperation portrayed in So Far Away to the rage expressed in God Hates Us, and Save Me, which feels like a call for deliverance, one can really get a sense of the grief surrounding the Rev’s death. If the lyrics are a little clichéd at times, the mood and sentiments are heart warming (or chilling- depending on your viewpoint). Fiction, a piano oriented song completed by the Rev mere days before his death, serves as the Rev’s swan song and a tender farewell to those that journeyed with him throughout his life.

Although Avenged Sevenfold are famed for their unique sound, it is interesting and encouraging to note the influence of some of their contemporaries on the record. Save Me has a very progressive feel to it and Metallica’s influence can be felt strongly in Buried Alive and So Far Away. These are coincidentally two of the strongest tracks from the album, with the former featuring a guitar intro that Hammett and Hetfield would be proud of.

If there is one criticism of the album it would be that although Nightmare is a very solid record and has a large number of great songs, it doesn’t quite match the heights reached at times in earlier efforts, notably Waking the Fallen and City of Evil. God Hates Us, whilst extremely visceral, can’t be compared to Unholy Confessions, and the epics, Victim and Save Me, are vastly inferior to I Won’t See You Tonight Part 1. This might not be completely down to the band members themselves, but perhaps a result of the constraints placed upon them by the nature of the album and their desire to record a fitting tribute to their friend. Avenged Sevenfold seem to produce their best (and most epic) music when they are given free rein to go absolutely nuts. Whilst Nightmare is a great album, it does not quite ride the crests and waves that were so evident in City of Evil.

Exciting Soundgarden news isn’t quite as exciting as first thought

Exciting Soundgarden news isn’t quite as exciting as first thought

By Asher Kenton

Type of Article: Music News

A new song by recently reformed grunge legends entitled ‘Black Rain’ was debuted on Zane Lowe’s Radio 1 show this week. Zane of course got very excited, however, the song is not actually new, but rather an unused take from the Badmotorfinger sessions. This is unsurprising though, as Zane is the most positive man on this planet and seemingly loves every artist to have ever existed (or to have got radio 1 exposure).

The song, although it sounds pretty good, is nothing mind-blowing. The riff sounds very Alice in Chains which is a good thing, but ultimately the song doesn’t carry you anywhere that special, the vocals are typical Chris Cornell, which is great to hear, but are perhaps a little low in the mix, and are a little repetitive. It’s also nice to hear Kim Thayil solo-ing again but ultimately this is an out-take which has been cut, and isn’t worth getting too carry away with. Of course it’s nice to hear news from the Soundgarden camp, and perhaps new compilation release ‘Telephantism’ will actually be good but it’s not the news we’ve all been waiting for: a Soundgarden Europe tour, now that would be something to get excited about!

2000 Trees Festival is a Breath of Fresh Air in a Commercial Market

2000 trees festival is a breath of fresh air in a commercial market

Written by Asher Kenton

Type of Article: Festival Review

Festivals nowadays are big business; bands get paid millions of pounds to play single shows and fans fork out hundreds to watch them. Not to mention the corporate sponsors having to pay  five or six pounds for a burger and 4 pounds for a pint of watered down, brand-name lager. However, at Upcote Farm near Cheltenham in Gloucestershire, a small and perhaps unassuming festival provides excellent music at a reasonable price (only around £50 for a weekend ticket), good food and drink and even a conscious effort to be as ‘green’ as possible. Headlined by Frank Turner and The Subways, 2000 Trees is a pretty remarkable affair.

Founded in 2007 by six friends who were sick of the corporate nature of mainstream festivals, ‘Trees (as it affectionately known) exudes a personal and friendly atmosphere from the head down. The organisers are a friendly group of people who do this for all the right reasons (they made big losses on their first few years) and only book bands that they like. The warm atmosphere is mirrored by the audience, who are the most friendly, outgoing and positive I’ve ever met at a festival, and the wonderful thing is, whereas if you make friends with a stranger in a crowd of 100,000 people you are unlikely to see them again, amongst just 4,000 or so you are likely to bump into them again. Furthermore, food, although expensive, is all locally sourced, most of it is organic and is the best I’ve tasted at a festival; freshly made pizzas, organic burgers and pieminister pies are amongst the favourite options.

Whereas most festival bars are named after whichever sponsor will give them the most money, at ‘Trees the two bars are named after the organisers’ favourite film The Big Lebowski (with the smaller bar named the Little Lebowski). Moreover, locally brewed cider Badger’s Bottom is a legendary aspect of the festival, and a must-try. At £3.50 for a 7.5% alcohol pint that tastes good and is easy to drink it sure goes down better than a £4 watered-down Tuborg. (Festival tip: just don’t smell it!)

The festival also has an excellent green reputation. The ‘Maker-green’ team help clear up and recycle as much as possible; all food and drink is locally sourced in order to fund the local economy and keep delivery carbon footprints down. Also, coaches are subsidised by £5 parking charges to reduce the amount of cars arriving. Furthermore, they only book bands from the U.K. in order to reduce the carbon footprint of tour schedules and aeroplanes.

While the budget for booking bands is nowhere near the size of larger festivals, the organisers do an excellent job, capturing an array of well-known and lesser-known talent across 3 stages, throughout the weekend. On Friday afternoon Maybeshewill got the party started on the main stage before Pulled Apart by Horses delivered a crazy and electric set before adoring fans. Jim Lockey then provided perfect cider drinking music in a packed-out Leaf Lounge. However it is the return of local favourite Frank Turner which caused most excitement. Having been forced to pull out of last year’s festival due to touring schedules, Frank Turner enjoyed a warm welcome to his “favourite UK festival” as he joined a number of his friends on stage throughout the day, including ex-keyboardist Chris TT. On this occasion, Frank and his touring band were given a well-deserved headline spot, which he used, despite the below-par main stage sound, to set the place alight. The most popular act at the festival, Frank Turner used his charm, honesty and wit to get the crowd singing along to his unique style of punk/folk in songs such as ‘Long Live the Queen’, ‘I Knew Prufrock Before He Got Famous’ and the ‘Ballad of Me and My Friends’. As the sun set, ‘Outdoor Type’ was perfect for this occasion and a devoted fan-base were also treated to new hits ‘The Road’ and ‘Try This at Home’ which showed that despite his recent surge is popularity, Frank Turner has got his feet well and truly on the ground. It is this honesty which means that his songs are so relevant to this selection of a few thousand people in a field in Gloucestershire. His joyous music is the highlight of a wonderful weekend, and is summed up by the spirited ‘I Still Believe’, which is enough to restore anyone’s faith in Rock ‘n’ Roll.

On the Saturday, Flashguns started slowly but showed significant potential with the excellently written ‘Racing Race’. Twin Atlantic played a thoroughly enjoyable set, reminiscent of early Biffy Clyro, topped off with a man in a chicken suit joining them onstage, dancing around and hyping up the crowd: a bizarre and memorable moment which sent the crowd wild. Instrumentalists 65daysofstatic then produced a sonically awesome set mixing heavy guitars with droning synthesisers and a mix of sampled and live drums. Bombay Bicycle Club were disappointing however; suffering from poor sound and only a few hits which can keep the audience engaged. This left The Subways to close the Saturday night. A slow start, again impacted by sound issues did not help, however, things improved with ‘Girls and Boys’ and got a bit crazy as lead singer Billy Lunn climbed up the side of the stage and jumped into the audience. The best thing about the Subways was the male/female harmonies, though one can’t help thinking they are only as big as they are because of gorgeous blonde-haired bassist Charlotte Cooper.  The band then got the crowd singing  their cheesy set-closer ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Queen’ which was a nice moment well orchestrated by the band, but it felt like the weekend had already been stolen by the brilliant Frank Turner.

All-in-all a fantastic weekend, at a really cheap price, good food and drink, cool atmosphere and some great music, in a world where you inevitably feel ripped off when you attend a festival, 2000 Trees is a breath of fresh air, and I’d return in a heartbeat. 

Arcade Fire show the Kings of Leon how to make it big gracefully

Arcade fire show the Kings of Leon how to make it big gracefully

by Asher Kenton

Type of Article: Analysis

The success stories of Canadian based art rock group Arcade Fire and American southern Rock quartet Kings of Leon can be charted along a similar timescale. Both started out around the turn of the century (KOL in 1999 and Arcade Fire in 2003) and released successful albums on independent labels which gained them a medium-sized but intensely devout following. Both then toured relentlessly and gained a larger following, culminating in both of them sub-headlining the famous Reading and Leeds Festivals in 2007 (on different days). They have also both gone on to further mainstream success; attaining number one albums in the U.K. and getting the chance to headline Reading Festival on their next time around (KOL in 2009, and Arcade Fire this year). However, with regard to how they grew in stature, the two bands differ vastly. Arcade Fire’s most successful record, the recently released ‘The Suburbs’ is if anything a stripped-back version of their sound, yet with enough substance and bite to receive rave reviews from virtually every section of the media. Meanwhile the Kings of Leon’s latest record, the 2008 released ‘Only by the Night’, featured a depart from their garage Rock sound into something more accessible; hooky choruses and catchy lyrics gained them a lot more radio airplay, but isolated many of their early fans, and left them highly regarded by few musical institutions aside from perhaps the NME. Although achieving mainstream success after Kings of Leon (and arguably they still aren’t as big) Arcade Fire have done so on their own terms, a remarkable achievement considering the current trend towards more accessible tunes in pursuit of commercial gain which can be seen in the recent upsurge in popularity of Muse and Biffy Clyro to name but a couple of culprits.

            Kings of Leon’s success has come at a price. They themselves admit to disliking mega-hit ‘Use Somebody’. “I was embarrassed by it. I thought it was sappy. By the time it was finished, I was like, 'That's not going on the record...' But everybody was like, 'You gotta put it on there.' So we did." said lead-singer Caleb Followill (Access Showbiz 2009). Therefore, their success has been marred by their willingness to concede to commercial pressure. Brother and Bassist Jared Followill also concedes that their songs have been over-played, “I thought 'Use Somebody' was a good song, but it's hard to f**ckin' like it when you hear it 90 times a day” (Access Showbiz, 2009); this is an opinion shared by some of Kings of Leon’s longest-serving fans who didn’t enjoy Kings of Leon’s new sound. This feeling of dissatisfaction mirrored by the band and their long-serving fan-base all came to a head during the band’s headline set at Reading Festival last summer; a moment that should have been a peak of the band’s career and a highlight of the festival season. Many punters came to see Kings of Leon solely because they knew the bands two radio-friendly hits, ‘Use Somebody’ and ‘Sex on Fire’, thus the atmosphere was somewhat flat. This infuriated the band, who openly criticised the audience, "I thought this was supposed to be the loudest crowd in the world?" and later stormed off stage, throwing their guitars on the floor as they left. This left those fans who had mostly enjoyed their set, including their older songs, with a bitter taste in their mouths, to say the least. Although only partially their own fault, this was the result of attaining a more commercial sound: a delight for the record company, disappointment for their fans.

            While ‘Only by the Night’s success was fuelled by some positive reviews by journalists, others felt they had traded in their authenticity for cash. The New York Times claims, "There was a time, not long ago, when Kings of Leon made music redolent of garage rock and Southern grit, all snarl, wriggle and yowl. But while "Only by the Night," the band's fourth album, gestures vaguely in that direction, its sights are set on far grander vistas." (Mahalo – Only by the Night Reviews).  Meanwhile, PopMatters claim that Kings of Leon are no longer original but that ‘Use Somebody’ is just, “another run-of-the-mill mainstream indie amalgam”. Thus indicating that Kings of Leon have lost some of their charm and respect amongst musical institutions.

            The same cannot be said of The Arcade Fire, who are slowly but surely gaining the respect of critics throughout the world. The NME declares ‘The Suburbs’, “pretty much perfect”, while the BBC argue that,  “The Suburbs is their most thrillingly engrossing chapter yet; a complex, captivating work that, several cycles down the line, retains the magic and mystery of that first tentative encounter. You could call it their OK Computer. But it’s arguably better than that”. This on top of the praise received for former albums ‘Funeral’ which made it to number 5 on the Guardian’s top Albums of the Decade and ‘Neon Bible’ which came 4th in Rolling Stone’s albums of the year chart. ‘The Suburbs’ therefore seems to have cemented Arcade Fire’s position as one of the most respected and talked about bands in the world today.

However, unlike many bands, they haven’t searched out a more commercial sound but simply recorded the music they wanted to hear. The result is a more stripped-back affair than the dramatic and perhaps overblown ‘Neon Bible’ (2007). ‘Month of May’ alludes to the driving, guitar chug of Queens of the Stone Age while ‘Deep Blue’ sounds like The Beatles’ melodies fused with David Bowie’s ambition. Furthermore, ‘Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)’ references Depeche Mode yet captures the alluring charm and grace of singer Régine Chassagne. This level of song-writing has led to widespread praise. The Guardian argues that, “The Suburbs' pleasures are subtle ones – the sudden lurch in rhythm that disrupts the drivetime rock dynamics of Modern Man, the delicate drift of Half Light I”. Far from search out success, Arcade Fire’s confidence in their own song-writing and ability to know where to use subtlety and simplicity are what is gaining them such respect and success. Lead singer Win Butler himself has stated that while he is usually is sick of the songs by the time an album is released, on this occasion he is only excited at the reception they might get. And this makes sense, for ‘The Suburbs’ isn’t an instant-hit album but rather one that grows on the listener over time as more is revealed upon each encounter. It’s also 16 tracks and over an hour long; hardly pruned into a commercial package like so many albums. This makes sense of course, as Arcade Fire are still with their original independent record label: Merge Records. Therefore, they have attained their success whilst keeping their artistic control and integrity well and truly intact. A remarkable feat in an industry that is so desperate to make a profit it is afraid to take risks or try anything new or unfamiliar.

Therefore, while the Kings of Leon’s success has come at a price to both the band and the audience, Arcade Fire have the world at their feet as they graduate from cult success to one of the biggest and most important bands in the world today.