Week Of 3/27 - Metal and EBM

Delay of Post due to illness. Right on the heels of attending a convention I became sick with the flu, which severely curtailed my music listening ability - much less posting. Last weeks Sunday Morning Blues is bumped to this coming Sunday, and this post is many hours late.... On with the show...

A lot of Live music this week, several new releases, and almost completely Heavy Metal.

New Releases:

Iron Maiden
En Vivo!
Label: EMI Records
Released: 3/20 2012
Genre: Heavy Metal



A double disc live release... Iron Maiden are now one of those bands that can simply Go On Tour. Which means I tend to skip a lot of Live Album releases - after all I only need so many live versions of classics from any Maiden era. But when they put out a live set from the latest album I'm inclined to pick it up - because Iron Maiden are amazing live. Truly a great show, and I like to hear how the new material sounds with a crowd, recorded live with no studio mixing. En Vivo! is the live tour from the Final Frontier album, which was epic in scale. Only five of the tracks from The Final Frontier made it onto this live set, which is only 17 tracks on 2 discs, though it still tracks in just under two hours. I would have liked to see the thing push the limits of the CDs some more, each could easily fit another track, a full 2 hours of live music would have been nice. Still, the boys still have it, the songs aren't hacked and hashed live, nor are they precision replicas of the studio. It's a live show, and it is good. If you're a big Iron Maiden fan you'll probably want this.

Overkill
The Electric Age
Label: Entertainment One
Released: 3/20 2012
Genre: Heavy Metal, Thrash Metal


I always love the release of a new Overkill album, through the 2000s they seem to just be getting harder and heavier, which is good after a faltering 90s (which I mostly don't own, though I may fix that in the future). The Electric Age picks up right where Iron Bound left off: pounding the audience into the pavement. The riffs are hard, Blitz still belts out some of the best thrash lyrics around, and everything is overall a grinding testament to the sonic assault that is unfiltered thrash metal. Nothing on Electric Age quite catches me like the last album though, it's an epically awesome album that gets better with every listen, but it's not immediately catchy. Just amazingly good. You can't be a metal fan without adding Overkill to your discography, and while it's not Overkill's best album, it is still leaps and bounds above most metal bands, in any day.

Adding To The Collection:

Hydrogyn
Strip 'Em Blind, Live
Label: Destroy All Records
Released: 2007
Genre: Heavy Metal, Hard Rock


Hydrogyn weren't around all that long before they had to the opportunity to put out a live album, so it's a short set. Only one track from the future album Deadly Passions (and the bonus track at that) is in the set, so no previews for the audience. It's a solid (almost) forty minute set, with a bonus non-live cover of Back In Black. They make a good live band, putting a solid amount of energy into the songs, a clean sound-board recording helps too. Good for hardcore fans of the band, but it's not an awesomely amazing set, they aren't quite as epic as some other bands out there on a live set - or maybe it didn't come through the recording.

23Crash
Weird News From An Uncertain Future
Label: Alfa Matrix
Released: 2007
Genre: EBM, Electro


32Crash is a Jean-Luc De Meyer, Len Lemeire, and Jan D'Hooghe side project. It's a weird concept album that tells a tale of the future. Planetary devastation, ecological disaster, alien invasion, conquest, and other assorted bits of doom filter down through a stripped EBM beat. This is almost under-produced. But it works, and well, because these three guys know exactly how far down to strip things and still keep the club feel and sound. Definitely an album worth seeking out, it sounds good, you can put it on and use it for ambient sound, or put on headphones and get lost in a strange futuristic tale.

Bonus Track:
Bassnectar (featuring Amp Live)
Ugly
Label: Bassnectar self-released
Released: 2012
Genre: dubstep
A preview track from the upcoming Bassnectar album. If this track is an average example of what's to come this next album will be big and loud and all kids of fun. Comes out Real Soon (April 10, 2012). The song is just excellent, truly. Can't wait for the next album, I've got my copy on pre-order.

Next Week:
And next week .... not nearly so much metal. Some very old Unwoman (and a limited release at that), A Capella, Bassnova, Industrial and more....