Laszlo Jones & Alex Skolnick – Kill Myself
Genre: Stoner Rock, Industrial, Electronicore
Laszlo Jones collaborates with the great Alex Skolnick in a bid to reinvent heavy guitar music.
How does heavy guitar music remain powerful and terrifying? And, when do you realize your band has become Greta van Fleet? That’s no dig at the collective ability of the teenager quartet. But, lest we forget the strength to bewilder and appall that their ancestors, Led Zeppelin, held during the 1970s.
For most rockers, the book has been written for a long time. It needs no reinterpretation. This is, especially, true for the rockers that could really play to begin with. Their reticence makes sense. It took them years to master their sound. Why opt to change it?
Clearly, metalhead guitar hero, Alex Skolnick doesn’t believe that. On Kill Myself, he teams up with French artist Laszlo Jones. The experiment is meant to prove if modern electronic music can be mixed with industrial and doom metal tendencies to create a brand new, hulking beast. The ears may need a bit of time to adjust to this if they’ve been treated to the kind of music that Testament makes. But, at the very least, this will prove to be brave, sonically adventurous material.
Belling The Tiger – Bleak
Genre: Progressive Rock, Alternative Rock
Belling The Tiger explore the outer reaches of classic progressive rock on Bleak, one of the songs from their debut album.
Yes, Jon Anderson once proclaimed that the group had had it by creating songs that had a chance of reaching the pop charts. Their mission in the late 70s was, according to the great rock tenor, to rewrite The Bible. But, you know, with a lot of key changes and solos for everyone in the band.
Coincidentally this was exactly what the punk bands, anti-prog thugs developing their groups at the same time, wanted to avoid. Punk won the battle. However, the scope of the work Tull, Yes, and Crimson left future generations wondering. “What about rewriting that Bible business?”.
It’s the holy grail of musicians that have no problem learning to play power chords. Belling The Tiger are a band making their debut. On Bleak, they throw the kitchen sink at a defenceless audience. There’s more content to this 7-minute song than on a nano-bible.
They’re quoting The Beatles and Led Zeppelin. They’re testing the singer through registers that would leave many breathless. And, most interestingly, they seem to have musical ideas to spare. For some punk-rock just won’t cut it, and jazz’s dress code is much too restrictive.
