Skip to main content

ALBUM REVIEW: "Villains" by Queens of the Stone Age

   It's obviously taken me far to long to get into Queens of the Stone Age, because Villans, my first experience of the band, is a damn good rock album. After a subdued intro on opener "Feet Don't Fail Me" the first of many killer riffs lets rip, and it's glorious. Infused with some distinctly 80s-sounding synths, the build up is pitch perfect as the simple but effective groove takes hold, complete with a wah-pedal on the bass guitar adding a funk edge. The production sounds a lot like classic Stones or Zeppelin, giving it a homey, familiar sound beneath the toe-tapping and riffage. The band aren't afraid to branch out and experiment, either, with a number of songs breaking the six minute mark with winding, linear structures and proggy passages. One of the things I love about the band's sound is the variety in guitar tones without loss of cohesion - there are so many funky sounds and odd moments across the album, but they never feel out of place or jarring ("The Way You Used To" is a great example of this). As a huge fan of the fuzz it's also great to hear that warmth and grungy filth all over Villains. There really isn't a weak moment on here - the tight 9 song track-listing has evidently trimmed all the fat - and you can take your pick of which of these tracks will get a festival crowd moving. My only gripe with the album is to do with the vocal performance - for the most part it's great, but I guess after a few runs through a lack of dynamic variety or excitement became more apparent to me. This might not be a problem for a lot of people, considering how tastefully written the melodies are throughout, but for me it started to become a slight issue. Overall I was completely drawn by Villains, and it'll be on my summer playlists for sure.

   Favourite Tracks: Feet Don't Fail Me, The Way You Used To, Fortress, Un-Reborn Again and The Evil Has Landed

   Rating: A

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NOSTALGIA PICK #3: "The Glow Pt. 2" and "Mount Eerie" by The Microphones

   There aren't many artists that have been making consistently exciting music for as long as Phil Elverum has been under his various musical pseudonyms, the most notable being The Microphones and Mount Eerie, the latter being the second incarnation after The Microphones' Mount Eerie.  From experimental beginnings to rugged indie-folk to what was essentially Phil's black metal album in Black Wooden Ceiling  and back again, nothing he has done has felt like a re-tread of what had come before, but somehow he has managed to maintain an instantly recognisable sonic fingerprint across all his projects.    For me the peak moments in his expansive discography come in the form of 2001's The Glow Pt. 2 and 2003's Mount Eerie .      A saw an exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney showing the work of Japanese artist Tatsuo Miyajima, which was a series of installations ruminating on life and death and the cycle it forms. All of the in...
Post a Comment
Read more

1 YEAR LATER: "22, A Million" by Bon Iver

   Bon Iver's third studio album turns 1 in about a week (where did that year go?), so I thought it would be interesting to talk a bit about how my impressions of the album have changed - or how they haven't - over the last 12 months. When this album was released I was more excited than I think I ever have been to hear a new album. For Emma, Forever Ago is one of my all time favourites, and I love his self-titled second album too, so I had huge expectations for this album, but was also wary that expectations might ruin my experience of the music. This was particularly the case for 22, A Million , because it is unlike anything else Justin Vernon has released. There have been hints at this more processed, electronic direction previously, like the song "Woods" on the Blood Bank EP and occasional flourishes on Bon Iver , but 22, A Million is a drastic departure from the Bon Iver sound we had grown accustomed to at this point in time. Or at least, that's what I thought...
Post a Comment
Read more