Right Now: Howard Jones out of KsE

What a crappy way to start off the new year with the news of Howard Jones leaving/fired from Killswitch Engage. I am a huge Jesse Leach fan, but if you have to have another singer for KsE it was Howard. End of Heartache is a classic and easily is up there with Alive or Just Breathing. I have always said those two albums were so much like Metallica's Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets. Meaning the songs were similar and how both albums were at the top of their game.

What sucks is that their last album was a "return to form" so to speak after the mediocre Daylight Dies. I was really excited to see what they were going to come up with, especially with everyone sort of doing their own thing. It would have been interesting to see what they could have produced after being apart for so long.

Now this opens the door for Jesse to return to KsE, but who knows if he will. He did the Times of Grace project with Adam D. and the touring version of the band features a couple of KsE members. I hope he does. Times of Grace was awesome and at times was reminiscent of KsE.

If I couldn't get Jesse back there is only one singer off the top of my head that could pull it off and that would be Jimmie Strimmell of Dead By April/Nightrage fame. I think he would be great in that role. He isn't allowed to do the clean vocals anymore for DbA so why not?

Video Killed the Radio Star: Times of Grace - Live in Love

Great video. I love videos that have a purpose instead of just showing guys playing guitars. The message at the end made me feel like I was watching our school's Peer Counseling video they put out every year. Even though I would love this song, I doubt anyone else would. But the message is a good one.

Heck if you aren't into metal, turn it down to watch the stats they show. And as for the message being good...here's the lyrics;

Just live in love, believe in love

In my life I have seen all the ways hatred destroys mankind
Break societies system, change the mind state, there's no compromise
Don't mistake kindness and compassion for weakness
It takes so much more strength to be selfless and live in love

I trust you live in selflessness and live in love

Through all the days, just live in love
Through all the pain, believe in love

(I change to think you not, it tries to function if this world...)
Take the time to think about your life, live righteous

I trust you live in selflessness and live in love

Through all the days, just live in love
Through all the pain, believe in love

The words we speak, the ones we don't say
Power you don't know you could say
Through all the days, believe in love

Don't you see, we are off
Don't you see, we are off
Brothers and sisters, we are one
Brothers and sisters, we are one
WE ARE ONE

And I pray this is not in vain, all that you know about, all you can hide
How would you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide
How would you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide (Through all the days)
How would you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide (Through all the pain)
How would you feel inside (Live in love)

Who Decides: Mid-Albums of the Year 2011

This will probably be the hardest year for me putting together a Top 10 list.  If this list isn't already packed, I have Trivium, In Flames, Sepultura, Dead by April, Blood Stain Child, Unearth, Anthrax and who knows what else.  It's an awesome year for metal music, so let's get started;

1(tie).  Mercenary - Metamorphosis: I talked about this album HERE already.  And there isn't much I can add.  It's near perfection. Each song is heavy & catchy with killer vocals.  I'm not sure what else you could ask for in a metal album.

1(tie).  Times of Grace - Times of Grace: Reviewed HERE.  This isn't a more "metal" album than Mercenary, but it is a more complete album.  You have some acoustic tracks, some doom-like tracks, and some classic metal tracks.  It's a great album.  The worst part for both of these albums is that they might not end up number 1 at the end of the year.

3.  Cavalera Conspiracy - Blunt Force Trauma:  I was not a fan of Infliked or the last two Soulfly albums, but this one hits the spot for me.  It is very light on the whole "tribal metal", but Marc Rizzo definitely makes up for it with his guitar work.  For some reason I feel like I am listening to some NWOBHM with harsh vocals thrown on top of it.  Right now, this is my surprise album of the year.

From here on out, these albums can change from day to day.  It's not like they aren't good, they are so good it's difficult to put them in order.

4.  Before the Fall - Antibody: brutal modern industrial style metal.  I have always had a soft spot for bands like Fear Factory, Strapping Young Lad, and Divine Hersey, and Before the Fall are in that same vein.  Don't hold your breath waiting for that clean chorus...cause it ain't coming.

5.  Lazarus A.D. - Black Rivers Flow: a more mature Lazarus A.D. shows up this time around.  Still thrash-oriented, but they aren't afraid to slow it down and push the envelope.  Some real solid metal here for classic metal fans.

6.  Sylosis - Edge of the Earth: this one reminds me a little of Machine Head's The Blackening.  It is a long album and takes some time to digest.  Musically it sounds a lot like Metallica's classic albums of MoP, RtL, and AJFA.  Vocally, mainly harsh screams.  It works, but I think the lack of variety hurts this just a bit.

7.  Deadlock - Bizzaro World:  I talked about it HERE.  It's solid, nothing new, but nothing bad if you liked their last 3 albums.  I said they were going into that KsE path of writing the same music over and over again.  I'm not sure another album like this will work.

8.  Soul Cycle - Soul Cycle: Soul Cycle play instrumental classic thrash metal.  It's good.  I talked about the high amount of solid instrumental albums HERE earlier.  If you like thrash and don't need vocals to enjoy the music...this is a must.

9.  Amaranthe - Amaranthe: I talked about them last year and finally the album is here.  This is pop metal at its best.  Female, clean male, and harsh male vocals really works well here.  If you don't mind keyboards playing a big part of the music, then try this.

10. Tyrant of Death - Dark Space: another instrumental album.  Think SYL meets Fear Factory without the vocals.  It's great heavy metal...the guitars and drumming are insane.

This can change any day because bands like DevilDriver, The Haunted, Protest the Hero, The Human Abstract, Inside It Grows, Titans Eve, Degradead, Arch Enemy, Izegrim, Artas, Circles, and Mygrain have all released solid albums.  Each one of the bands mentioned could easily end up in the top 10.

But just do some quick math, there are 10 above, plus the 12 that barely missed out, and the 7 known albums that haven't been released.  That's 29 albums I am looking at trying to narrow to 10.  good luck to me.

Music Non Stop: New Trivium - In Waves

Wow...this is good, not as good as Shattering the Skies Above, but still better than most of The Crusade. As of right now, I still have Mercenary or Times of Grace as my favorite album, but this might make the top spot.  Trivium is easily my favorite "new band" out there right now and this new song is hopefully the tip of the iceberg.

Tirades of Truth: Mercenary - Metamorphosis

Holy crap! I thought when Times of Grace released their debut, that it would easily be my favorite album of the year. If not Times of Grace, then maybe Trivium or DevilDriver, but Mercenary? Never. They dumped their "clean vocalist" and keyboardist (not that big to me) and their first single didn't really do much for me. I was worried about the production. Well they are streaming the entire album HERE and let me tell you...it's amazing. By the way, while you are listening to the stream, check out THIS. A nice explanation of the songs and their origin. Funny see the explanation of The Black Brigade.

I have listened to this stream a couple of times and I can't believe how good this is. The loss of the clean vocalist isn't even noticed. There are a couple of times I thought he came back to record a couple of songs, Velvet Lies anyone? And well...keyboards? Who needs them? They even put in a cool orchestral piece in In a River of Madness. Rene has such a range and would probably make my top 10 list of vocalists if I redid it. He goes from singing, to growls, to death, to almost a rock voice. It's amazing.

One thing that makes Mercenary one of my favorites is the pure "heaviness" they are able to create. I mentioned The Endless Fall before, and Metamorphosis is no different. There are parts of songs that make my speakers almost explode. I used to think Fear Factory or even DevilDriver were the heaviest band I had, but I am wrong. Mercenary takes it easily.

So is there anything wrong with this album? Not sure. I would probably have to listen to it more, but the one thing that caught my attention was that the solos weren't too impressive. But honestly when you can create riffs that would probably scare a little kid I can let the super Eddie Van Halen solos slide.

I can't wait to get this on CD so I can hear a better quality than a web stream.

One last thing...their new logo. I have their old logo on the top of my page, under Metallica. But the new one is pretty cool a lot better than their old one. Seriously, how cool is this thing?

A lot more "in your face" than before. Another nice touch. Do I dare call the album of the year now? It's kind of hard not to.

Tirades of Truth: Times of Grace - The Hymn of a Broken Man

So this past Saturday I got a late Christmas present in the form of a sign copy of the debut album from Times of Grace. Who? Jesse Leach and Adam Dutkiewicz that's who. Jesse was lead vocals of Killswitch Engage for their first 2 albums, which includes their ground-breaking album Alive or Just Breathing. I can't talk enough about how great that album is, you can read my thoughts on it HERE. And as far as Jesse is concerned, he is an awesome vocalist. He's in my top 10 vocalists...that's how good he is. And after this album, he is definitely moving up. Adam is still in KsE and according to interviews these songs were written while Adam was recovering from a surgery.

Onto the album. I have listened to this thing pretty much non-stop since Saturday and I gotta say it doesn't disappoint. If you are a fan of KsE, you will like what you hear. Parts of the album are very reminiscent of KsE (Strength in Numbers, Fight for Life, Live in Love, Hope Remains), you get the double bass, the weird vocal distortion that was used on AoJB. The lyrics are totally a throw-back to AoJB. They are powerful that's the best way I can sum them up. AoJB had some uplifting lyrics, and The Hymn of a Broken Man takes that concept and builds on it. Check out the lyrics from Live in Love;

Just live in love, believe in love

In my life I have seen all the ways they tried (to destroy mankind)
Break societies system, change the mercy, there's no compromise
Don't mistake kindness and compassion for weakness
It takes so much more strength to be selfless and live in love

I trust you live in selflessness and live in love

Through all the days, just live in love
Through all the pain, believe in love

(I change to think you not, it tries to function if this world...)
Take the time to think about your life, live righteous

I trust you live in selflessness and live in love

Through all the days, just live in love
Through all the pain, believe in love

The words we speak, the ones we don't say
Power you don't know you could say
Through all the days, believe in love

Don't you see, we are all
Don't you see, we are all
Brothers and sisters, we are one
Brothers and sisters, we are one
WE ARE ONE

And I pray this is not in vain, all that you know about, all you can hide
All that you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide
All that you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide (Through all the days)
All that you feel inside (Live in love)
All that you know about, all you can hide (Through all the pain)
All that you feel inside (Live in love)

When this project was announced, both Jesse and Adam tried to distance it from KsE, for obvious reasons. I was expecting a rock album, but the dual vocals from Jesse are back stronger than ever. Adam's vocals are present as well, but it's Jesse that really shines on this album. His clean vocals were developed more over the years through Seemless and they work great here. His death metal screams are as good as ever if not stronger than his previous albums. The first track Strength in Numbers could have been on any KsE album and it really sets the pace for the entire album.



So the question comes up, is this just KsE without Howard on vocals? And the answer is no. First off, Adam throws in some pretty nice guitar solos, which are never present in KsE (for whatever reason). Secondly, the music does stray away from that metalcore sound that KsE helped create. Take a song like The Forgotten One. It is an acoustic ballad, with a country feel to it. No screams, just some beautiful music. And it's not alone, The End of Eternity never kicks into full speed and has some killer vocals on top of it, but parts of it are just breathtaking. Fall from Grace is similar to The End of Eternity in terms of tempo, but once again it's Jesse's vocals that make this track shine.



I can't forget to mention the fact that all of the instruments were played by Adam Dutkiewicz. I knew he played drums in KsE before moving to guitar, but the fact that he wrote the entire album speaks volumes of his talent. On top of that, he also produced the album. Now he has produced some great albums (All That Remains, As I Lay Dying, and Killswitch Engage to name a few), but he might be the most under-rated man in music today. He gets a bad rap for running around on stage with cape playing guitar, looking like an ass at times, but he is one talented man.

This is a solid album. From start to finish it is everything I was hoping and so much more. I loved their work on KsE, so why would I want them to stray too far from it? This is the KsE that should have been after The End of Heartache. It is enough of the old KsE, yet it takes some chances and pushes those boundaries that we fans put up. As I said in the beginning, if you are a fan of KsE, pick this up you won't be disappointed.

I hope this isn't a one time collaboration between these two. I am curious to see where this progresses from here. If I had to speculate, I would say probably more of the slower tempo songs. Anyway, it's been a long time since I started off the year with such a strong album, it will be interesting to see where it ends the year.

Music Non Stop: 2011 already?

Is it too early to look ahead at some albums for 2011? After all, 2010 hasn't been stellar as I am still trying to round out my Top 10.

Well here are some albums I am already looking forward to.
Deadlock - Bizarro World. With a title like that, I know I can expect some good things. Deadlock is all over the place at times. Sometimes they are At the Gates with females vocals on the top and other times they throw in techno, jazz, and rap. Whatever they might be this time, this should be good.

Dead by April They have a EP coming out in January and then an LP later the same year. The EP will have a couple of new songs and some "heavier" versions of some songs off the debut album. If you recall my review of the band, I said they needed to be a little heavier for me, so this has definitely peaked my interest.

Lazarus A.D. - Black River Flows. About time. This band released their debut in 2007, then re-released it 2008 or 2009 after some remixing by James Murphy (I really hope Arcania does something similar). The song they released for the teaser isn't a total thrasher like pretty much anything off of their debut, but it is still good. Lazarus A.D. has potential and for me a lot is riding on this album.


Times of Grace Jesse Leach and Mike D. from Killswitch Engage are back together. Now I love Alive or Just Breathing...love it. When these guys got back together they said not to expect AoJB2, that it would be more rock. Well listening to the samples it sounds amazing. It isn't AoJB2, it is something that has evolved from that. This is the one I can't wait for.


So there you go, four albums that probably would have made my top 10 this year. I really can't wait for these albums. Oh well, let's wrap up 2010 already.