Seb’s weblog

Some people who know me have probably expected that I would do such a review, but it is very hard to summarize and write about such an album that I have been waiting for years like many other fans. And it is also hard to judge songs as new when I have been listening to some since 2001 (with bootlegs from the Vegas shows, not to mention the 2006 Paris concert that I attended where 5 songs from the album only released last week were played).

Is this the best album ever made? I wouldn’t say so. Is it a good album? Yes, sure! Would it please a Appetite for Destruction-era fan? I wouldn’t bet on it. It somehow sounds like Guns n’ Roses, but with less a stone-esque, punkish sound. This is overall a really good rock album, but it is overproduced at times and contains last-minute glitches and dubious choices (most that can only be really heard by those who have been following the various leaks).
(more…)

People, if Chinese Democracy was already reported to have cost $13M in 2001, maybe giving such a number now would be misleading since most of the tracks were recorded a few more times since then.

If the world is gorgeous. Not that much of a rocker, but mind-blowing in its kind.

Replacing Brian May’s nice and clean job with some butchered (probably fretless) thing.
(more…)

Usually, I write a post with a list of CD I recently acquired with a short review of mine. Well, that’s “usually”, but I haven’t done so in a while, so I kind of lost track of the CD I reviewed (or what my review would be), so I won’t list everything, but just the most important ones:

• Red Harvest, Bloodsimple: Great, Impressive, Aggressive. It just rocks. This is just grand: The first song with lyrics from Jim Morrison, or Dead Man Walking which makes me want to kill someone (or at least to get a try at the mosh pit if I ever cross them on stage), and the drummer is great (since they seem to be a Spinal Tap story hiding, I wonder if it sounds the same live). So many headbanging songs! My only regret would be that sometimes the singer sounds like James Hetfield and I ain’t no ‘tallica fan!
• Chicken Noodles II, Buckethead & Travis Dickerson. I know, I sound like a Bucket fan, but really, this one is different. Is that a bird? A plane? Superman? Hendrix? No, that’s Buckethead! It sounds so bluesy and soulful that at first I could hardly believe my ears.
• whatever, Paul Gilbert: He’s damn good. But it’s far better (or less cheesy) when he doesn’t sing, really.
• Red Album, Baroness: Recent but vintage sounding, sometimes feeling like the doors gone metal. Weird but not that bad.

Dear Trent,

Your website sucks. Deeply. Oh, not as much as, say, voyage-sncf (which is the high level standard for suckage), but it sucks in its own way. It sometimes looks (and works) like a weblog or even a photoblog, but there’s no history. And when you’re posting 5-6 photos in a row, only crackheads doing a reload every minute can have a chance to pick all of them.

Your website sucks. And to compensate the high suckage level of your website, people built their own website posting everything you post there. But like I said, if they don’t have enough crack incoming, they might miss a post every now and then.

There are different solutions. You could probably enable full content in the corresponding feed, this way we will at least be able to see the content and you won’t have to change the visual aspect of your site, if that’s the problem. And this way, we don’t have to think about the thousands of fan comments (“I love you, Trent”, “come play to my house”, “alessandro is so sexy”, etc…). And I know you can post this content to the full-content feed, because you just do it for the “real” news. Another solution would be to post those pictures on flickr. It’s not like it would be difficult, again, since you’re already doing it for a selection of photos. Having pixelised phone camera pictures in the middle of dark blurry in-concert (not even large) pictures wouldn’t be such a drama.

Thanks for listening, Trent. Think of the ki^H^Hwebsite.

PS: don’t forget to free Robin in time for the VMA. Let him rehearse a bit, I’m sure Josh can help him too.

I ain’t no number, but I got my copy of The Slip

• Resurrection, Chimaira: Brutal and well-executed metal. Real good, nothing to complain about;
• Diatribes, Napalm Death: Even though I went to their concert, I don’t think I heard any of those songs, but Cursed to crawl is one my favorite from the songs I knew beforehand;
• Angel Down, Sebastian Bach: He told the press that he wanted a huge drum sound. I’m not convinced on this one, but I was amazed at how heavy the guitars sounded. However, some songs just sound like cliché, so it overall gets a thumb down;
• The Wall, Pink Floyd: Did I already tell you that I dislike thin fender-like guitar sound? Well it is still true;
• “V” is for Viagra, Puscifer: Country boner is enough to give the record any bonus point, really;
• Anthems for the damned, Filter: I expected a lot from this band and I was a bit deceived. It’s a bit of a mix between Army of anyone (which wasn’t already what I expected), John5 (he has a distinctive notmykind of sound) and some kind of a Filter-best-of (I mean: there are almost the same guitar riffs from another song). Not convinced;
• Retox, Turbonegro: Maybe a bit darker than Party animals but still good rock & roll stuff;
• No, Virginia, The Dresden Dolls: I still can’t find the catchy songs from the first album, and it feels like the overall drums/piano interaction is more casual;
• Scarlet’s Walk, Tori Amos: nice songs, and still a good mastering of the sounds and the mixing table;
• Keep Telling Myself It’s Alright, Ashes Divide: It sometimes sounds like A Perfect Circle with a different singer, or with a different tempo but still with catchy songs. But every now and then, it would be closer to a so-so college rock band, where something important is missing.

(more…)

and if you listen closely, new song #2 piano part was played during concerts, years ago.

And the evening started by being wet. Awfully wet, when a small storm erupted just at the time of the door opening.

Anyway, I entered quite in time (just wishing I had dry pants handy) to watch the first-first part assumed by Warbringer. I know a bit Napalm Death and that their genre is some kind of death-grind-core metal thingie. And really, I didn’t expect Warbringer’s Thrash sound, and they’re quite good at it with a Slayer kind of style! One bad thing is that all the songs seemed to talk about the same shit, end of the world and all. And the other “bad” thing from their work is that they damn look young! I don’t know how old they are, but if I were to handle the drinks, I kindda would ask them for their ID first! But quite good anyway, and I love the right-stage guitar player’s (John Laux) energy.

Let’s shuffle a bit the stage and enters Suffocation. A bit closer to Napalm Death in vocal genre, but still with good shredders on guitars. (sorry, not much else to say)

And then, Napalm Death. The singer is somehow “bizarre”. I mean, he could be my neighbor or a co-worker, the way he looks when entering the stage, and I love his english accent and his anti-religion rants. But then, the songs start and he “sings”. I’m not that much into the whole death-grind vocal style, but they’re good anyway. I only had a hard time with the tempo changes when sometimes it gets really fast and it gets hard to headbang. But in the end… it rocks! There were plenty of crowd surfers, no smokers and a good sound.