Trollheart

I had to include both of these, although they're by the same artiste.



This is sung to the tune of “Iron man” and even has Ozzy in a cameo getting furious that he's been ripped off! Not to mention the two young ladies in the video, one “Naughty” and one “Nice”! I know which I'd prefer! Great lyric: “Full of Christmas cheer/ He only has to work one day a year” and “Millions of kids out there/ Santa must be a millionaire”! Excellent.



And this is hilarious! Crossdressing song set to the tune of “Winter Wonderland” --- “In the snow there's a teddy, with straps like spaghetti”. Wonderful stuff. And very weird. In a good way.


What can you say about “The 12 lays of Christmas”? I should be so lucky! Good singer though.

Another favourite (!) of The Batlord, here's Insane Clown Posse with their take on Christmas.


No idea what album it's from --- and I trawled through their discography in case it showed up but no luck --- but it's pretty funny, with a healthy dose of angry.

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Trollheart

Time to wrap things up and set out the cookies for Santy! All of my journals will, as ever, be closed tomorrow, Christmas Day, though technically of course they won't: you can read them, but there won't be any new entries made until St. Stephen's Day (or Boxing Day if you're not in Ireland) when they will start being updated again.

Just like to say thanks to all who have patronised and kept my journals going with your comments and contributions, and even though I was away for several months this year it seems people for some reason still want to read what I write. Talk about your Christmas miracles!

Anyway, wherever you are, whether there's snow on the ground or the sun is burning high in the sky, whether you believe in Jesus or not, whether you celebrate the holiday season or whether you are just looking forward to a break from work, may you all have a very Happy Christmas and I'll see you all back here on Friday.

Nollaig Shona, Joyeux Noel, Felices Navidades, Glædelig Jul, Hyvää Joulua, Frohe Weihnachten, VrolijkKerstfeest , Buon Natale, Glædelig Jul Wesołych Świąt and Merry Christmas to all my friends and (almost) family here!

A few quick mentions, though this is by no means a full list, but some people I would like to single out for thanks and to send peaceful and happy wishes to at this holiday time. If you're not mentioned here it probably means you didn't make enough sacrifices in my temples this year. Or that I forgot you. Probably the latter. Don't feel bad: I'm an old man and my memory is going. What was I saying again? Oh yeah... these guys...

Vanilla, Roxy, Urban, Briks, Machine, Frownland, Pet_Sounds, Unknown Soldier, WWWP, Exo, Justin, Anteater, Misspoptart, Goofle, Janszoon, Ki and Lil, Wpnfire, WhateverDude, YorkeDaddy, Plankton, Neapolitan, Mondo, Chula Vista, Oriphiel, Freebase, Fetcher, Moss, Blaro and of course The Batlord!

May you all have a rockin' Christmas! See ya on the other side!

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The Batlord

I'm pretty sure it was from an EP or something... nope, apparently it was from some comp called Holiday Heat. They did have a Christmas EP though. And am I to understand that you actually liked the song?

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Trollheart

Yeah it was pretty damn funny to be honest: "Where's Santa?"
"Get your ass off to bed! He comes round here he's gettin' a bullet!" (or something close)

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The Batlord

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Trollheart

Happy Christmas all! Hope everyone had a great festive season. Not that it's over, but time for me at least to try to get back into doing some writing in my journals. And what better place to start than with

You don't want to know, and I don't want to tell you, what a scumbag my father is, but I can't really relate this story without referring to him, as he pretty much drives it. When I was young --- I'm talking maybe seven, eight years old --- we would always know that Christmas was on the way because we would be told to write our letters to Santa and they would, quite literally, be sent up the chimney to disappear in a puff of smoke, we always somehow rationalising that this was a passage to the North Pole and that the Big Guy would by some magical means be able to receive our letters, the Christmas decorations, including the big old servicable tree that had stood in the living room for what seemed like a decade or more, would make their annual appearance but more importantly and more remembered, the other mysterious pilgrimage from the attic would begin.

Like most, if not all households, we used our attic to store things that were only required every so often, as well as things that were probably never to be seen again --- dolls my elder sister had grown out of, tricycles we were too big to ride, old toys --- and this of course included Christmas decorations but more importantly to this story, the owl fella's collection of records. We had an ancient radiogram in the sitting room. You probably don't know what that is, unless you're old as me (and even then you may not) but basically it was a huge, squat monster than looked kind of like a large fruit machine or one of those old vending machines that used to dispense cigarettes in hotel lobbies and the like. It was bloody massive, and heavy, made of probably oak but certainly some heavy wood, with varnished knobs for turning the sound up and down (no bass or treble in those days) and a tuning knob for the radio.

My mother (God rest her soul) would always try to make things as pleasant for us as possible, and we would all get lost in the busy Christmas atmosphere as streamers (paper ribbons) would be carefully and meticulously stretched from one corner of the ceiling, to terminate by the lightbulb, another at right angles to that from the opposite side and then two more, so that we would, at the end, if done correctly, have an “X” of coloured paper with the light as its central point. Other decorations would be hung, from the ceiling and pinned to the walls, and although in latter years I've come to appreciate the logic behind the maxim “less is more”, back then we had every type of decoration imaginable, from happy Christmas Carollers in a Victorian setting on the wall to Santa himself smiling from the door. Real holly would be hung over the fireplace (eliciting some very annoyed gasps as the thorns invariably stuck into our flesh as we tried to arrange the damn thing properly, only to have it fall down again as we stood back to admire our work, and took the name of he for whom the season is named rather in vain!) and candles would be put out.

The traditional unravelling of the Christmas tree lights would begin, and go on, many not working but you could get it to obey you if you twisted each of the tiny bulbs until you discovered which one was faulty, and reindeer and snowmen and little parcels and sticks and angels all eventually depended from the branches of the old, worn-out tree, which looked, when fully dressed, as if it might topple over in despair, just give up the ghost. But it never did. The floor would become sticky with little pine needles, and the paper angel on top of the tree would glare down at us from her high perch as if to say Are you sure this is safe? I often think now that we put up so much decorations as a sort of defence against our real, true, non-Christmas lives, though I at the time was too young to realise what was going on when I went to bed. I think my ma made sure that we were almost overburdened with Christmas, as if she could block out the fear and the tension that permeated every other day of the year, as if somehow the magic of Christmastime would dispel the darkness we lived under, blow the black cloud away and usher in a time of forbearance and peace. When she hung our Christmas sacks up (we didn't use stockings in Ireland, or at least in my house anyway) I often think sadly and angrily now that the only thing that she had on her own Christmas list was a peaceful and safe time for us all. We eventually got that, but it would only come about by the removal of the architect of our fear and oppression, whereupon we would all begin bright new lives. That was, however, a long time away yet.

Radiograms were what the name suggested: a combination of a radio (probably only Long Wave and Medium Wave, no FM in those days either) and a record-player (gramaphone), with its speakers built into the imposing surround of the thing, never seen, an integral part of the beast. There was of course no CD player, such things having yet to be invented, and no tape deck. The only USB we knew at that time stood for “Up Stairs to Bed”, so no, it didn't hook to any computer. Even those were in short supply in the early seventies. The radiogram used a curious arrangement for its records which was carried on in early record players, whereby you could “stack” two or three albums (or singles) above the turntable while another was playing, and when that one ended the mechanism would automatically drop the next one down, whereupon hitting the platter it would begin to play.

Now of course this was a very bad idea: a record slapping down onto another record was liable to scratch not only itself but the one now beneath it (and again, as the third one plopped down), and of course as the amount of records built up the stylus of the needle would have more trouble making an impression, leading to the higher likelihood of scratches developing. The only real plus side was that you could load up, I think about four records maybe, and then sit down and listen to them without having to get back up. Yes, again, remote controls were a long way off. Naturally, you could only listen to side one of each album, but then you could always turn them all over, stack 'em up and go again for the second side.

The point about all this is that, every Christmas, at least when I was young, the father would bring a chair up to the landing and prise open the attic doorway, then we would be sent up to the dark, forbidding, dusty and frankly scary space to locate and haul out his private stash of LPs. These were all 78s (which meant they ran at 78 RPM, or revolutions per minute, a standard soon dropped as the more popular 33 RPM for albums and 45 RPM for singles became the accepted benchmark) and were very old. I would say they were pressed maybe in the forties. The covers were all, naturally, quite dusty, despite having been kept in boxes all year, and they had an unmistakable aroma about them, a smell of wax and plastic I always came to associate with the festive period.

From January to mid-December these albums may as well not have existed. My father was not one to play music; perhaps the radio, but even with such a relatively reasonable collection of records he did not play them at all. It was only when Christmas arrived that we would see these almost legendary discs, and marvel at the colourful covers on each, and the odd names ---- Como, Sinatra, Williams, Crosby. These were, I believe, the first ever records of any sort I saw with my own eyes and held with my own hands, and of course as the only entertainment available I listened to them avidly as they spun around on the ancient turntable with many a squeak and crackle, a pop and a hiss as the abused needle laboured across scratches and indentations made years before. The sleeves were stiff and did not bend (nor did the records themselves, as I found to my cost one year when one snapped in half!) and were very colourful. Patriarchs of family value Christmas smiled out of them at me; Perry Como with a pipe in his mouth and a scarf wrapped around his neck, Nat “King” Cole relaxing in a rocking chair with a trumpet by his side, Connie Francis smiling winsomely beside a large Christmas tree. But though these images have faded into my already-failing memory over time, one sleeve always remains there, etched in my mind almost from the pure difference of it as from anything else.

I could not tell you what the record was called, though I believe it had something to do with nursery rhymes for children, and depicted, on a blue and white sleeve, a young child (I could not say then even if it was meant to be a boy or a girl, and perhaps that was left deliberately ambiguous by the artist) running up a flight of stairs, their shadow thrown in large, grotesque relief on the wall before them, in a nightshirt and cap, with a candle in hand. I always remember being vaguely afraid of this picture, I don't know why. Perhaps it was the pure terror of going up the stairs alone in the dark, which was not something at the tender age of seven I relished --- we all know the monsters that wait at the top of the stairs to grab the boy or girl who is not quick enough to turn on the light in time, and also that humming or talking to yourself keeps them at bay until you can reach that switch.

I got to know the records also by the labels. There was Decca, blue I believe with silver writing. Another was black with silver and then there was HMV, which at the time was called by its full name, His Master's Voice, a dark red label with that famous dog listening to the old gramaphone. That one always stood out to me. I also used to look at the back of the album sleeves, and inside too, where you would find advertisements for such giants as Dave Brubeck and Miles Davis, though I of course at the time had no idea who they were, nor Pete Seeger. But there was something otherworldly about them, almost alien in that they could be anyone, from anywhere, and with their wise faces --- usually, but not always smiling: Davis looked very grumpy --- they seemed like teachers awaiting the chance to impart important and perhaps forbidden knowledge to me. Their silent entreaties, however, fell on deaf ears.

I think, when I do think about it now, that the reason I never got into any of these artistes --- unlike some of you, who were drawn to their parents' music --- is that he never encouraged me, or any of us, to explore the music. He never spoke about it. In fact, when he put the records on it was in silence, almost reverential but also a sullen silence, as if he were grudgingly allowing us to share in something he considered his. You can listen to these but they're mine. Possibly why he only played them at Christmas. As a result, I grew up scornful of these artistes and wove my own musical path of preference as I grew older, a path which diverged sharply from the music my father played, but never really seemed to love or even like. It was almost a ritual, a robot placing platters on a disc thanks to some long-forgotten program that was still running, unattended and unremarked upon, its original purpose long forgotten and no longer cared about. Also, we did not have a choice: we could not leave the room; once the records were on the turntable we were required to listen, whether we liked it or not. I associated these men and women with that world and resolved to have nothing to do with it.

My father had no idea how to treat records either. Even at this early age I seemed to realise that handling the vinyl as he did --- picking it up by the corner and pulling it out of the sleeve --- was wrong, but what did I know? He would often put the records back in their stiff sleeves without bothering to also use the inner sleeve, which was there to protect the record from the harsher, sharper edges on the outer sleeve. The needle on the radiogram too, would only get the most cursory breath over it to dislodge any heavy dust and he never dusted the records themselves, leading to more scratches each year and the albums becoming less listenable every subsequent Christmas, and I doubt he ever changed the stylus, but it served us well.

All this side, there was a definite magical air that settled over the house as Bing Crosby would begin singing about “White Christmas” or Cole would intone the first lines of “The Christmas Song”, and for a while peace would reign in the world, and it really did feel like Christmas. Once the season had passed though, the radiogram would be shut down and unplugged, and we would have to wait another eleven-and-a-half months until the ghosts from Christmas Past would again rise from the attic and regale us with songs we had heard, many times before, but never got tired of listening to, clustered around the squat musical monster as we shut out the real world for a week or so and tried, for that period, to be a normal family.

Sometimes it even worked...

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Trollheart

When I started this section originally its purpose was to look at songs whose lyrics focussed on, shall we say, unusual themes, then it became a case of questioning what a song was all about when I touched on Duran Duran's “The Reflex”. Now, I'd like to widen that scope somewhat, by examining song whose lyrics are neither obscure nor odd, and which can easily be understood and are written about normal themes, but that within those lyrics still produce the same reaction, one that can only be summed up in the phrase

On the face of it, this is a song written, perhaps autobiographically, or at least semi-autobiographically, as a performer prepares to go on tour, leaving his fiance behind. He's sad to go, and unable to face months or longer without her, wakes her one more time as his taxi waits outside to take him to the airport. All tender and loving and very well and good on the face of it.

On the face, I say, of it.

But look deeper now with me into the true message behind the song...

Leaving on a jet plane --- Peter, Paul and Mary --- written by John Denver --- 1969

Oddly enough, not a hit or even released as a single by the country legend, this song became a huge hit for Peter, Paul and Mary at the tail-end of the sixties and certainly served to raise Denver's profile. But it's the second verse that disturbs me, where Denver blithely confesses to having not one, not two, but “so many” affairs, and he does this as he cravenly prepares to leave his lover for some time, as she is only half-awake. We only ever hear his side of the conversation, and it's possibly to be supposed that the woman has not woken up and he is singing to her while she sleeps (another layer of cowardice to add to if so) but let's just envisage the full text here, and fill in what I believe would be the woman's replies.

To keep it simple, let's jump in at the second verse, because up until then, if the woman is awake, it's a fairly innocuous and loving exchange. But this is where Denver “comes clean” and where I see the trouble beginning. The woman's imagined responses are in brackets.

“There are so many times that I have let you down” (Uh, what? What do you --- yawn --- what --- what do you mean by that, honey?)
“So many times that I have played around” (Are you telling me --- are you saying you've been unfaithful? You're telling me now, as I'm only half-awake and you're on your way out the fucking door??)
“I tell you now, they don't mean a thing.” (Oh well you would say that wouldn't you? If they don't mean a thing why did you have the affairs? I tell you what, they mean something to me! They mean you can't keep it in your pants, you cocky little fucker!)
“Every place I go I will think of you” (Yeah, while you're banging your latest conquest in whatever seedy hotel room you take her --- or them --- to! You make me sick!)
“Every song I sing I will sing for you” (Save it pal! Sing your songs --- which, while we're being all honest and forthright here, I never cared for --- to your little groupie sluts!)
“When I come back I'll bring your wedding ring” (The only thing you can bring me --- other than fucking syphilis from all the whores you've fucked --- is your dick on a platter, you cunt!)
“So kiss me and smile for me” (Like fuck! Why should I? You bastard!)
“Tell me that you'll wait for me” (Like YOU waited for ME when you were on tour last time? Why should I? Garry down the road has always been eyeing me up, and you know what? This time I'm gonna let him get what he wants. See how YOU like it!)
“Hold me like you'll never let me go” (I'll hold your fucking balls in a vise, you scumbag!)
“Cause I'm a leavin' on a jet plane” (Don't let me stop you: airport's that way)
“Don't know when I'll be back again” (Hopefully never. With a bit of luck your plane will crash and I won't have to ever hear your whiny voice again!)
“Oh babe I hate to go”. (Sure you do. Just get the fuck out of my house and don't bother ever coming back! I'm going back to sleep. You know where the door is. And tell that fucking taxi to stop blowin' his horn or I'll come down there and make him eat his licence plate! Go fuck yourself!)

After all, how weak and ineffectual an apology/admission is this, that he waits until he is leaving, until the taxi is actually outside, waking her up to say “Bye honey oh and by the way I've screwed a lot of women over the years we've been together, but it doesn't matter cos they meant nothing, and on my return we'll be married. How does he think he's going to get away with that?

Yeah, I know: I need help!

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The Batlord

That song will forever remind me of Armageddon and Ben Affleck singing.

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Trollheart

I heard a lot about this band (though had never even heard of them never mind heard anything by them) and resolved to try them out. Before I start though I would like to bring up one of my old bugbears --- there he is: ain't he cute? --- that being the propensity of bands who have had more than one album to self-title one of their subsequent offerings. I don't get it. I can understand at the beginning, starting out, a band wants to get themselves known, wants their name out there, so they may title their debut album the same as their band name. But once they've been established, why do this on later albums? To me, it's pure laziness: what will we call the new album? Ah, let's just use our name! Fuck that. Genesis did it and I was not happy. Metallica did it and nobody was happy. I'm pretty sure Beyonce did it, but then who cares?

There's no excuse for it. And not only that, but anyone who doesn't know the band might think they are buying the debut album, so it's a little disingenuous too I feel. This is Nothing More's sixth album, in a career spanning over a decade now, so why be so bland about the title? It's not like they've struggled to name other albums --- “Madhatter's bliss”, “Save you/Save me”, “The Few not fleeting” ... they've obviously got ideas, but this time around they've opted just to call the album “Nothing More”, and that sets me personally off on a bad footing. Now, admittedly, this then marks their tenth anniversary, so maybe there's something in that; maybe they're setting down a marker and saying we remember our roots.

But I still don't like it.

And it's not a good way to go into a review of an album by a band you have never experienced before. I'm not saying my mind is made up or anything, or that I'm already biased against them, but in a subconscious fashion I'm telling them they had better live up to the hype I've heard about them, because they have performed the equivalent of my cat pushing in my door and waking me at 4am from a lovely dream, and I am less than well-disposed towards them.



Nothing More --- Nothing More --- 2014 (Eleven Seven Music)

Seems this is the first album to be released on a professional label, as the other five are all under “Nothing More Music”, which you have to assume is either their own label or a code for self-release. Either way, Wiki has little on them and nor, surprisingly, does Encyclopaedia Metallum, which makes it a little hard to give any background on them. If they have their own website you can bet it will be a ... oh. Okay. It's not a Facebook or Myspace or even Bandcamp page, it is their own; however there is again no information about the band, so at the moment all I can tell you is that they're from San Antonio (Texas, boy!) and as I mentioned already have been around for ten years this year.

“Ocean floor” does not begin as I would expect it to, with a kind of backward-masking technique on the vocals (not really, but it's what it reminds me of) and a beat I would have more associated with a pop than a rock band really, but it's quite short and hammers in due course into “This is the time (Ballast)”, with a rough vocal from Johnny Hawkins, quite impressive in its range, and the man on the guitars is Mark Vollelunga. Sort of a growly vocal coming in every now and then, but this is still not quite as heavy as I would have expected, though this is the hit single from the album I believe. Are these guys then nu-metal? Alternative Metal? I suppose it doesn't matter but so far I don't hear too much of what I would really consider any sort of metal. Well, it's early days yet I guess. The track ends abruptly and skitters into “Christ copyright” (good title) where the guitar settles down after a while, and the beat comes together quite well. It's a faster song, quite melodic with a good vocal from Hawkins, some interesting effects and a sort of stuttering drumbeat from Paul O'Brien. Using some overdubs of evangelical speakers it's pretty clear what this song is about, and they're of course not the first to tread this path, nor will they be the last. The message, for me though, is a little lost in the sort of high-pitched, excited vocal that makes it a little difficult to make out the lyric over the thundering guitar and drums.

“Mr MTV” has some clever ideas, with an introduction ripped from Dire Straits' “Money for nothing”, and then interesting wordplay --- ”MT nation, MT youth of inspiration” --- a slower song with a quite aggressive punch to it, possibly the closest I've yet heard these guys come to true metal. Nice kind of reel almost on the guitar there near the end, sort of sounds more like keyboards but none are credited. There's a big guitar punch, rather appropriately, to “First punch”, and it's quite anthemic in its approach, no doubt inducing much air-punching on stage. The whole thing though has too much of a grunge feel to it to really interest me, at least so far. The growled vocals which are occasionally added seem like they're just put on there for effect, or because the band feel this is what they should be doing, what's expected of them. It's a decent song, certainly, but I'm not finding anything here that's winning me over to their side. I'm not saying I don't like them, but the claim of one member that this is the greatest album this year is so far something I'm finding hard to support.

It's a long album too, with fifteen tracks, though the Spotify copy I'm listening to seems to have seventeen. Guess two are bonus tracks, although they're oddly placed in the middle of the album rather than at the end. Still, fifteen tracks seems more than enough to listen to, given what I'm hearing, so I'll skip those other two. That brings us then to “Gyre”, which opens on a nice acoustic-y guitar, then some nice looping percussion takes in it, but they decide to use the death vocal here, plus some taped effects which I don't feel work that well really. Actually, I take that back: as the song progresses they fit in much better, and I don't actually think there's going to be a vocal here, the death one at the start just there for effect probably. Quite a nice little laidback track in fact, and the first that has made me think these guys could have something.

The beat kicks up for “The Matthew effect” and I'm reminded of Tiamat in places, Ten in others, and also Evanescence. Decent song but nothing special really; expectations falling after rising on listening to “Gyre”. The first ballad then comes in the shape of “I'll be ok”, with echoing drumbeats and a rather nice emotive guitar from Vollelunga, really like the vocal here. Another one that raises the possibility that this may be more than just another album. Maybe. “Here's to the heartache” is a bit punchier, with a very singable chorus, very catchy, almost Christmassy! Like this a lot I must admit. “If I were” is okay too, but there's something a little formulaic about it that disappoints me, almost alt-rock-by-numbers. Decent guitar solo though. There's a nice low-key opening to “Friendly fire”, then it explodes all over the place with guitars salvoing left, right and centre and drums hammering like falling bombs. Good stuff.

A telephone ringing kicks off a rather frenetic “Sex and lies”, which betrays influences from Maiden and Manowar with a striding, chugging guitar riff but a rather choppy, confused vocal line which I don't like. The chorus is, again, quite catchy though. The bridge manages to slip in the name of the band (and thus of the album) which I guess unofficially makes it the title track. The opening lines of “Jenny” pay homage to Nick Cave, so that's given them a boost in my book, and it's not a bad song either, as they dial back the frenzy for a short while before it goes into overdrive in what is becoming a slightly predictable manner. The closing tracks are the longest, with “God went north” clocking in at just over six minutes, though that's nothing compared to the almost-ten-minute final track. Before that though, there's a very progressive feel to the atmospheric opening of the penultimate track, and if keyboards are not used then I'm surprised because I feel it would be hard to make all these sounds on a fretboard. Anyway, it's a pretty epic song and features one of the strongest vocal performances yet from Johnny Hawkins, really impressive. The song develops really well as it goes along, hitting its apex in the fourth minute when Hawkins almost strains his voice hitting those higher notes but with real class. If more of the album was like this I think I'd be heaping praise on it for sure.

The song is slightly overextended however, with admittedly a nice almost acapella vocal ending that takes up nevertheless the last minute of the track, so it could have ended on the five-minute mark. So this just seems unnecessarily stretching the song out for no real reason. We've already had “Gyre”, now the closer is “Pyre”, which fades in slowly with wind sounds, distant thunder, very ambient, and considering it runs for just short of, as I said, ten minutes, I guess they're allowed to play with the intro a bit. It does go on like that for over three minutes though, before some spoken vocal chant or something comes in, so is this really necessary? Now some soft guitar is breaking in, very slowly, but we're now at the four-minute mark as slow percussion cuts in, now the fifth, and I have the uncomfortable feeling there may not be any song --- oh okay here it comes, but again it's pretty much instrumental played over some sort of lecture or something, very deep but I feel very much cheated that a ten-minute track has used half of that time to, well, do nothing really.

Now we get a vocal of sorts, but it's kind of just singing two lines as the lecture, symposium or whatever it is goes on in the background with the music as a backdrop. It's a clever idea sure, but do I want to hear nine minutes and fifty-five seconds of it? No, I do not, and if I were to play this album again (not by any means a certainty) I would probably skip this last track. I guess it's what you'd call ambient music, as the voice drops away and leaves only the music to fade us out, and I have a lot of time for ambient music, but on a supposedly rock album this is just too confusing for me and it leaves me with a vague feeling of being cheated.

Oh, and the last full minute has nothing but rain, wind and effects like those that started the album. So add up all the non-music parts and you get a staggering total of six minutes out of slightly less than ten which is, nothing really. So although I appreciate they had to build up the atmosphere and set the tone, realistically that song could have run for four minutes. A whole lot of padding, far too much for my tastes.

TRACKLISTING

1. Ocean floor
2. This is the time (Ballast)
3. Christ copyright
4. Mr. MTV
5. First punch
6. Gyre
7. The Matthew effect
8. I'll be ok
9. Here's to the heartache
10. If I were
11. Friendly fire
12. Sex and lies
13. Jenny
14. God went north
15. Pyre

Yeah, I'm just underwhelmed by this. I don't know what to make of it. It's absolutely in my opinion not metal; in places it's alt-rock, then it's almost pop and though Nothing More show their metal teeth once or twice, other times it's like some new-age effort where I keep expecting someone to try to convert me to their religion or at least sell me insurance. I don't know which way to jump, and in the end I'm just left frustrated. I wouldn't say it's a bad album, and given the diversity on it that's not of course a bad thing, but diversity can be a two-edged sword, and here I feel it is.

I get the impression that if I listened to the album a few more times I might get the hype, but as it says in my sig, I'm programmed to be very busy, and really most albums will only get one chance to impress me. This, on first listen, has not done that. I don't hate it but I don't love it. I actually don't know what to make of it.

But album of the year? The next big thing? Nah. It's a decent, interesting album.
(You know it's coming...)
Nothing more.

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Zhanteimi

You really need to calm down about that John Denver song. It's just a song.