Skip to main content

Baroness

20
Baroness

Baroness


This expansive Georgia band are possibly the most chameleon-like metal act in business right now. In fact, that genre can no longer neatly or accurately encompass the sound or ambition of this anything-but-purist group. And that’s made them sort of a slippery band to grasp with firm resolution.
I first became aware of this heavy-metal band with their 2012 release Yellow & Green. They had already released 2009’s Blue Record and 2007’s Red Album and have since released 2015’s Purple and 2019’s Gold & Grey. This band is heavy. They’re not afraid to take chances. In 2012 the band was a part of a nearly-fatal bus accident. This bus accident would see some members leave the band for good, and a new line up change would happened from Purple on. The word “epic” gets thrown out way too much, but Baroness’ music is truly that: epic. Adventurous. Not many bands can make old Black Sabbath tricks seem new, but Baroness pulls it off. The array of instrumentation and emotion throughout their music is a joy to listen to and quite an achievement. Who knew progressive sludge could sound so beautiful? Baroness formed in Savannah, Georgia in 2003. This band was D.I.Y. from the get-go. Booking their own tours, hand printing their own merchandise, and relentless touring regime, They released their debut album in 2007 (which Revolver magazine named the best album of the year). They followed that up with the heavier Blue Record and then the double album Yellow & Green in 2012, getting them into the Billboard top 30 and Spin magazine naming that the metal album of the year. The band has come full circle, in far of their D.I.Y. roots. In 2015 they formed their own label, Abraxan Hymns, and released Purple. Rolling Stone magazine described the music as “… a ferociously cathartic and brilliantly crafted blast of progressive metal. Again, Baroness blast past genre barriers, alt-metal with twists of prog and jazz, sprinkled with moody swirls of space-rock and noise. They seem to have found their artistic vision. Luckily, there still seems to be a lot of rocking left in this band. Put those devil horns and keep rocking. Innovative. Infections… it’s…


Baroness.






Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Eels

91 EELS EELS After a couple of song-rich, keyboard-dominated albums released under the Man Called E moniker, Mark Everett morphed into the trio Eels with 1996’s [DreamWorks Records released] Beautiful Freak . At its best, the debut gave a trip-hop twist to the California singer/songwriter tradition; at its worst, it suggests one more bummed-out wise guy’s take on Beck’s collage-style rock. With a sense of humor that skews toward cynicism that’s alleviated occasionally by bouts of sincerity, Everett is not the likeliest subject to make a transcendent album about death. But he nearly pulls it off on 1998’s Electro-Shock Blues . The music is somber but not sedate, with bursts of saxophone, off-kilter orchestration, and outright noise evoking the turbulence beneath the deadpan vocals. The singer battles not only depression but also his penchant for irony, and his struggle to move beyond them makes for a fascinating if sometimes morbidly downcast listen. On 2000’s Daisies of the ...

Björk

28 Björk Björk If Billie Holiday is an American treasure, well, if you were to put that treasure underwater, froze it, thawed it out centuries into the future and doused some acid & baking soda on it, out of that treasure chest would come Björk. Originally gaining fame in her home of Iceland with her band, the Sugarcubes, Björk was bound to break solo & she did just that with 1993's Debut . Following that was 1995's Post , 97's Homogenic , 2001's Vespertine, 2004's  Medúlla , 2007's Volta , 2011's Biophilia  (the first album where I was truly a fan), 2015's Vulnicura and 2017's Utopia . There's a lot to unpack there... you can't skip her first three or four albums, they're all amazing. I like Volta  just because it seems to be the loosest (and most fun) album she has. Vulnicura  was her break up album, with Björk expressing that the album reflects her feelings before and after her breakup and the healing process. Her legacy...

Elton John

93 Elton John Elton John The Elton Run is a great road-trip game: Using the radio’s scan and seek buttons, see how long you can keep a continuous streak of Elton hits rolling. It’s been proven possible to follow the Elton Run up I-95 from Virginia all the way to Boston. The hazard: One sixth of your listening will be devoted to “ Your Song ,” Elton’s most overplayed standard even though everybody is over it at this point (Sample lyrics: “If I was a sculptor / But then again, no,” I think we can all agree we don’t need to hear that cheesy line anymore.) But Elton has a staggering number of hits; At least one in the Top 40 every year from 1970 through 1995 (!). With his electric boots and mohair suits, he’s the prima of all donnas, sitting like a princess perched in his electric chair. He entertains by picking brains. He sells his soul by dropping names. And for all his camp flamboyance, he’s aged into the most beloved entertainer on earth. Elton’s got about a million compilatio...