Tenacious D - The Pick of Destiny (2006)

For those of you who haven't heard of Tenacious D, they are a 2 piece Hard Rock/Heavy Metal/Acoustic Rock/Comedy Rock band who formed in 1993 in Los Angeles, California. They consist of Jack Black (Guitar & Vocals) and Kyle Gass (Guitar & Vocals). The band got their starts initally in 1989 at the Edinburgh Fringe festival as both members were part of the Los Angeles Theater Groupe "The Actors' Gang". Kyle taught Jack how to play guitar in exchange for Jack helping Kyle with his acting skills. They are currently signed to Sony BMG and Epic Records. While touring, they include John Konesky (Electric Guitar, dresses as the Anti-Christ during performances), John Spiker (Bass, dresses as Charlie Chaplin during performances), and Brooks Wackerman (Drums, dresses as Colonel Sanders during performances). They currently have two albums, a 6 episode TV Show, and a full length movie entitled The Pick of Destiny.

The Pick of Destiny, released in 2006, was Tenacious D's second album, following their 2001 self-titled release. The album was also the soundtrack to the movie of the same name. The album consists of fifteen tracks which include "Kickapoo", "Classico", "Baby", "Destiny", "History", "The Government Totally Sucks", "Master Exploder", "The Divide", "Papagenu (He's My Sassafrass)", "Dude (I Totally Miss You)", "Break In-City (Storm the Gate!)", "Car Chase City", "Beelzeboss (The Final Showdown)", "POD", and "The Metal". The album was an interesting to listen to. As some of you may know, this is the second soundtrack I've done. Overall, the album was inconsistent, it jumped around from song style to song style, there was the upbeat one, the classic sounding one, several slow ones, and on others they threw in the electric guitar and full band. Now don't get me wrong, Tenacious D is a pretty damn good band, this just didn't have the same feel. Sure, their first album wasn't a soundtrack, but they could have at least kept the consistency of the album to say the least. There was really nothing wrong with the album at all, nothing lacked, just was a bit out of order.

Overall, the album was pretty damn good. I can't really think of other musicians that are like Tenacious D, except maybe Stephen Lynch, or even Bo Burnham, but if you like acoustic rock as well then you should check it out. The album was released on November 14, 2006 and is available on amazon and iTunes.

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5.0

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Tenacious D's Website

Dir en Grey - Withering to Death (2006)

For most of you who haven't heard of Dir en Grey, they are a 5 piece J-Rock, J-Metal, Metal, Alternative Rock, well, let's just go with Various Rock band from Osaka, Japan. They formed in 1997 and have had the same line-up of Kyo (Vocals), Kaoru (Guitar), Die (Guitar), Toshiya (Bass), and Shinya (Drums). Their first recognization outside of Japan into the US market of music was their 2006 release Withering to Death (other albums were released only in Asia while some were released in Asia and Europe). They are currently signed to Free-Will Records, which is a division of Sony Music.

Withering to Death is Dir en Grey's fifth studio album and was Dir en Grey's first official album released in Europe and North America (their previous album "Vulgar" was originally released in 2003 in Asia, but was released in Europe 3 months after Withering to Death). The album consists of fourteen tracks which include "Merciless Cult", "C", "Saku", "Kodoku ni Shisu, Yueni Kodoku", "Itoshisa Ha Fuhai ni Tsuki", "Jesus Christ R 'n R", "Garbage", "Machiavellism", "Dead Tree", "The Final", "Beautiful Dirt", "Spilled Milk", "Higeki wa Mabuta wo Oroshita Yasashiki Utsu", and "Kodou". Upon my first listening to the album (about 2 or 3 years ago now), I could only listen to the first three songs, which on my first listening, were amazing. Now that I have finally listened to the full album (I've listened to the track "The Final" in between those times), I can see how this got Dir en Grey onto the North American market. This album shows how talented Kyo is as a singer, at one point he can be singing so sincerely while in the next few seconds he can change to a death growl and back again to the nice side of his vocals. This is shown in depth in the songs "Merciless Cult" and "Saku" and is apparent in other songs as well. Saku was the album's second single and was voted as MTV2's Headbanger's Ball #1 Video of 2006, and it is a damn good song, it encompases screams, mid-tone vocals, fast paced growls, and even falsettos. All of that is over an already amazing band. To get a feeling for most of Dir en Grey's songs, if the guitars sound darker, it typically means that Kaoru wrote the song, while the more upbeat songs are usually written by Die.

Overall, the album was incredible, I honestly could not find anything wrong with it at all. Though not the band's best seller, it is their breakthrough album into North America and Europe. If you're into Maximum the Hormone, J-Metal, or even Metalcore to an extent, you should check them out. The album was released on May 16, 2006 in the US and is available on Amazon and itunes.

Overall Rating: 5.0 out of 5.0

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Dir en Grey's Website

Beneath the Sky - More Than You Can Handle... (2006)

Beneath the Sky, for those of you who haven't heard of them, are a 5 piece (formerly 6 piece) Metalcore band from Cincinnati, Ohio who formed in 2004. The band consists of Joey Nelson (Vocals), Kevin Stafford (Guitar & Vocals), Jeff Nelson (Guitar), Nick Scarberry (Bass), and Bryan Cash (Drums). They are currently signed to Victory Records and have released 1 demo, 1 EP, and 2 full length albums. Now for the review thingy.

More Than You Can Handle..., Beneath the Sky's first EP, consisted of a different version of the band. They were a 6 piece when this was released. The Nelson brothers and Scarberry were still with the band, it also consisted of Chris Profitt (Guitar), Brandon Sowder (Drums), and Matt Jones (Keytar). The album consists of 5 tracks, those being "A Gunsmoke Kiss", "7861", "Miss Misery With a Delicate Voice", "Our Last Road", and "Being In A Coma Is Hell Carried On". When the album starts off, you hear something that you don't typically hear, an old vinyl record skipping, this is also at the end of the last song on the album. I personally liked it cause it gave it continuity and vaguely reminded me of how Dream Theater started and ended a few of their albums. In the track "Our Last Road", Joey Nelson did something that impressed me vocally, he changed his scream 5 times within just a few seconds. He went from a high pitched scream, to a slightly lower growl, to a mid-tone growl, to a low scream, to what seemed like an extremely low inhale vocal, but I doubt that. The album also marks the first appearance of the track "7861". They re-recorded it and put it on their first full-length album "What Demons Do to Saints". I personally like the EP version better, as they layered the vocals, had a lower guitar tone, and it was overall just better. I'll let you decide though, here's the EP version, and the full-length version.

Overall, this is an album that defines Metalcore, and I hardly even like the genre, but love this album. Definitely pick this up if you're into Underoath, The Devil Wears Prada, August Burns Red, As I Lay Dying, and Scary Kids Scaring Kids. The album was released on May 13, 2006, but is hard to come by as it was self-released. I personally can't find it on amazon or itunes, however, both of their full length albums are on there.

Overall Rating: 4.8 out of 5

Beneath The Sky's Website

Cannabis Corpse - Blunted at Birth (2006)

Cannabis Corpse, in case you haven't guessed already, is a 4 piece Death Metal band, that takes their name as a spoof off of Cannibal Corpse, though singing about marijuana. They formed in 2006 in Richmond, Virginia and are currently signed to Forcefield Records. Their current line-up is Andy "Weedgrinder" Horn (Vocals), Philip "Landphil" Hall (Guitar & Bass), Nick "Nikropolis" Poulos (Guitar), and Josh "HallHammer" Hall (Drums).

Cannabis Corpse's first album, 2006's Blunted at Birth (taking it's name as a spoof of Cannibal Corpse's 1991 album Butchered at Birth), consists of 7 tracks (all taking spoofs of Cannibal Corpse song names) which include "Blunted at Birth", "Staring Through My Eyes That Are Red", "Reefer Stashed Place", "Force Fed Shitty Grass", "I Cum Bud", "I Will Smoke You", and "When Weed Replaces Life". As a death metal album, this honestly was really well done. It had the good old deep growling sounds like the early works of Death, Cannibal Corpse, and even some sounding like Matt Heafy's screams from Trivium. The guitar work was excellently done, mainly because of Philip Hall (this is his side project, his original band is Municipal Waste). The sound quality on the record was poor, sounded badly recorded, then I read a little into it and found this quote "This recording was done entirely on a Boss BR 900 digital 8 track. I am definitely not a pro engineer, so if you don't like how it sounds, FUCK YOU!" LandPhil, Fall 2006. Other than the sound quality, not that bad of a record, was a bit on the shorter side of albums, but still a good album nonetheless.

Overall, this was an interesting album to listen to. At first, I thought it was going to be Stoner Metal (just by the name of the band, the album, the songs, you get the idea), and was expecting it to have long, kind of mellow tempos. Instead it hit me with blast beats from nowhere and caught me off guard, and I would recommend this album for people who are fans of Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Obituary, Deicide, Immolation, Incantation, Grave, Monstrosity, Death, and old school Death Metal in general. The album was released on December 19, 2006 and is available on amazon and itunes, so go and pick it up.

Overall Rating 4.0 out of 5

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Cannabis Corpse's Website

Preschool Tea Party Massacre - Hardcore Died with Hitler (2006)

For those of you who haven't heard of PTPM (which I'm guessing is a large chunk of you), they are a nine piece Grindcore band (yes, nine), that formed in 2002 in Newark, New Jersey. According to their myspace page, they consist of Supreme Allah (Vocals), Concubine (Drum Programming, Effects), Easy Money (Vocals, Guitar, Drum Programming), Don Carnage (Over the Top Cookie Monster Vocals), DJ RUFFneck (Vocals), Stumpy (Weird Noises, Laughing, Fights Fires), The Edge (Vocals), Shan Bone (Will Contribute Soon), and Joey Wallz (All instruments). They are currently signed to no label, and all of their cd's are self produced. And now onto the review.

Preschool Tea Party Massacre's fifth album release, entitled "Hardcore Died with Hitler" consits of 26 (yes, twenty six) tracks. The tracks in order are "Caveman Dildo", "Fuck Her and Kill Her But Not in That Order", "Charles Lindbergh was a Fuck Machine", "Say Cheese and Get Raped", "Pope-Mobile Drive By", "Sand Burial Fuckfest", "No Viewing Octopus Porno on Company Time", "I Swerved to Miss a Cat and Hit 36 Kids", "Climbing The Ladder of Exhibitionism At The Old Folks Home", "Dead Baby Eaten by Dogs", "Doggie Style Cyber Sex With Marilyn Monrobot", "Best Things In Life Are Free, Then Why Did I Pay To Get AIDS", "Beaten With Your Own Cowboy Boots", "Malibu Is For Gay Guidos and Women", "I Don't Just Develop Film, I Develop Families", "Black Girlfriend Killed Grandma", "Sausage King Shooting Spree", "The Story of the Lonely Giraffe Who Fucked a Tree, a Fence, and a Shed", "Breastfeeding A Boozed Whore", "If You Got The HIV. Holla At Us (Cause We Never Rock Jimmy Hats)", "It Fucking Hurts When I Piss", "Since When Is Caging a Child Illegal", "Of Course I'm Not a Real Person. I'm a Big Piece of Poop", "Managing To Fuck A 16-Year-Old", "You Would Rise To The Occasion In A Room Full of Guys", and "Cape + Mask + Gun = Neighborhood Shooting Rampage". Oh so many ways to describe this album, I'm going to start with the easiest one, no wonder it was self-produced, it's hard to listen to. I'm not joking, this is one of the few albums that I forced myself to listen to. The guitar was soooooooooo very simplistic that I got tired of the repetition. The drumming just got annoying after a while. It was quite literally just the snare drum for a good half of the album, it sounded worse than Metallica's Saint Anger album (and I had a really hard time getting through that one). There was hardly any "singing" on the album at all. It was unintelligible growls, high pitched black metalesque screams, and then randomly throughout the album was a guy acting all gangster. There was also the annoyance of the random techno aspect throughout most of the songs. The last track on the album, "Cape + Mask + Gun = Neighborhood Shooting Rampage" is 13:36 long, it should only be 3:00 long. Why you might ask, mainly because the first 10:30 of the song is nothing, quite literally nothing, just dead air, and then it's just a random conversation between two people while a keyboard plays quietly in the background. That's not even the worst part of it. The album is riddled with soundbytes and clips from movies. All of the tracks have them, some even have multpile ones.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this album to anyone. The only way I'd recommend this is if you hate iwrestledabearonce, and I'd only recommend this if you wanted to start to like iwrestledabearonce. The only thing I liked about the album were three of the soundbytes and nothing else.

Overall score: 0.8 out of 5

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Preschool Tea Party Massacre's Website