REVIEWS FROM MY VINYL COLLECTION

Day: December 17, 2022

BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME – Alaska

This is the band’s third full release, that came out back in 2005. I’m not a fan of screamo music in general, as it just leaves me cold and that incessant scream just grinds all my gears. However, there is one band who have outgrown that movement who weren’t necessarily part of it in the first place, and that is BTBAM. Admittedly, this is an early release, but musically these guys are insane. They put so much into one tune that would keep your average band in ideas for their entire career.

The opening to All Bodies is just so intense and heavy and within thirty seconds it’s changed. That is the band in a nutshell. The title track has a touch of the Iron Maiden’s at the intro, then the blast beats kick in and it’s all over the map from there on in. My favourite track is Selkies: The Endless Obsession. It starts just like Dream Theater, lots of noodling and odd time changes then boom, the insanity just rules. Roboturner is just flat out insane. They say speed kills, and it does here.

BTBAM are an incredible band and have gone from this hardcore metal insanity project, into an amazing prog metal band. I know this album won’t be for everyone, but if you are anyway intrigued by technical metal, then give this a spin.

9/10 from The Grooveman.

TORA TORA – Bastards Of Beale

This is the band’s fourth release which comes 25 years after their last, although I don’t think that album ever originally saw the light of day. I did see a label called FNA records advertising a copy once though. This is another Frontiers back from the dead release that came out in 2019, of all original material. It’s not a bad hard rock album, with some tracks that stand out from the rest.

Silence The Sirens has a killer riff and a rockin’ groove. Son Of A Prodigal Son has a very hard, rootsy, Americana vibe that is huge right now, and they have that heavy Zeppelin vibe down to a T. Let Us Be The One is a real sleazy groover that has that LA late eighties strip feel. Silence The Sirens though, is my favourite and is head and shoulders above the rest. Unusually Side 2 is way better than Side 1 as it’s loaded with the good stuff.

8/10 from The Grooveman.