52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #2

The Paper Chase – Hide The Kitchen Knives

(Southern Records, 2002)

Buy the album here

This is somehow the most twisted and the most musical moment in this entire blog. The Paper Chase was a band that revelled in distorting and choking notes until they died in front of you, yet celebrated melody with unbridled joy and delivered perfectly timed hooks as second nature. The domestic darkness at this record’s core is more frightening for all the catchiness and lush instrumentation, but it is the theme pulling the music towards a unifying central line that makes Hide The Kitchen Knives the band’s best work. While other albums, especially the band’s final release Someday This Could All Be Yours, Vol.1, proved their musical ability and their acute vision of everyday demons, none of these works had such focus and single-minded intent. Hide The Kitchen Knives magnifies minute domestic details until they burst through their own cells, splattering the listener with emotional gore and aural distortion that will never wash off.

John Congleton is, simply put, the maestro behind this madness. For most people, he’s more likely to be known to them through his vast catalogue of work as a producer with acts as disparate as Saint Vincent and Baroness. His attention to detail as a producer clearly plays into the flow of this album and the richness of its sounds. Take “A Little Place Called Trust” as an example. Scraping into existence along the sharpening blades of the title’s kitchen knives and bolstered by the mumbles of what sounds like sampled news reports, this song displays all the diverse architecture of a John Congleton song where angles, curves, wood, stone, and glass clash repeatedly but somehow unify to create a powerful yet fragile family home. The distorted guitars jump over and are then swamped by discordant piano and bleating lambs (really). Behind this madness the deep percussion and thick bass provide steadier ground for the overly sweet melodies of Congleton’s voice, allowing their insidious hooks to take hold and making his cries of “you are not the innocent” unavoidable and frightening.

And “frightening” is the word needed to describe the portentous atmosphere and sickening rhythm section of “AliverAlungAkidneyAthumb”. Its opening repetition of a spoken word sample recounts the hypnotic power of cntrl-alt-delete-u but The Paper Chase aren’t hanging around on this one. Even with the gut-churning constancy of those plodding toms and bass, the pace is frantic once Congleton breaks his silence with, “how could you let it in your house and let it in your bed”. The lyrical flow is astounding and takes you on another tour of domestic terror replete with spiritual and physical metaphors yet always grounded in a grim reality. Signing off with the darkest delivery possible of the line, “drive carefully dear” transports us seamlessly into the song of the same name with its jammed out opening and pained vocals. These songs also share the lyrics, “my little nest of vipers”, a recurring technique in The Paper Chase’s songwriting drawing the listener into this dirty world of minute details and gigantic emotions. In fact, while there are amazing standalone songs, the impact of listening to the album as a single entity exponentially magnifies the intensity of each song, so as we drift into album closer “Out come the knives” we are hanging on every single word of the worrying and evocative tale Congleton tells:

did sweet daddy die square on your birthday

in some macabre-ish attempt to see you’d rue the day.

or appear in the end and be happy he made it back,

to be just in time to cut the cake and watch you

boil alive in your own butterscotch

Congleton’s expertise as a producer and performer creates the impression that the band simply stood mic’d up in a room for roughly an hour and just jammed this out in one take. And that’s an incredible feat when you consider the thick layers of instrumentation that make this production so lively and re-listenable. It also makes a mockery of trying to explain the greatness of this record one track at a time. There is only so much we can learn from isolating these tracks when the relationship they have with their neighbouring material is important and strong. I think the best I can do is to describe the sensations I have experienced while sitting/standing/dancing and listening to Hide The Kitchen Knives. Initially I felt the imagery of the lyrics pulling me in to the titular kitchen scene imagining my own stories of familial or romantic turmoil, while the live feeling of the production pulled me to the centre of the band’s rehearsal room. But more recently the record has felt like the soundtrack to Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood. I feel myself being drawn near to delicate and detailed characters while the fear of a horrible crime lingers behind me at all times. And much like Capote’s novel, it is the attention paid to the extended reality of these stories that holds this power over the listener and made such an important record in my musical life.

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #7

Prong - Cleansing

(Epic, 1993)

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I use the term “party metal”, and nobody ever seems to know what I mean.  I refer to music that has all the hallmarks of heavy metal, meaning it would never be able to infiltrate the mainstream, but has the energy, danceability, and sense of fun that might result in a party getting started, even if only by one lonely guy in his front room.  I’m most often referring to bands like Every Time I Die, their no-holds-barred lyrics, and their don’t-give-a-shit charm, but the term started before that band even came around.  For one shining album, Prong made party metal that could have sweaty maniacs moshing hell-for-leather one moment, and grooving all sexy-like, looking for a hook-up the next.  It feels like music for people who would wear leather trousers out even though it’s 35 degrees in the club, but simultaneously it’s for those who subscribe to the Andrew W.K. party uniform.  So even if you’re in your jeans and white T-shirt, grab your leathered friend, get Cleansing blasting through your speakers, and let the party commence.

Produced by 90s metal producer extraordinaire, Terry Date, you’ll hear Pantera guitar tone influences on this record, and at times that groove metal feel might make you think Prong are little more than Pantera impersonators.  However, Prong and Tommy Victor (guitar, vocals) are far less interested in macho posturing and way more into industrial and dance music influences.  In fact, Prong are closer to White Zombie in their sense of musical fun, and, while the explosion of DJs in metal bands wouldn’t occur until later, you can feel the push towards scratching being incorporated into metal with some of the guitar techniques and sampling employed here.  “Broken Peace” begins with a Tom Morello-inspired background riff and a pummelling bass line.  Those Rage Against the Machine-like guitar squeaks hint at the developments mainstream metal would see in the 90s, but more importantly provide a lighter, more danceable backdrop to the industrial riffing that kicks in.  While Prong want you to dance to their tunes and keep everyone happy with their rounded rhythm section sounds, they are a heavy band and the riffs are crushing in their weight and sharpness.  Tommy Victor’s vocals are not the usual frothing, angry metal frontman style, but rather have a slow, deliberate burning intensity to them, exemplified by his delivery of the lines:

Now it's all exploding

Pick up the broken peace

Nothing left to break.

“One Outnumbered” maintains this vaguely politicised burning intensity but balances it with coddling passages of dream-like guitar clouds and soothing bass.  It’s indicative of a band mindful of dynamics and the value of a gentle sway to break up the neck-snapping headbanging.  That’s all well and good, but it ain’t metal if it doesn’t punch you in the face at some point, and the riff here is a series of jaw-cracking jabs, the vocal a left hook to make your head spin.  It’s one of those riffs that makes you wish you could bang your head backwards as well, as if standard headbanging doesn’t fully express your approval of the pacing, rhythm and crunch of that guitar sound.  Tommy Victor displays an exceptional innate sense of rhythm and groove on this record, both on guitar and in his vocals, and at points the album feels like a tribute to the riff, every song designed to put its perfectly formed guitar parts directly into your brain.

Even when things get a little swampy on the later tracks, there is an undeniable guitar hook in each song.  The squeezed riff of “No Question” inspires thoughts of Zakk Wylde’s over-exposed production on Sonic Brew; “Home Rule” hits with the intensity of Rollins Band and its great riff is perfectly complemented by peppery drumming; the staccato phrasing of “Sublime” is a prime example of what Prong do even if it wanders too much.  But the true heart of this album is in its opening third.  First track, “Another Worldly Device”, does not delay its riff attack, shredding your tympanic membrane with a delightfully abrasive guitar sound played at speeds that keep your feet moving double time.  The raspy vocals match that riff, before the solo injects a little left-field lunacy with wailing squeaks that continue to lie below the surface of the closing chorus.  “Cut-Rate” has a lunacy of a thrashier nature, with top speed being reached within tenths of a second of the song’s beginning.  The solo somehow seems to crank that speed up until the song can barely contain itself and it dissolves into some vague industrial noises and a plodding, heavy outro.  While both of these songs are great, Prong’s strength is not necessarily in playing at speed.  The album’s iconic high point is the party metal duo of “Whose Fist Is This Anyway?” and “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck”, both more focused on intense groove, stop-and-start rhythms, and banging of the head.

“Whose First Is This Anyway?”, a song title applicable to so many life situations, is built on an incessant rhythm that allows the guitar parts to chop, stop, roll and generally keep the listener grooving and moving.  The influence of and on White Zombie can be heard most clearly here and is a clear sign of Terry Date’s work across the bands he worked with in the 90s.  “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck” is a bona fide heavy metal classic.  The lyrics of working class hardship seem to carry a self-reflexive heavy metal importance that has made the track a club classic since its release.  The rolling bass intro lines up another cutting Prong guitar sound, but it’s happy to let Victor’s voice stand on its own before lurching back in with a galloping pre-chorus riff.  The picked sections, open string strumming, pinched harmonics, and vicious main riff provide an incredibly varied foundation for the iconic line to grab hold of its listeners, “snap your fingers, snap your neck”.  It’s a song for singing along, swinging your hair, and banging your head with your friends whether they prefer leather or denim.  Christ, even if they prefer corduroy or twill cotton.  Cleansing is an album that exists right at modern metal’s heart.  Welcoming fans from both ends of the metal spectrum to celebrate guitar riffs and party hard.  While Prong have never quite rediscovered this perfect balance, Cleansing stands as a classic metal album with an identity all its own.      

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #9

The Presidents of the United States of America – The Presidents of the United States of America

(Pop Llama/Columbia, 1995)

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Opinion: The Presidents of the United States of America officially disbanded in November 2016 shortly after the presidential election because they could no longer associate themselves with the person who would share their title.

In their tumultuous existence, stretching over more than 20 years, The Presidents tried to spread the opposite of whatever the sitting U.S. President is made of: joy.  Infused in every song was abstract silliness, love, and a sense of fun that found expression in the hookiest hooks, chilled California sounds, fuzzy Seattle sounds, off-key screams, bouncing riffs, and inspirationally nonsensical lyrics.  Most widely known for this album’s hits (and my favourite karaoke songs) “Peaches” and “Lump”, The Presidents… is more interesting and touching than either of these songs suggest.  While they are all rock songs with simple rock song structures and simple rock song sounds, each is given a sense of personal experience and tender care that creates a connection with the listener rare among such outwardly silly bands.  No other band can make me sing along with complete and earnest dedication to seemingly meaningless lyrics:

Ten million monkeys all pick up guitars,

Nobody taught them how

Five thousand fishies rockin' really, really, really hard

Nobody taught them how

Check-out chicken drivin' Vinny's little blue car

Nobody taught them how!

And while it all seems like pointless fun, The Presidents… are also connected to reality.  For one, they have consciously taken part in the world’s largest ongoing jam by covering “Kick out the Jams” by MC5, and have written songs about their lack of talent/hope and the lure of fame in the California sunshine.  “We Are Not Going to Make It” is the most direct rocker of a song on the album.  A big hooky bass line leads us straight into a ripping chorus sung on the edge of their screeching capability, and with lyrics like, “… there's a million better bands / with a million better songs” you have to admire the honesty of the band’s debut.  The false start at the beginning of the song coupled with its unproduced garage rock sound makes it nearly impossible not to love them.  “Naked and Famous” is a much more considered track overall, and its patience and humour make it a soul-cuddling conclusion to the record.  Its picked verse sections are endearing while the plodding pre-chorus and chorus are a wonderful set-up for a fuzzed-out, solo-filled, “woo hoo”-tinged bridge section where The Presidents… let loose again.  The quiet contemplation of nude fame becomes an outright celebration of the human desire to be naked and famous at all. 

While “Stranger”, with its wistful verses and bombastic chorus, brilliantly touches on the clumsiness of instant human attraction, especially in awkward circumstances, the band otherwise seem preoccupied with animals and what our relationships with them might tell us about ourselves.  The album cover imagines what The Presidents might look like as little brass animals, and songs like “Kitty”, “Boll Weevil”, and “Body” are dedicated to the peculiarity and appeal of different animals.  “Body” appears to be the childhood memories of amphibians and lizards that have died in various ways, the images of their dead bodies having left indelible images in the child’s mind.  Its seductive verse sounds create an alluring atmosphere that becomes brilliantly weird the first time you realise what they’re singing about.  The pounding closing to the song, with the refrain “I can’t get your body out of my mind”, is an album highlight.  “Boll Weevil” seems to be about a lazy friend with physical characteristics of a boll weevil, mostly his bug butt, and is an ode to the glory of being outside in the sunshine.  While they may not convince Boll Weevil to move, the infectious energy of the track has me wishing hard that I had some sunshine to go out chasing right now.  Album opener “Kitty” uses cat sounds, cat behaviour, and the simultaneous appeal and nuisance of cats to introduce the listener to the animal-themed madness coming their way.  It’s a welcoming, infectious, and funny start to an album that will leave you feeling like you love everyone and everything.

And that’s why this album is on this list.  As the rest of the albums that I’ve written about might give away, I don’t find myself drawn to much “happy” music, but this album taught me to dance, shriek, and even sway with closed eyes to all these fun sounds and ideas.  The wonder of an unstoppably infectious track like ”Feather Plukn” is what this music is all about.  It’s silly, cute, and nonsensical but it’s sung with complete and forthright joy.  Even though the song marvels at the talents of animals, I feel like the band are cheering me on, celebrating all the amazing little things I can do – even though some of the animals seem more talented than me.  This spirit of celebratory joy is what made “Lump” and “Peaches” such big hits for the band.  And while I take those songs for granted somewhat, they brought thousands of people together in celebration of being alive, animals or not.  The best way I can describe the impact of this band is to recount seeing them live in London years ago.  The Presidents… were playing the entirety of this album start to finish, and though I’m not a naturally social animal, within seconds of the set starting I was wrapped around the stranger next to me, jumping in unison, singing or screaming every word together, and having the most fun imaginable.  In between every song we smiled at each other, and at the end of the gig we wished each other the happiest lives.  If you were to tell me that story I might boke, but in all honesty, it is one of the purest, happiest, and most enjoyable nights of my life.  

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #11

Monster Magnet – Dopes to Infinity

(A&M, 1995)

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There are albums that always feel like you’re coming home when you listen to them.  You’ve been away a long time, and the welcoming familiarity of those sounds brings back relaxing and reassuring memories.  But it’s not just the nostalgic comfort it brings, it’s the quality of the sounds, and that sense the music, like your home, exists within you the whole time.  Dopes to Infinity is one such album.  Monster Magnet accomplished this simply by not trying.  They weren’t trying to be anything, they only wrote and performed the music they were destined to make, with no pretensions, no posturing.  While the band lost that natural feel over the next four albums – Powertrip was an attempt to become hard rock icons (and did this brilliantly); God Says No came off as a self-aware diversification of their sound; Monolithic Baby! was a disjointed mish-mash of the previous two albums; and 4-Way Diablo felt like they were lacking direction or inspiration – they would regain it spectacularly with the release of Mastermind.  It’s the spaced-out, laidback, drug-fuzz of Mastermind and Dopes to Infinity that is the best of Monster Magnet.  On these albums the notes, echoed vocals, organic solos drift from one astral plane to another, combining corporeal pleasures, metaphysical meanderings, dream-like imaginings, and modern cultural references to form a space rock cornucopia.

Title track “Dopes to Infinity” is a clear example of this, effortlessly sliding from dense stoner riffs to floating on heavenly clouds through the gentle hum of the backing vocal and the perfectly mixed guitar lead.  That’s without mentioning how utterly righteous Dave Wyndorf’s voice is, and its ability to imbue words like, “We are all here my friends/Alive and spaced but all so beautiful”, with both cool and gravitas.  I haven’t always understood what Wyndorf is singing about, but I’ve always felt like it means something.  The seamless transition into second track, “Negasonic Teenage Warhead”, takes us to Monster Magnet’s first notice to the world that they could write incredible rock anthems.  Essentially conveying Wyndorf’s disappointment at Kurt Cobain’s elevation to rock star and the accompanying saddening of rock ‘n’ roll, Monster Magnet wanted to remind the mid-90s that it was ok to rock out JUST FOR FUN.  Big bass, killer riff, cyclonic theremin sounds (?), rock screams, and a giant pogo-ing chorus all combine to create the foundations for giant rock hits on next album Powertrip.  In 2001, Scottish comics geniuses Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely used the track title to name their new teenage X-Men trainee character, who was subsequently brilliantly re-imagined as a disaffected teen with explosive powers in the 2016 film Deadpool.  These things seem to exist in meta-textual harmony as Monster Magnet used a Jack Kirby Marvel character to name the fifth track here, “Ego, the Living Planet”, most recently seen depicted by Kurt Russell in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.  I have it on good authority that Kurt Russell is a huge Monster Magnet fan.  It’s all connected…

“Ego, the Living Planet” is built on a cosmically repetitive, driving stoner riff with monk-like chanting and frantic lead woodling lying just below the surface.  The only vocals are the briefly repeated line, “I talk to planets baby”, and the screams of presumably planet-devoured souls.  Wyndorf’s love for and fascination with the epic sci-fi and philosophical work of comic writer and artist Jack Kirby inspired him to create a song about one of his most innovative characters, a living planet.  The size of the riff and the cosmic feel to the whole song perfectly capture the feeling of awe such a character can inspire.  But Monster Magnet being Monster Magnet, they pivot in the following track, lulling us back to comfort with gentle strumming and loving vocal melodies in “Blow ‘Em Off”.  Monster Magnet are in such a perfect groove on this record that you never notice the changes of tone, the shifts from quiet to loud, or the difference between hallucinatory visions and very real observations from the world of 1995.

It is difficult to pull out favourite tracks from Dopes… because each song has at least moments that near perfection, but Monster Magnet reach levels of undeniable stoner excellence in “King of Mars” and “All Friends and Kingdom Come”.  In the former, Wyndorf shines the light on another comics influence, Edgar Rich Burroughs, by referencing two of his most iconic creations with the single line, “And I can crown me Tarzan, King of Mars”, while taking us on a journey through soundscapes of heavy, reverberating, open string strumming, gentle leads, booming bass, and perfectly unnoticeable drums.  “All Friends and Kingdom Come” seems to describe the megalomaniacal actions of another comic character from Evil Ernie, who, having been given Armageddon-like superpowers, holds the future of humanity in his psychotic hands.  Where “King…” displayed the brilliance of Ed Mundell, Joe Calandra, and Jon Kleiman on their instruments, “All Friends…” presents the subtle melodies of Dave Wyndorf’s voice as the focal point. 

“King…” keeps us hooked with detailed soundscapes, “All Friends…” with simplicity and immediacy, but both display how completely interwoven the band’s various sounds, tones, and ideas are on this record.  The experience of listening to this record is one of seamlessly flowing sounds, images, tastes, smells, and touch.  It is the gentlest of trips because, even though it rocks incredibly hard at times, it never forces things, never pushes things where they don’t want to go as musicians, and where you as listener rather they wouldn’t.  It is undoubtedly healthy for artists to push themselves into unfamiliar territory in the pursuit of new forms of art, but sometimes it is more enjoyable to witness artists working at the peak of their ability within their limits, simply riffing on what they already know and bringing us along for the ride.  As with the brilliance of White Zombie, there is little point trying to discuss all the detail that goes into a record like this, all I can suggest is finding a copy of Dopes to Infinity and letting your mind be blown to kingdom come.  

    

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #12

Rage Against the Machine – Rage Against the Machine

(Epic, 1992)

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Sitting in the back seat of my Dad’s car with a personal cassette player listening to Rage Against the Machine en route to a family holiday in Florida is not the most rebellious thing I’ve ever done.  But hearing those words and crazy guitar sounds burning in my ears during those hours, I felt ready to protest everything, to jump out of a moving car, to tear the branded holiday wear from by body, and live a life outside of the machine.  While this has never actually happened (it’s a work in progress…), this was a watershed moment for me musically, culturally, and politically.  It’s not every day that a kid goes to Disney World a neatly dressed, rule-obeying lad, and returns a ferocious, politically minded and opinionated nuisance.  My Mum and Dad are probably angrier at RATM than any other band. 

But RATM are just as angry at us.  Tracks like “Killing in the Name” and “Wake Up” throw our passive complicity with injustice in our faces, asking us to arm ourselves with knowledge and act.  While live recordings from the time betray vocalist Zack de la Rocha’s youthful idealism, the band’s integrity and intent cannot be questioned.  They used their major label status to support causes and protests standing against global injustice, with the band’s very real support of the Zapatistas in Mexico even resulting in rumours of Zack de la Rocha being involved in gun-running for the organisation.  Guitarist Tom Morello’s recently created Firebrand Records for protest and rebel music exemplifies his dedication to spreading the word and giving a platform to otherwise unknown political music acts.  It’s this dedication to their causes and the very real burning anger at the heart of each song that makes this album so moving and inspirational.  While the teeth of mainstream metal seemed to have fallen out in the early 90s, RATM came screaming to life, tearing through the posturing of MTV metal bands with incisor-like efficiency. 

“Know Your Enemy” is one such track.  Morello’s killswitch shifting of reality is grounded by Tim Commerford’s enormous funk bass before the speedy punk riff kicks in and takes us into the song’s anti-establishment heart:

Yes I know my enemies

They’re the teachers who taught me to fight me

Compromise, conformity, assimilation, submission

Ignorance, hypocrisy, brutality, the elite

All of which are American dreams.

The final repeated line is the blood-boiling, condemnatory conclusion to a furiously tight, funk-punk attack on the figures of authority who distort and abuse the system to keep others down.  But we should also celebrate the musical diversity on display: Morello’s riffing takes on classic mid-paced metal stylings as well as deeply heavy modern metal “chugging”, not to mention his almost indescribable solo on this track, while Maynard James Keenan’s guest vocal adds texture and a different delivery of anger.  If you are seeking the most direct delivery of anger then preceding track, “Bullet in the Head”, has all you need.  Commerford’s bass and Zack de la Rocha’s vocals form the foundation of this track while Morello’s killswitch antics keep the listener guessing where this song might go.  It’s a relatively slow build, but for the song’s final two minutes that tension and anger are focused on powerfully delivering you the message that you have “a bullet in your fucking head”.  And while it’s easy to dismiss this as just a catchy, violent image, or as an interesting metaphor for being brainwashed by the “system”, it’s important to remember that RATM mean this literally too.  Then as now, innocent people are being shot in America by figures of authority, and it’s an injustice that somehow seems to divide people, such as the political/media/societal fallout of Colin Kaepernick’s beautiful and brave protest of police brutality and systemic racism.  Rage Against the Machine is arguably as relevant today as it was the day of its release.

While album opener “Bombtrack” perhaps feels dated and “Killing in the Name” is over-exposed, a classic track like “Wake Up” is just as violently potent today, and there are less discussed songs that deserve recognition.  “Settle for Nothing” and “Fistful of Steel” are just two examples of an album that is quality from first to last.  The former is a quiet, slow-build to unbelievable waves of heavy rage crashing around your ears intended to motivate immediate change.  The latter is a pounding lesson in the immediacy of heavy metal and rap music combined; “Fistful of Steel” is simple, direct, heavy as hell, and with as much attitude as you could ever need.  But for me, all that built up rage and the message at its heart is perfectly distilled in closing track, “Freedom”.  Bursting in on a bouncing riff, it has as much positive energy as any song on the record.  The stop-start power of the instrumentation, Brad Wilk’s control of the pace and anticipation, and Zack de la Rocha’s spit-filled tirades combine to make me thrash and sing along for seemingly minutes on end without ever breathing.  It’s a suitably destructive and constructive ending to an icon of resistance.

Fusing funk, punk, metal, and rap Rage Against the Machine reshaped rebellion in an age when it became acceptable to add the prefix “pop” to the term ”punk”.  But the commercial success of the band has taken us perilously close to taking this protest music for granted.  Rap-metal became a synonym for shit metal later in the 90s, but RATM are not to be blamed for that development.  In many ways, their final studio album of original songs, The Battle of Los Angeles, is a better album than this iconic debut.  Their legacy should remain untarnished after the bone and brain rattling attack of “Testify”, “Born of a Broken Man”, and “War Within in a Breath” from that album.  However, the band will always be remembered for reminding us to scream, “Fuck you I won’t do what you tell me!”, but to always, and more importantly, back it up with knowledge and action.  So while it is important to know your enemy, it might mean more to know yourself first.

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #15

Machine Head – Burn My Eyes

(Roadrunner, 1994)

Buy the album here

1994: corruption, racism, hate.

The church has failed.

If Jesus came down, he’d be shot.

These words blew my mind.  Machine Head were like nothing I’d heard before.  The second metal band I found, after the obvious Metallica moment of my youth, and they were talking about the world as it was right then!  And spitting venom as they did.  Recorded to make it feel like a newscast from the riot-ravaged streets of LA, this opening line to “Old” transported me to a world where all the things I’d grown up believing – Christianity, the world being a fair place, and other middle-class norms – would be challenged or even permanently erased.  From the moment I looked at the twisted, industrial Dave McKean album cover the experience was visceral, uncomfortable at times, and insanely addictive.  Unsure of what I thought on first listen, there was a burning need to revisit time and again to understand what was going on, what made these guys so angry, and how anything could be so heavy.  These were the first forays into what felt like some bizarre underground scene for teenage me, and while that perception quickly shifted over the coming years, that feeling of newness, fear, and excitement still strikes me when I listen to this record.  Burn My Eyes will always be one of my favourite metal albums.

I vaguely remember seeing the video for “Take My Scars” (from the following album) on ITV’s Chart Show (!!!), and being hooked by this grainy, dirty, playing-under-a-freeway aesthetic that I hadn’t seen before.  Machine Head carried a street-smart vibe that seemed completely alien for a middle-class kid from northeast Scotland.  This vibe infuses Burn My Eyes with an edge of authenticity and reality that makes every vaguely politicised track hit home harder.  “Block” is a prime example of this.  It comes scratching into existence on a gigantic, earth-shifting rhythm section intro with electric guitars barely able to contain their energy.  The thrash-punk attack that follows stands as a flag of resistance to the inequities and damage that modern capitalism wreaks, and encapsulates the wide-ranging rebellion against the mainstream that Machine Head were trying to embody.  From poverty to pollution via drug addiction, “Block” is a catch-all neo-thrash anthem of rebellion, and the perfect way to conclude the album.

What precedes it was just as vital back in 1994, and still feels fresh to my ears now.  While there are a couple of slightly lower points on the record – “A Thousand Lies” suffers from following the eventually iconic opening tracks, and its rap-inspired verse vocal and the accompanying lyrics are not good, while “I’m Your God Now” just feels lazy – even they work to provide balance to an otherwise non-stop onslaught.  On an album that is mostly famous for its opening duo of “Davidian” and “Old”, and perhaps rightly so, it’s impressive to note that the best tracks here are “None but My Own” and “Blood for Blood”.  The former begins as a mid-paced celebration of piercing pinched harmonics before working itself into a thrashy lather with traded solos from Robb Flynn and Logan Mader.  The final outro is a frantic thrash attack fuelled by Chris Kontos’ perfect modern metal drumming, and charged with the mantra-like words, “my heart bleeds for none but my own”.  The latter sets out to be as harsh on the ears as possible with droves of distorted sounds crashing in on top of one another, until Flynn’s count of “1-2-3-4-GO!” clears the way for another neo-thrash riff backed by pummelling drumming that had insane mosh pits breaking out wherever Machine Head played.  With Kontos on top form, bassist Adam Duce’s backing vocals setting the tone, and Flynn and Mader trading the most interesting solos of the album, “Blood for Blood” is Machine Head at their most focused and effective.

And that’s how I feel about this record as a whole.  Machine Head have journeyed through the sub-genres of mainstream metal with accompanying highs and lows in their critical and commercial success.  The nu-metal laughability of Supercharger was probably a low point for most Machine Head fans, while those same fans will probably hold the following two albums in high esteem thanks to the Gothenburg stylings and improved songwriting.  But as good as Through the Ashes of Empires and The Blackening are, they simply don’t have the same honest energy, focus, and likeability of Burn My Eyes.  Like the humanoid figure on the cover, this album crackles with electricity and captures the desire to keep thrash alive in the 90s when many bands were going the other way.  In “Blood for Blood” and “Block” you couldn’t find a better jolt of electricity to awake a genre that had, just ten years prior, changed the direction of heavy music forever.   

    

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #18

Entombed – Wolverine Blues

(Earache, 1993)

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With one demon grunt my musical life was changed.  A grizzly bear of a riff and thumping drums suddenly exploded then unexpectedly stopped.  A primal roar burst forth, and the music continued on its destructive path.  The moment was over in four seconds, but it is still one of the most memorable in my listening experiences.  The opening of “Demon” tells you everything you need to know about Entombed’s objective on Wolverine Blues: simple, direct, instinctive, heavy, and hell, even anti-intellectual.  This album is more concerned with making your guts vibrate than firing synapses, more focused on gigantic power chord riffing than duelling solos and Classical-inspired structures, and would rather you fear it than respect it.  Where Death, Carcass, and the emerging death metal mainstream began taking a surgically exact approach to their music, Entombed decided to down tune, fuzz out, and ride a Pantera-inspired wave of groove metal success.  Wolverine Blues has been credited with birthing the sub-genre of “Death ‘n’ Roll”, and in doing so it opened the door for hard rock and heavy metal fans to work their way backward to the oft intimidating world of death metal.  While the album sounds like it wants to kick you in the face, it is actually politely opening doors for you.  How nice of it.

“Demon” is the centrepiece.  It is brash, violent, and lyrically vacuous, but at its pounding heart it only wants to make you stomp your feet and bang your head.  The immediacy of the riffs, the pauses, the wild yells all serve that singular purpose.  The direct approach is maintained by “Full of Hell”, with lyrical insights along the lines of, “I'm organized chaos but don't call me stupid I'm insane”, and “Hollowman” with its punchy riffs and drunken-mate vocals.  The whole thing clocks in at around thirty-five minutes of groove-laden, mid-pace riffs, blues-tinged solos, fat drums, and fatter vocals, but there’s an argument to be made that it should have been even shorter.  While the riffs are always catchy and there is never a "bad" song, the first four tracks do the job of the whole album in less than half the time.  Opener “Eyemaster” is the most musically interesting on the album.  Combining the groovier “death ‘n’ roll” sound with the faster old school death of their first two albums and throwing in some killer solos, the song stands head and shoulders above the rest.  The buzzsaw guitar sound and syncopated riffs on “Rotten Soil” are dirty and broken in the best way, and clearly show the band’s influence on Bloodbath, while title track “Wolverine Blues” is a sludgy monster that balances the thrashier tracks it follows.  Rounded off by “Demon”, Wolverine Blues could have been one of the most legendary EPs of all time.

It may not have aged as well as its Stockholm Sound defining predecessors Left Hand Path and Clandestine, but this album’s influence on me is stronger.  By giving my fearful little mind enough groove to hang on to, family friendly satanic imagery, and that rounded sound of mainstream metal, this album brought me slowly and gently into the death metal fold.  Nuzzling in its big, furry arms I was cradled into the midst of earlier Entombed, Autopsy, and Deicide, but never felt alone or exposed.  It was like having a big brother to take you to the pub for the first time, but this pub was serving pints of blood in hollowed out skulls. you paid with your everlasting devotion, and your brother was a viking warrior.  Wolverine Blues will always be my big metal brother, even if he’s a little past it these days.      

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #21

Corrosion of Conformity – In The Arms of God

(Sanctuary, 2005)

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Let’s start by addressing why this Corrosion of Conformity album, and not Deliverance or Wiseblood, is the topic of this post.  When In The Arms of God made its long-awaited appearance I had been a COC fan for nearly ten years, and I considered both their classic mid-90s albums among my all-time favourites.  Deliverance and Wiseblood are genre-defining albums that bridged the gap from heavy metal to more MTV-friendly hard rock without sacrificing an ounce of the band’s originality, credibility, or identity.  Their southern-fried metal-rock crossover is infused with politicised anger, provocative lyrics, and cultured musicianship.  They are important albums that continue to dominate my thoughts and shape the music that I’m drawn towards.  They are the albums that COC fans will discuss and debate online to determine which is their best.  But neither of them have quite captured my imagination or challenged my preconceptions of the genre in the way of In The Arms of God.  This is an album that intertwines the epic, the personal, the domestic, and all things in between.  It constructs for itself an aural atmosphere that enhances the songs in the moment and the memory of your listening experience after the fact.  It is impassioned song-writing laid down in surprising and exciting ways, and I have no doubts that there are many more COC fans who consider it their favourite record, whether consciously or not.  I am writing about this COC album because it is their best.

Flooding in on a wave of organ, the opening solo sets out COC’s approach on this record: they don’t give a shit what people expect.  This record is going to go where the hell it pleases, is going to ask you questions you’ve never been asked, and isn’t really going to care what your answer is.  It is at times catastrophically heavy but somehow never steps outside of the hard rock/metal crossover for which COC are known.  “Stone Breaker” may have taken fans by surprise on first listen, but it is a spine-tingling and dynamic song that plays with Led Zeppelin guitar epic stylings, hardcore aggression, and gigantic, irresistible riffs that will have people’s heads flying off their necks.  All that without even mentioning the stellar drumming performance of stand-in drummer, Stanton Moore, who brings a depth of sound and drum fill prowess that are impressive and memorable.  The seamless manner in which Mike Dean’s bass sound and Moore’s drum lines work together is testament to their abilities and contributes to a heavier overall sound.  That heaviness continues with “Paranoid Opioid” in which we are thrashed relentlessly by a riff from COC’s hardcore days while being spun into confusion by the psyched-out vocals.  As strong as this opening duo is, it’s third track “It Is That Way” that will have fans feeling at home.  The train samples and echoed drums of the intro give the impression the band are playing in some NOLA dirt patch, while the slower paced bluesy guitar tones from Woody Weatherman and Pepper Keenan’s welcoming drawl hark back to earlier work, and perfectly set up the listener for the album’s most idiosyncratic and atmospheric passage.

“Dirty Hands Empty Pockets/Already Gone”, like its title, is split: part rumbling bass with gravelly spoken word, part giant riff explosions.  It feels like pure COC, but is bold enough to spend more time on building anticipation than on the catchy, headbanging sections.  It’s a decision that pays off with each lunge into that riff being a highlight of the album. “Rise River Rise” is another.  Again displaying patience and a willingness to stand out from its surroundings, this track takes the layered atmospherics to the hilt with three guitar sounds flowing over one another.  A thick electric sound forms the foundation upon which an electro-acoustic riff slides, before squealing leads offer accents and changes of direction.  Pepper Keenan’s hard rock clean vocal and the wailed and whispered backing vocals perfectly complete the epic disaster atmosphere that ties so neatly into the biblical feel of this album.  It is a truly entrancing song.

After extended atmospherics “Never Turns to More” bursts to life with phenomenal drumming and breakneck riffing.  The long bridge section is filled with beautiful guitar and vocal details and fully justifies this track’s status as the album’s longest.  “Infinite War” is much quicker to get to the point.  Blistering with hardcore aggro, tight riffing, and pounding drumming, this song steps on your neck to ram home its simple message.  In the brief moments it eases up the musicianship is astounding.  Weatherman’s leads, the weight of Moore’s drums feeling like 60s and 70s psych, and Keenan’s vocals all bring unique qualities that enhance and diversify this brutal rager. 

COC introduce the album’s final passage with the classically mid-paced “World On Fire”.  Weatherman’s closing solo is epic, and is the final moment of light before the melancholy of “Crown of Thorns” and the utter devastation of “In The Arms of God”.  The former is upsetting with its cries of pain, distorted spoken word samples, and eerie rocking chair sounds building a portentous atmosphere.  The latter takes that atmosphere and throws it in to the heavens with rumbling and cascading drum fills, escalating riffing, and furious screams of Nietzschean angst.  It feels like every muscle is trying to tear itself from your bones as you try to keep up with the desire to explode like the music you’re listening to.  At this moment the entire last hour of music you have listened to feels like nothing more than precursor to this insane riff epic.  It is not without interesting detail either, but the final feeling is one of pure heavy metal exhaustion where every last bit of passion, energy, and anger has been spent in releasing this built-up pressure.

In The Arms of God is breath-taking.  It hits me on every level as hard now as it did when it was released.  There are no faults to be found, no spare moments, and no wasted ideas.  Everything contributes to the whole and that whole makes each song better in return.  I might not convince every COC fan that this record is their best, but I hope that everyone who reads this takes an hour in a room with a stereo turned all the way up, and sets themselves In The Arms of God.  

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #24

John Knox Sex Club – Raise Ravens

(Self-released, 2011)

Buy the album here

Scotland is renowned as a proud country of great national beauty, from the coves and jagged rocks of its coastline to the beguiling and ever-changing scenes of its highland ranges, but for most of its inhabitants Scotland is a far more urban experience.  With massive population centres like Glasgow and Edinburgh, Scotland’s history and character are as tied to industrialisation, living conditions, and education, as they are to its famous mountains, lochs, and wildlife (real or mythic).  While Scottish music may still be widely considered to stem from rural and Highland traditions, and most commonly encountered at ceilidhs, Scotland has a more recent but equally important musical identity.  Bands like Belle and Sebastian, Arab Strap, and Mogwai have created a new urban “folk” music that, inadvertently or otherwise, draws on tradition but actively engages with the urban existence of Scotland’s contemporary population.  For me, John Knox Sex Club does this better than anyone.  Even their name pulls on Scotland’s history and drags it in to the red-tinged light of modern, urban Scotland.  Filled with traditional instrumentation juxtaposed with amplified guitars, crashing percussion, and honest vocals with native accents, theirs is an openly folk approach to post-rock-influenced indie.

To describe John Knox Sex Club simply as indie denies them the full impact of their epic visions and immense musical power.  It’s a music that should only be played in the cavernous and echoing halls of grand castles and cathedrals.  Fittingly, the vocals are delivered with the worryingly addictive vehemence of a preacher sermonising on your sins, while the orchestral strings clash with the rhythm section like the forces of heaven battling the demons of hell.  This is epic indie with unbound scope and musical ambition.  Opening track, and 13-minute behemoth, “Kiss the Dirt” does all of this and more with its cold, foggy, Scottish morning opening gently strummed and lyricised, and its powerfully cathartic peaks packed with Mogwai-like progressive dynamics.  The heartfelt and beautiful vocals work alongside the violins to cut through the intensity of the instrumentation and provide a moving poetic exploration of modern civilisation.  The lyrics are an epic poem of human history, mythology, politics, fate, love and more that anchors itself to modern urban life:

Link arms across

High rise flats

Or watch as our lives drop

Like dripping taps

In forgotten rooms

It is an unfathomably good song; uplifting yet honest, musically epic but never complex, “Kiss the Dirt” is an astounding way to open an album.  The only problem being that it’s impossible for the album to maintain this standard.

“Above Us the Waves” is a beautiful song of longing that replaces the immensity of “Kiss…” with lyrical and musical subtlety.  Passion is still a driving force here, but John Knox… ask us now to take pleasure in quiet moments, gentle melodies, self-effacing hooks, and minute domestic observations meeting grand nature similes.  It’s a comedown of sorts, but one that rewards repeat listens.  From there an instrumental track leads us from “…Waves” to the more outwardly post-rock slow build to powerful release of “The Neighbours” and its memories of family strife in urban settings.  A memorable chorus is supported by a twisted bass line that winds itself around the gliding strings and escalating wails of both vocalists, before ominously leaving us with the permanent and unresolved danger of the line “like footsteps in the hall”.  It’s another impassioned poem of urban life that leaves the listener in awe.  “Katie Cruel” is a reworking of a traditional song that further develops the idea of a new folk music in Scotland.  The sparse, gloomy atmosphere combined with the underlying distorted guitar sounds give this traditional song a modern twist without overwhelming the strings and the original lyrics.  Where hints of Harvestman peek through on “Katie Cruel”, the final track has a more accessible Crippled Black Phoenix quality to it.  A noticeably warmer verse and guitar sound in “The Thaw” is interrupted by the experimental, part spoken word, mid-section that layers light sounds in a dizzying manner.  John Knox… then find their way gently to the uplifting and hopeful repetition of the album’s final line:

The grass grows beneath the ice and snow

Produced in small batches and packaged by hand by the band themselves, Raise Ravens is a unique view on modern life in Scotland produced by a truly independent band.  Never disavowing the past, never judging the present, and finally pointing to the future, John Knox… have produced an album that touches on all parts of life in Scotland.  While the lack of record company backing may have contributed to multiple hiatuses, it is their independence that allowed John Knox… to truly express themselves and deliver the beauty of this album to anyone who wishes to listen.

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #26

Clutch – Blast Tyrant

(DRT Entertainment – Weathermaker Music, 2004)

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These words are a foreign language in my brain…. I didn’t really like Blast Tyrant when it came out.  I found it fluffy, poppy, and lyrically esoteric on the first few listens and decided I was better off without it.  I had stumbled across Clutch when they supported Raging Speedhorn in Glasgow (to our delayed collective confusion) and was overjoyed and blown away on first listening to Pure Rock Fury.  PRF is an album that hits with hardcore intensity, delightful blues-tinged jams, wild vocal dexterity, and that bursting-at-the-seams garage heaviness that I adore.  By the time the more polished, key-infused rock ‘n’ roll of Blast Tyrant came around I was rabid for “Pure Rock Fury II”, and found myself slowly backing away from the new album as if trying not to offend it.  It just wasn’t what I wanted.

Luckily, I was wrong.  It’s exactly what I wanted, what we all wanted.  Blast Tyrant is crowd-pleasing, life-affirming, perfectly conceived and executed rock ‘n’ roll from the best active rock band in the world.  Clutch have continued to sharpen to a fine point their approach on Earth Rocker and Psychic Warfare, but it’s on this album that guitarist Tim Sult, bassist Dan Maines, drummer Jean-Paul Gaster, and vocalist Neil Fallon reached their zenith.  The extended jams of earlier work like Clutch, the heaviness of PRF, and the more tightly packed simplified rock of Earth Rocker all meet in the middle of this band’s phenomenal career to produce a record that genuinely gets better from first track to last. 

“Mercury” rolls in on Sult’s heavy yet rounded and warm riffing, Gaster’s balanced drumming, and Maines’ beautifully light touch on bass before silence descends and Fallon cries out “Daedalus, your child is falling and the Labyrinth is calling”.  The difference between this record and PRF is instantly recognisable – the assured guitar sound is rockier and distances itself from their hardcore roots, the drumming is about feel rather than punching a hole in your eardrums, and Fallon’s vocals are more diverse than ever.  By the time we get to the dancefloor-filling “The Mob Goes Wild” it’s clear that the band are musically channelling Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Tom Waits, and AC/DC while drawing on Fallon’s unmistakable talent for telling frontier-type stories touched with sci-fi, fantasy, and mythology.  But there is barely any time to take note as the songs fly by in a flurry of brilliant riffs, genius vocal hooks and choruses, perfectly delivered drum fills, and general rock prowess.  “The Regulator” brings a moment to breathe and reflect.  The beautiful acoustic guitar intro is goosebumps-inducing, while Fallon’s deep and smooth vocal carries the listener off in to the world of The Regulator.  When the song bursts into its rocking chorus it feels as if you are being lifted by the very angel feathers Fallon sings of, and the hairs on your neck will to stand to attention until the guitar slowly fades out and into “Worm Drink”.

Other high points on the album are “Cypress Grove” with its rock single feel refining the intent of earlier album The Elephant Riders, “Army of Bono” where Fallon’s ripping chorus vocal points forward to his unmatched performances on Earth Rocker and Psychic Warfare, and the breakneck speed and superb backing vocals of “Subtle Hustle”.  But the whole album finds its perfect representative in “(Notes from the Trial of) La Curandera” where immediacy, jamming, storytelling, and otherworldly feelings of being carried off somewhere combine to supreme effect.  Sult’s riffs are huge and uplifting while Fallon’s voice is equal parts gravel and soaring melody, giving the impression that the song exists in the clouds somewhere.  And I think this is the key difference between this record and PRF: where the former was very much a gruff, earthy album, Blast Tyrant takes flight from the very beginning and never puts you back down.  It’s a journey that makes you feel weightless, inspired, and almost breathless.

This is all thanks to the skills of each of the band members.  There is at least one song that perfectly displays what each of them does better than any counterpart in any rock band in the world.  The sheer array of insane and catchy guitar sounds Tim Sult produces on “Profits of Doom” sets him apart from his contemporaries, while Dan Maines’ controlled and rumbling performance on “Worm Drink” does more for the song than any other instrument while simultaneously not drawing any attention to itself.  Jean-Paul Gaster also has this skill of being able to serve a song without outwardly showing off.  During “(In the Wake of) The Swollen Goat” Gaster sits just behind the gigantic riffs powering the whole song with insane fills, exquisite feel on the high hat, and perfect timing.  And if you thought that Neil Fallon was all shouty and gruff, just skip to “Ghost” to hear his sonorous tones and melodic range deliver another of his gripping stories.  I used to daydream of perfect all-star rock and metal band line-ups when I was a kid, plucking a frontman from this band and a guitarist from another, but I don’t need to any longer.  Clutch are all I could ever need from a rock band, and they fill my heart with joy. 

      

52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #31

Rainbow – Rising

(Oyster/Polydor, 1976)

Buy the album here

Heavy metal would be a different experience if it weren’t for the contributions of Ronnie James Dio and Ritchie Blackmore.  Dio and Rob Halford of Judas Priest led a generation of heavy music vocalists with unlimited talent, operatic stylings, incredible range, and, in Dio’s case, a penchant for ludicrous fantasy lyrics.  Blackmore stands proudly in a line of iconic heavy metal guitarists like Tony Iommi, Randy Rhoads, and Eddie Van Halen who pushed the envelope and changed common perceptions of what the guitar could do, and what heavy metal could be.  Together, Dio and Blackmore have taken me to heights that none of these other musicians’ bands could accomplish.  The imaginative epic quality of their music, the riffing and structural intelligence of Blackmore in combination with his renowned soloing, and Dio’s badass, righteous voice do more for me than any other band of the era.  Rising is the pinnacle of Rainbow’s all-too-short existence.

And in terms of pinnacles there are none greater, none more impressive, than the masterpiece of “Stargazer” in which Dio and Blackmore exceed even their own high standards.  Dio’s lyrics concerning a wizard who enslaves thousands in his quest to build a tower to the stars are thematically focused but fantastically realised, and his delivery is bold, aggressive, and pitch perfect.  Blackmore’s riffs are huge, atmospheric clouds that seem to change with the wind, and his solos are both as sharp as lightning strikes and as gentle as summer rain.  But it’s the powerful drum solo from heavy metal legend Cozy Powell that brings “Stargazer” to life, and the work of both The Munich Philharmonic Orchestra and Tony Carey on keyboards that have the song reaching for the stars, much like the delusional wizard Dio creates:

All eyes see the figure of the wizard

As he climbs to the top of the world

No sound, as he falls instead of rising

Time standing still, then there's blood on the sand

Oh I see his face!

From the moment the wizard falls to his demise, the song continues to scale the heights of musical greatness.  The strings, guitars, drums, and vocals keep pushing and pushing, insisting that there must be higher peaks to reach, as if the spirit of the wizard is still convinced of his ability to touch the stars, and take his place among the gods.  The progressive element of Rainbow’s approach matches so perfectly the tale they want to tell that you may find yourself wishing that the story and this incredible song may never end.

Rising is more than just a vehicle for this show-stealing epic though.  “A Light in the Black” continues the story of the enslaved people of “Stargazer” with yet more inventive work from Blackmore, solid driving rhythms from Powell, and Dio stamping his vocal authority over everything.  It seems like a comedown after the excellence that has preceded it, but Blackmore’s and Carey’s histrionic solos followed by Dio’s screams of “I’m coming home” make it a fitting end to the album.  The chorus of “Do You Close Your Eyes” is perhaps a low point on the album, but the verse riffs and vocals are awesome, even if the song lacks the high-flying creativity of the rest of the album.  The mid-paced chug of “Run with the Wolf” is a more direct heavy rock song with Dio’s vocals providing the greatest highlights, while “Starstruck” draws a stirring harmonised sea-shanty guitar opening in to one of Dio’s customary tales of dangerous women. 

But it’s the album’s opening track that evens the scales when set against “Stargazer”.  “Tarot Woman” begins with floating, prog keys delicately setting the scene for an album that belongs to an astral plane.  The exaggerated vocals work off the staccato rhythms of much of the main riff, before the solos carry you to another level.  Dio pins you down again with screams of “no, no, no” that develop the sense of danger that lurks just beneath everything in this fantastical album, but ultimately it’s the unique sound of Blackmore’s guitars working alongside those keys that leaves it mark and builds the foundation from which “Stargazer” launches itself towards greatness.

Rising taught me to love that more natural 70s drum sound where the heaviness is incidental, the power of fantasy lyrics, and the genius of Ritchie Blackmore.  Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath always dominated my thoughts of the period, but this album changed that for me, and I have to give most of the credit for that to Ronnie James Dio.  The man credited with popularising the use of “devil horns” among heavy metal fans gave more to us with his vocal talent than he ever did with crowd-pleasing gestures.  Just listen to Henry Rollins discuss his love of Dio’s voice or the Sabbath album Mob Rules and you’ll start to understand that Dio had something that no other heavy metal singer has ever had.  He may have sung about beasts, dragons, mystical lands, wizards, evil women, and many other things you will never encounter, but he did it with an intense sincerity that could, and still does, make you care about things you barely understand.  His was a talent for inclusion, a weapon to draw people in rather than slay them like the dragons he saw in his mind.  Heavy metal sung with heart and soul to give others heart and soul when they needed it most.