It’s kind of funny, but for all the time I spent in high school
\nas a headbanger, I never got into – or heard much of – the group
\nRiot. It’s not that they were an underground band; hell, I’d heard
\nfrom many of those thanks to friends. It wasn’t until the son of
\nour next door neighbor died and I inherited what was left of his
\nrecord collection that I first had a chance to experience this band
\n– and I wasn’t too impressed.<\/p>\n
So listening to the band’s latest disc,
\nSons Of Society<\/i>, is kind of like walking on unplowed ground
\nfor me, seeing that it’s been years since I listened to that
\nbattered copy of
\nNarita<\/i>. And it’s interesting to hear that Mike DiMeo and
\ncrew create a killer disc by pushing forth the same musical
\nstandards that you would have expected from this group all
\nalong.<\/p>\n
The band – vocalist\/keyboardist DiMeo, guitarist\/keyboardist
\n(and founding member) Mark Reale, guitarist Mike Flyntz, bassist
\nPete Perez and drummer Bobby Jarzombek – take the ten tracks (plus
\nopening instrumental, done in a Middle Eastern theme) and make the
\nmost of the time they’re given, putting the listener through a
\nmusical wringer that leaves them happily gasping for breath most of
\nthe time. They’re able to quickly recover from the rare misstep,
\nand replace that memory with a tune that you won’t be able to get
\nout of your head for days.<\/p>\n
Take “On The Wings Of Life,” for example. A powerful hard rock
\nsong wrapped around a killer chorus, this is a track that, if some
\nrock radio stations had some balls to program it, would be a hit
\nthat would let the world know that this band is still out there,
\nand still demands your attention.<\/p>\n
For the most part,
\nSons Of Society<\/i> is the kind of album that captivates you in
\nalmost every song. Even the ballad “Cover Me” has enough power to
\nlock you into a serious groove. Sure, the nitpicker might say that
\nsongs like “The Law,” “Twist Of Fate” and “Dragonfire” are
\nthrowbacks to the old school hard rock – but so what? Those songs
\nhad melody as well as musicianship, and I have no problem with
\nthat. “Twist Of Fate” is one example of how this combination can
\nwork well, like peas with carrots.<\/p>\n
If this album has any Achilles’ heel, it would be the title
\ntrack, the band’s tip of the hat to thrash. With a chorus that is
\npoorly underdeveloped, this track just hangs there limp as a noodle
\non a fork. The funny thing is that this song was probably a coat of
\npaint or two away from being on the same level as the bulk of the
\nmaterial on this album – which makes its falling short of the mark
\nthat much more noticeable.<\/p>\n
There still might be a few listeners out there who pine for the
\nold days and one of Riot’s many different line-ups. Relax, sit
\ndown, strap on the headphones and let this particular lineup stomp
\nyour senses into acceptance. Truth is, if you didn’t know the
\nband’s history, you’d swear this lineup has been together since day
\none – and that’s something magical they’ve achieved.<\/p>\n
\nSons Of Society<\/i> is an album that should not only put Riot on
\nthe road to superstardom in America, but should serve as a wake-up
\ncall to fans of hard rock old and young that Riot is still around –
\nand they’re not going anywhere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25074,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6136],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-36279","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-riot","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36279"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36279"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}