You’ve got to hand it to John Bush and the boys in Anthrax —
\nthey’re not ones to play it safe.<\/p>\n
Coming off of a live CD\/DVD combo
\nMusic Of Mass Destruction<\/i>, one would have expected the band
\nto burst forth with a collection of new songs. Instead, the band
\nturned to their fans, asked them for their favorite songs from the
\npre-Bush era of the group, then went in and re-recorded those
\nsongs.<\/p>\n
The end result,
\nThe Greater Of Two Evils<\/i>, dares the older Anthrax fan to see
\nhow the music has grown in nearly two decades while staying true to
\nthe structure of the songs made famous by vocalists Neil Turbin and
\nJoey Belladonna. While these songs will never take the place of
\ntheir original counterparts, they do hold up surprisingly well.<\/p>\n
First things first: Bush is neither Turbin nor Belladonna. His
\nvocal style is in a much lower range, so anyone expecting to hear
\nBush go for the high-pitch screams in songs like “Panic” and “Metal
\nThrashing Mad” are going to come away disappointed. And, I admit, I
\nincluded myself in that category at first; it seemed like Anthrax
\nwas daring to disinter the corpses of their past and try to make
\nthose old skeletons dance — never mind the fact many of these
\nsongs have been part of their live repertoire for some time
\nnow.<\/p>\n
In the end, the listener comes to realize that Anthrax doesn’t
\nwant you to forget about the original songs — after all, those
\nwere the ones that put them on the map. If anything,
\nThe Greater Of Two Evils<\/i> is a disc that tries to show
\nrespect to the past while bringing it into the present. In that
\nregard, they do succeed, as Bush does put a respectable stamp on
\nsuch classics as “Among The Living,” “Caught In A Mosh,” “Madhouse”
\nand “N.F.L.” (Listen close at the end of the disc for the “hidden”
\ntrack, “Lone Justice.” Kudos to Anthrax for not burying it with
\nminutes of dead air — not that there was much time left on the CD
\nanyway, clocking in at over 78 minutes.)<\/p>\n
Yet there is still something missing in these arrangements. No
\ndisrespect meant to lead guitarist Rob Caggiano, but his solos just
\naren’t up to the caliber of those laid down by departed guitarist
\nDan Spitz. He would have done better trying to stay closer to what
\nSpitz played than to create his own unique take on them, as heard
\non songs like “Be All End All” and “Madhouse.” (Playing devil’s
\nadvocate for a moment, I can imagine that even if Spitz had stayed
\nin the band, he would have made changes to his solos along the
\nway.)<\/p>\n
This disc also serves as a farewell to bassist Frank Bello, who
\nleft the band a few months after these sessions were recorded. Joey
\nVera, Bush’s bandmate in Armored Saint, is presently handling the
\nbass duties for Anthrax. Nothing against Vera, but I am sad to see
\nBello no longer in the band for both his skills and a
\ntight-but-loose attitude in his performance style.<\/p>\n
\nThe Greater Of Two Evils<\/i> was a risky project to undertake as
\nit could have alienated older Anthrax fans from the present-day
\nband with their takes on old material. Fortunately, the end result
\nis one which should be pleasing to all sides, and illustrates that
\nbands don’t grow old, they just grow musically.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26882,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5959],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-38181","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-anthrax","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38181","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=38181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38181"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}