When Living Colour first hit the scene in 1988, they were
\nundoubtedly groundbreakers. A black heavy metal band? Who woulda
\nthunk it? Better yet, who would have guessed it unless you knew any
\nof the players prior to this collaboration?<\/p>\n
What Living Colour did in their all-too-brief career together
\nwas to knock down the unspoken racial barriers that existed in the
\nworld of hard rock and heavy metal. And
\nVivid<\/i> is a portrait of a band who was hungry enough to claw
\ntheir way to stardom.\u00a0<\/p>\n
From the leadoff track (and first single) “Cult Of Personality,”
\nCorey Glover and crew set out to not only blaze new trails in hard
\nrock, but to dare to add a touch of melody and funk to the music.
\nVernon Reid’s guitar seems to be set on permanent shred (which
\nproves to be his downfall), while Muzz Skillings and William
\nCalhoun lay down the foundation on bass and drums,
\nrespectively.<\/p>\n
Had
\nVivid<\/i> only contained one good song in “Cult Of Personality,”
\nit would still be of note to check out. Fortunately, the strong
\nperformances continue throughout most of the album. “Open Letter
\n(To A Landlord)” is both a political statement that transcends race
\nand a damned pretty song, while “I Want To Know” is further proof
\nthat Living Colour was not a one-hit wonder.<\/p>\n
Other well-known songs like “Glamour Boys” and “Middle Man”
\nmight not have had the polish and glitz of the first single, but
\nthey are worth checking out nonetheless. “Middle Man” is a track
\nthat has grown on me over the years. Still others, like “Which Way
\nTo America?”, make you wonder why they never got a fair shake on
\nthe radio.<\/p>\n
There are one or two tracks which are throwaways, such as
\n“What’s Your Favorite Color? (Theme Song)”. But these are few and
\nfar between. If anything, the only real disappointment on
\nVivid<\/i> is that Reid doesn’t slow down his playing as often as
\nhe should. His guitar style could be very soulful when he wanted it
\nto be – why he wanted to sound like Joe Satriani on speed I don’t
\nthink I’ll ever fully understand.<\/p>\n
\nVivid<\/i> has lost very little of its punch a decade after its
\nrelease, and stands as a solid hard rock\/heavy metal album, no
\nmatter what the color of the artist creating it. For Reid and crew,
\nthis album proved that Living Colour was no gimmick, but was the
\nreal thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27428,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5755],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-38795","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-living-colour","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38795","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=38795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38795"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}