Sometimes, I do feel like the years I spent away from the metal
\nscene have left me at a severe disadvantage when looking at today’s
\nmetal scene. I missed out on the time when artists like Marilyn
\nManson came up from the ranks; all I get to see is the
\nmulti-platinum, parent-angering end result.<\/p>\n
So I do feel like an outsider when I listen to an album like
\nChamber Music<\/i>, the latest from Coal Chamber. On one side, I
\ndo hear music that is constantly pushing the envelope and causes me
\nto smile. On the other hand, I sometimes hear tracks that fail to
\nresolve themselves in my mind, leaving a rather cluttered picture
\nbehind.<\/p>\n
Like a lot of bands I’ve heard of late, Coal Chamber seems to
\nmix the power of bands like Pantera with the fury of Nine Inch
\nNails. The resulting sound isn’t techno, but it isn’t quite metal,
\neither. And while many bands are working on perfecting this sound,
\nCoal Chamber – vocalist B. Dez Fafara, guitarist Meegs Rascon,
\nbassist Rayna Foss Rose and drummer Mike “Bug” Cox – do seem to
\nmake themselves unique in the crowd.<\/p>\n
After the theme-inspired opener “Mist,” Coal Chamber kick things
\ninto overdrive with songs like “El Cu Cuy,” “Untrue,” “What’s In
\nYour Mind” and “Not Living”. Tracks like these not only are
\nentertaining, but they make the listener think about the boundaries
\nof heavy metal as they know them – and challenge them to expand
\nthose boundaries. Granted, it’s a little jarring the first time
\naround, but revolution always is.<\/p>\n
\nChamber Music<\/i> starts to unwind a bit on their cover of Peter
\nGabriel’s “Shock The Monkey,” featuring Ozzy Osbourne on vocals. I
\ndon’t know if this is the case for the commercial release, but my
\nadvance copy had an excerpt of this song, not the full track – and
\nthe excerpt seems to waste not only Osbourne’s vocal talent (which
\nhe still has) but the power of the cover. Here’s hoping that the
\nconsumer gets the full track.<\/p>\n
After that miscue, it almost seems like Coal Chamber just can’t
\nhit the target with the rest of
\nChamber Music<\/i>. Tracks like “Burgundy,” “Feed My Dreams” and
\n“No Home” just don’t pack the punch that earlier tracks did. Only
\n“Shari Vegas” comes close, and even that isn’t nearly as strong a
\ncut as, say, “Not Living”.<\/p>\n
What I will admit about Coal Chamber is that they’re not a
\none-listen-and-out band. In order for you to really appreciate what
\nthey’re doing throughout the album, you have to listen to
\nChamber Music<\/i> several times – preferrably over the course of
\na few days. And I’ll admit maybe I haven’t spent enough time with
\nthis disc, ’cause the more I listen to it, the more I do find I
\nlike. But my opinion on the second half of
\nChamber Music<\/i> hasn’t changed a lick yet.<\/p>\n
It might be early in a band’s career to call their second album
\none “for the fans,” and I don’t doubt that
\nChamber Music<\/i> will win over some new fans to Coal Chamber’s
\ncamp. But for cutting edge metal, this band doesn’t always seem to
\nhave sharpened its sword for the whole journey.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28039,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7599],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-39433","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-coal-chamber","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39433","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=39433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39433\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=39433"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=39433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}