By the mid' to late '90s I was pretty disillusioned with the metal scene. Everything had a clean edge and anything that tried to be controversial was either completely fake or a regurgitation of a time long gone. Yeah, rock was hitting the mainstream big time but alot of the band's crossing styles were so clean cut and Americanized that the image, sleaze and true shock value had completely lost its way, even the black metal bands were producing symphonic, epic and clean sounding trash. Soulfly were thankfully one of the bands to rise above the quagmire of repetition Max Cavalera leaving the Sepultura camp but continuing the angst of 'Roots' with this rumble of a debut. Yes, there was alot of crossover on the record and collaborations with alot of artists I was never interested in, such as Fred Durst of the appalling Limp Bizkit, but the tunes were in your face, and the tribal machine kept rolling.
Max on fine form, his venemous tongue spitting out each lyric amidst a glorious sound of streetwise brutality, at times not too far removed from Sepultura's 'Roots' venture but yet maintaining and also seeking a new edge. 'Eye For An Eye' and 'Tribe' are monster tracks that could easily have fitted onto the 'Roots' album, but there's an urban edge here, not quite hip-hop but in its chops and licks there's a ghetto feel as the riffs bruise and drums pound like jungle thunder.
Experimentation is quite high on the agenda here and the instrumental 'Soulfly' track is a perfect example of that, but there's still such a strong element of fury that makes this one of the records, alongside Machine Head's 'Burn My Eyes' that makes for essential listening.
8/10
No comments:
Post a Comment