| CD REVIEW Monsterworks |
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Band: Monsterworks Things had been slowing down somewhat on my to-do roster, with only a couple of releases for late May still awaiting my crushing criticisms (huhhuh), so when the editor-in-chief told me he was finally gonna lay some new jobs on me, and that some of those were from the Copro label, I immediatelly got onto the Internet Highway Of Information to find info on those releases. I have to tell you, when I found out that one of those was this epic Monsterworks album, my heart leapt a couple of beats and time stood still for a microsecond. Immediatelly after, I was onto the band’s MySpace page…and found out that in fact Singularity is nót the follow-up to the March 2006 Casket Music released The Precautionary Principle. Not indeed! Merely 6 months after the release of that album, the quartet was again in the studio to record Spacial Operations, the first of a double album concept story, an album which they made available through download to the public at large…at no cost at all (the bandmembers all having good paying jobs, they could concentrate on the music itself, and remain unaffected by the silly criticisms of people who simply don’t “get” what they are about – just to give an perfect example: one Kerrang! journalist rated The Precautionary Principle a full 4 K’s…another gave Spacial Operations only two!)!!! The story so far in a nutshell (you can read the complete story…which has had me mesmerized throughout…on a blog posted Nov. 26, 2007 at the band’s MySpace)? The year is 2227 and on a routine mission to Saturn, Captain Sam Crow and her crew aboard shuttle Rogue are catapulted into unknown space, hundreds of light years from our galaxy, where they meet a parallel human civilisation in the midst of an all-out religious/political war. Just when they stumble in that strange universe, the religious usurper Merrick has overtaken the throne by secretively having the King and First Prince of the planet Corollas assassinated, accusing The King of “abandoning” his people. Sam and her crew make their “first contact” with this race of people (and specifically with second Prince to the throne Gannon) on the moon basis where the killing took place, to find Prince Gannon and his Royal Spacial Forces busting in on ‘em! The two groups fraternize…in fact, something beautiful blooms between the Prince and Sam…and on her recommendation they try to set foot on the Prince’s home planet. They are summarily chased off, and a hunt for them ensues. The Prince has no other recourse but to seek help with the Kingdom’s principal rival, the Empress of the Gardar Empire, but Merrick, whom has an almost hypnotic hold on the people of the Kingdom, is so bold as to launch a full-out attack on this realm as well! In the chaos the Prince’s forces are hopelessly seeparated from each other. Many (among which apparently also Sam) die, and while the Empress flees with the help of Gannon’s Luitenant and one of the Earthmen, Gannon and a skeleton crew (among which some Earth people) try to flee the planet surface in his battle ship Magma Maiden, which gets severely damaged in the attempt. They start to crash-land into a transport ship, when on the incitement of a vision, young Earth woman Emily shoots off the arsenal of Magma Maiden into the cargo ship. Magma Maiden then flies into the explosion…to find themselves catapulted back to our stellar system. Part one of the story ends with Magma Maiden’s board computerannouncing that under current consumption rates the crew can only live 5 more hours…so the ship automatically floods the cabin with cell destruction halting gas, reducing the crew to a near death state within minutes while tuning down her energy output to bare minimum. All of this spread (including song lyrics and musical credits) over a total of 17 pages! Now try to imagine that, in combination to the band’s usual frantic musical approach, they’ve added “samples” and sound bits to give the whole a soundtrackish feel. Now also imagine that, in order to make the soundtrackish feel as realistic as possible, the guitarists have added extra layers of whaling/ screaming melodic guitar lines. The end result of which is simply só magnificent, a lot of people won’t know…or understand…what hits ‘em when they first hear this Monsterworks opus! Promotion on the album was nihil, although frontman Jon díd tell a couple of people. By word of mouth alone, and by September 2007, Spacial Operations had been downloaded over a thousand times, which ain’t bad at all! Monsterworks returned to Earth Terminal Studios in March 2008 to record a second episode in this story, which evidently picks up where it was left off, the crash-landed Magma Maiden being found by space scrap pirate Flood and his crew. With Merrick apparently intent on intergalactic dominance, they become involved in warning Earth of the oncoming doom, and in Gannon’s quest to free the people of the Corollas system from Merrick’s tiranical hold! Meanwhile, the Empress and the remainder of her followers are doin’ their bit as well. As you’ve understood, there’s not much of the second part of the story written out yet, and although the first part of the album is clearly about Gannon’s tribulations on this side of the galaxy, I’ve personally become confused about the second part of the album. There’s hints of a rescue mission, and a resurrection after death, followed by the Good being victorious over Merrick after all…but frankly I am waiting with a fairly high degree of anticipation to read the song-by-song story outline! So guys (or rather Jon), get cracking! Musically, this album is even more over-the-top than its predecessors, lead guitarist having been left to his own devices to fill in extra layers! In fact, at a certain moment Jon told Ian he feared they might’ve overdone things somewhat! Hahhah, nay man…néver! The outcome is in fact even bigger, more gloriously bombastic and magnificently excellent! Or, as “Wayne” would’ve stated some 10 years ago, “A tripple whammy Schwuùùùngg!!!” (imagine the accompanying pelvis movements yourself)! In fact, when Ian and Jon (the original members from New Zealand) invited Hugo and James (their English collaborators) to a listening session of the finished product (they’d only come in contact with the rough original recordings, without the extra layers of lead and solo guitars, keyboards/ synths, and extra soundtrackish effects), their jaws dropped in awe! Personally, I’m not at all surprised to find one Devin Townsend featured among Monsterworks’ MySpace friends (their “lunacies” are somewhat similar, you know!). So, how doés it all sound? Well, for a couple of guys who united back in the old days with a common love for Deicide and Queen… Why chucks! If you’ll surf to myspace.com/monsterworks, you’ll find the track “Godkiller” (representative of the heavier style of the band, displaying several of Jon’s vocal styles: one soaring, another growling, yet another searing Black!), plus 3 songs off the Spacial Operations album, which are fairly representative as well. On the album also a much calmer track, with Gannon pondering about his fate far from home in “Meanwhile”, a sensitive semi-ballad which Jon says “…sounds like Nickleback crossed with Nile, played by Isis (but only like Nile for the Egyptian bit outro)…”! Also, you’ll find a bonus track in the re-recorded version of “Macroscope” (which opened the band’s 1998 debut album Dormant), because “…the lyrics seemed to fit the space concept allbum setting with an almost spooky sense of déja-vu (considering it was written a decade ago)…”! The Singularity album comes complete with an mp3 section including the Spacial Operations album (which is just as well, because I’ve never been into the whole shitty download thing, and wouldn’t have known how to do that, not without help anyway), a file with the complete background & song-by-song story & credits, and a video for the track “Who Am I?” off the 2006 album (although I’ll admit I haven’t been able to view it for some reason, only music coming through)! The latest news about Monsterworks is that singer/ guitarist Jon, bassist Hugo, and drummer james have returned to the beloved Earth Terminal Studios in mid April 2009 for anewrecording session with knob twiddler akà sound engineer Lewis Childs, and what the band came up with again sounds wonderful, so says Jon. With Ian having become a father shortly after the mastering of Spacial Operations, not having picked up a guitar since, and currently apparently in Greece, it’s uncertain whether he’ll even be part of the new recording. Then again, with the aid of Internet, why shouldn’t he be able to get involved anyway? The question is, does he wànt to return to that kind of lunacy, now that he’s supposed to “be the good example”? No matter what, of course you’ve understood that Singularity will be having a very singular place in my “Best Albums Of 2009”-lists? Absolute top rating…they don’t come any better! In fact, it pains me that I’ve gotta let go of the album for a while now, as spending the good part of last week on the album exclusively has given me a backload of other albums waiting to be reviewed! Aaach, I’ll have leave the album on my mp3-player, just for the off chance that I’ll be able to listen to it again on a bike trip! 100/100 Tony |