Here's some gritty 70's inspired heavy rock from this Swedish trio with a lot of your usual guitar grooves and melodic harmonies, the occasional presence of Hammond organ, a few slightly "progressive" sounding improvisational breaks, and so on. But a couple of things make this stand out from the pack. First of all, I really love the gritty vocals. The guy really sings, but his vocals are thick and textured, so it's really rough, powerful singing - great stuff, especially when he nails some harmonies (check out "Let it Go")! Secondly, the bass playing is awesome, and the bass is almost louder than the guitars! The basslines rarely mirror the guitars, instead working on their own between the guitars and drums to accentuate the riffs, and it works out quite impressively. More bands of this nature need to use the bass as a full instrument like this. Overall their songwriting is honestly not what I would classify as original, I've heard things of this nature many times before, but their approach is certainly more convincing and more interesting than average. Take for instance the cleaner and more upbeat vocal harmonies and acoustic guitars towards the end of "Follow the Fools" (one of the more "progressive" types of tracks, at least in spurts), or the catchy chord progressions (And fucking cowbell, baby!) of "Fading Memories". I can definitely appreciate this. As for the recording, it's not bad. I think the rhythm guitars might be missing a little something as they don't necessarily feel loud enough, partly due to the fuzzed out, dense distortion (it's not over the top at all), but at the same time, I certainly don't want the guitars to overpower the amazing bass performance... and the lead tones sound great. The percussion sounds perfect though, and I wouldn't mess with the bass tone either. They're definitely really close to hitting the mark. I'm not really into the layout, but that's just because I'm picky. It's tolerable, it's just really basic and I'm not into the artwork. I guess in some ways the cover art has sort of a 70's look to it, mainly with how the band logo overlaps the illustration, but I find the presentation of the text to be too blocky and plain. It's legible, though. And I'm really interested in the fact that aside from the lyrics, they also include brief liner notes about the record, including a quick breakdown of each track and some of the nuances at work. Not being a fan of many things (okay, barely anything) 70's, this generally wouldn't be my proverbial cup of tea, and of course the very dated band name and album title (I don't know, "Captain Dog" makes me think of something like Genesis' "Foxtrot" or whatever) rub me the wrong way, but musically this band's talents are undeniable, and it's my assumption that those into this style would find this to be thoroughly enjoyable. Because hell, even I dig it!
[Meteor City]
Running time - 49:54, Tracks: 10
[Notable tracks: Let it Go, Fading Memories, Be the Same]
Meteor City - http://www.meteorcity.com
