Wednesday

Powerslaves again, and probably again. The best tracks on this successfully connect the dots between Iron Maiden and the Human League, which is a fantastic thing to do, since in 1983 most people who liked one of these two bands wouldn’t have cared much for the other. Eventually the nostalgia machine conflates the entire musical output of each generation; Powerslaves takes a preemptive strike by beating that foul impulse to the punch. Were Heaven 17 and Krokus actually that different from one another, after all? Certainly Powerslaves, where we hear the great guitar riff of “The Trooper” transformed into a synth-patch pre-set, thinks that the answer is “perhaps not.” Great, great stuff.

9:43 a.m.: Nevermore, Dreaming Neon Black. Sometimes this record kicks my ass and other times it just annoys me. Today it’s mostly annoying. It’s the lead singer, man. This is one of the few bands who’d be better off just going instrumental. Meaning no personal sleight to the singer, of course, who I’m sure is a stand-up guy. I just think his constant, giant vibrato is distracting, and since the riffs are completely monstrous, it’s a shame to have something pulling the spotlight away from them.

10:26 a.m.: The Primordial Undermind, new album on Emperor Jones. Unbelievably authentic psychedelia: put more reverb on the guitar and it’s Blue Cheer meeting Vanilla Fudge after a month in the desert.

12:41 p.m. Sang the chorus of E.U.’s “Da Butt” to myself while going out to get the mail.

While cooking dinner: Morbid Angel, Heretic, first two songs only because dinner didn’t take long to cook. Kinda wished dinner was going to take longer, because Heretic is a wonderful album.

 

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