235: Roots Rock Riot, by Skindred

Skindred (United Kingdom)
Roots Rock Riot (2007)
12 tracks, 45 minutes
Spotify ∙ iTunes

Last week we had Roots Rock Soca by Black Stalin, a play on Bob Marley’s song ‘Roots Rock Reggae’. Well, today we have another, this time in the form of Roots Rock Riot by Welsh group Skindred. Given the shared reference, it’s probably not surprising that there’s a Caribbean connection at the heart of all three. But Skindred take the ‘rock’ part very seriously.

I seem to say ‘this artist wasn’t like how I expected them to be’ quite a lot, and I was going to say it again, except that isn’t true. For Skindred, I didn’t have any expectation – when I first saw them, I had never heard of them before they came on stage. It was at the Manchester Academy, where they were supporting Gogol Bordello. I had no idea who the support was going to be, and I was expecting them to be the usual sort of entertaining but forgettable sort of act to just get you in the mood and buying an extra couple of drinks before the main band comes on. Not this time. The impact Skindred had, it was like the gig was a double-header. They were so good. They weren’t even not what I was expecting, they were playing something I’d never even thought would exist before.

Because Skindred play ragga metal. It’s like reggae pumped up to maximum aggressiveness, or if metal grew up in Jamaica. It really does seem as if the mix would just be an incongruous mess, but it just works so, so well. There are bits of hip-hop, punk and R’n’B in there occasionally too, but when they get those screaming guitars, chugging chords and double-bass pedals going under some intense ragga verses, only to flip over and have screaming and growling over electronics – that’s when it really hits the spot.

Lead singer Benji Webbe is a brilliant frontman for the group, and I just love the way he has four distinct voices in his repertoire. There’s the straight-outta-Kingston ragga-rap sound, deep and croaky; the metal screaming and growling; a surprisingly high-pitched and smooth singing voice; and his hilariously out-of-place speaking voice, warm and gentle with a strong South Walian lilt. Put them all together, and he’s the got the perfect range for a band like Skindred.

Roots Rock Riot is one of those albums that I assume I’d remember one or two songs from, the highlights, but then I listen through and I’m remembering almost every track, each as banging as the last. ‘Rude Boy for Life’, ‘Spit Out the Poison’, ‘Trouble’, ‘Destroy the Dancefloor’ and of course the opening title-track too…they’re all super hard hitting and it’s incredibly difficult to refrain from moshing along, bouncing angrily – yet merrily – off nearby household furniture. Incidentally, the album provides an amazing soundtrack for a workout, by the way. Just don’t be surprised if the other people in the gym give you a bit of a wider berth after you’ve been headbanging on the exercise bikes.

229: Rodrigo y Gabriela, by Rodrigo y Gabriela

Rodrigo y Gabriela (Mexico)
Rodrigo y Gabriela (2006)
9 tracks, 43 minutes
Bandcamp ∙ Spotify ∙ iTunes

With this album, their third, Rodrigo y Gabriela received quite a bit of notoriety, albeit rather short-lived in the mainstream. Their line-up is so simple: two Mexicans playing nylon-stringed guitars with techniques largely inspired by the flamenco players of Andalucia…and that’s it. All acoustic, all instrumental, no plectra. Rodrigo generally takes the lead role with Gabriela providing the rhythm (that’s chords and percussion, derived from slapping the guitar, slapping the strings and all other manner of ingenious guitar manipulation).

When they first started getting attention, a lot of the discussion around them focussed understandably on their guitar wizardry, but I remember hearing them referred to most as flamenco guitarists, or their music as Latin, but I actually don’t think that’s right – or at least it’s not where their popularity comes from.

Because although flamenco is extremely evident in the strumming patterns and the way the instruments combine and share roles, and there are definite elements of Latin music in there (as well as bossa nova, tango and jazz), their core is something very different. This is metal. Yes, they’re nylon-stringed acoustics, but it feels like every piece on this album starts from a place of metal of some kind, whether that’s thrash, death or melodic. Where they go from there varies (even to include an improvised solo from Hungary Romani violinist Roby Lakatos on the track ‘Ixtapa’), but play these pieces on wailing guitars and stick a chugging bass and speed drums behind them and there would be no doubt. I’m actually surprised that apparently only one YouTuber has taken it upon themselves to make this a reality:

It’s not as if their metalness is a secret. The two were in a metal band before they formed the duo, and this album even features a cover of Metallica’s ‘Orion’. A lot of the press surrounding the album talks about their metal influences, but on the ground, all I heard was ‘flamenco’ and ‘Latin.’ Weird. I find it interesting what makes us put complex music like this into narrow boxes and why we choose what boxes we do.

But whatever you call them doesn’t matter really, does it? This is a great album of guitar interplay that presents familiar sounds in an unfamiliar way. There’s also something so entrancing about two instruments playing in such a close manner that even makes the brain go a bit strange – there are points that you’d swear there are some piano chords going on, or a miniature flute choir or something. They play hard and they play gentle, but there’s always a passion and a fire in their fingers.

Metal, flamenco, Latin, jazz or whatever – Rodrigo y Gabriela is an album by two amazing guitarists making their own thing in an interesting way. Now all I need is more metal YouTubers to get their fingers around this one…

225: Led Zeppelin, by Led Zeppelin

Led Zeppelin (United Kingdom)
Led Zeppelin (1969)
9 tracks, 45 minutes
Spotify ∙ iTunes

I never cease to be amazed at the fruitfulness of the 1960s. To think there was a time when the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, the Doors, Captain Beefheart, Dr John, the Stooges, Pink Floyd, Janis Joplin, Can, and, and, and… were all creating scene-defining music in their own fields all at the same time is just mind blowing. And that’s just in the vague field of rock, without mentioning all the jazz cats, the blues revivalists, the folkies on both sides of the Atlantic. And all of those intersected at important junctions too, of course. I’d hope that someday we’d look back on any era with the same awe in hindsight, but you have to admit that the line-up the 1960s had going on is kinda hard to beat.

I guess that’s a bit of a non-sequitur (can something start with a non-sequitur? Who knows), but considering the shape of popular music at the beginning of the decade, to end it with Led Zeppelin – the eponymous group’s debut album – it really shows what a transformative period this was. In this album are the inklings of what was soon to be heavy metal. In fact, when I listen to this album, I cannot help but hear it as the birth of the whole wide-ranging musical movement that metal became. Although every song has a heavy imprint of blues or British or American folk overlaid with all the trappings of 60s psychedelia, there’s something else in there. Whereas psychedelia usually revels in mellowness or trippiness, Led Zeppelin took it to a different place: in their hands, it was harder, heavier and more aggressive – and more exciting.

Even as a blues band, Led Zeppelin excel on this record. Their versions of ‘You Shook Me’ and ‘How Many More Times’ (the former made famous by Muddy Waters, the latter a development of Howlin’ Wolf’s ‘How Many More Years’) show a group that were capable of doing the blues rock thing without abandoning their own sound of burgeoning heavy metal to do it, making them stand out as more interesting and innovative than the other British blooze boom bands such as John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, Fleetwood Mac and even the Rolling Stones.

Throughout this blog, you’ve probably noticed that I have a thing for in-between points in music, whether that’s music that highlights geographical-cultural-historical connections between different traditions or that marks the mid-stage of a musical evolution. Led Zeppelin is definitely one of those in-between stages, with psychedelic rock, blues and British folk as its ancestors, and all sorts of metal as its descendants. The 1960s had so many of those albums or musical moments that spun whole genres on their head, or conjured them from some genius realm, and nothing could be the same since. I wonder when the next such upheaval will happen, and what will come of it…

020: Renegades, by Rage Against the Machine

Rage Against the Machine (USA)
Renegades (2000)
12 tracks, 51 minutes
Spotify · iTunes

Hmm, there does seem to have been quite a few angry albums in the last few days, right? I don’t think this is exactly representative of my standard levels of anger, but who am I to argue with the list (in conjunction with random.org)?

Rage Against the Machine sound quite angry, anyway. I mean, it’s right there in the name. Chill out lads. Their best known album is probably their self-titled debut from 1992 (the one with ‘Killing in the Name Of’ on. Chill out lads!!), but it’s this one that I come back to the most. I don’t really know the details, but Renegades smacks of contractual obligation: it was released months after the group split up, and it’s a full cover album, no originals at all. As far as I can tell, it had a mixed reaction from fans, but the critics seem to like it, and so do I.

It’s another one for me where one song completely dominates the rest of the album. The tracks are good quality throughout, I don’t think there’s any clangers in there, but when it gets to their version of Cypress Hill’s ‘How I Could Just Kill a Man,’ it blows everything else out of the water. It’s got a wonderful trifecta: funk, hip-hop and metal, all in equal measures and all mingling into a tasty, tasty Victoria sponge of a track. It’s gotta be a high point in rap metal. Compare it to something like Anthrax and Chuck D’s ‘Bring the Noise’: a classic, of course, but in a fun and cheesy way, with a cheeky wink – rap..and metal??! Wacky or what?! - but this one from Rage feels so sure of itself that it could have been the original. It all works so naturally in their hands.

That track’s a bomb, but as I say, the rest is definitely worth your ears too. It’s not all rap metal either. The proto-punk of the Stooges and MC5 work particularly well with Tom Morello’s electrics-soaked guitar adding interesting new flavours to ‘Down on the Street’ and ‘Kick Out the Jams,’ respectively. I reckon the most unexpected cover would have to be the last track, Bob Dylan’s ‘Maggie’s Farm,’ but they do a good job of it – and completely unlike the original, of course.

If you’ve gotta end your band’s run with a contractually-obliged album without writing a bunch of new songs, follow Rage’s example and absolutely smash it like they did with Renegades.

018: Dead Bodies in the Lake, by Ho99o9

Ho99o9 (USA)
Dead Bodies in the Lake (2015)
10 tracks, 26 minutes
Soundcloud · Spotify · iTunes

This is terrifying. I admit my taste in music isn’t exactly hardcore, and so I’m sure this stuff is tame for some of you lot out there, and you’ll probably be rolling your eyes throughout reading this (leave me alone, I’m a delicate flower). But I remember the first time I listened to Ho99o9 (pronounced Horror) was on my way to a house party – I was on edge all evening.

And that’s great! I always find it interesting when music – or any art – invokes such a visceral reaction. It’s why I get so frustrated at music that is ‘nice.’ I often use the word ‘nice’ in a negative way when talking about music – not to mean that it is gently enjoyable (there’s lots of music that is nice in a nice way, of course), but to mean that there is a complete lack of anything to inspire emotion. It’s musical ‘meh.’ Sometimes a visceral reaction can tip over into revulsion and any chance for enjoyment disappears, but at least you feel something. But to be ‘nice’ – that’s a sin.

Dead Bodies in the Lake is not nice. It’s sludgy metal with electronics, it’s dark hip-hop with hardcore punk. It’s like a psychological horror film in audio form. It’s disturbing and disorientating, and it’ll get your hackles right up. The version I know is the mixtape – no gaps between tracks means there’s no let up and no way out. It forces you through the experience and it’s thoroughly uncomfortable. How amazing is it that music and art can make us feel like that? To feel such strongly negative emotions and come out the other side having had a whale of a time. Ho99o9 do that as well as any band I’ve discovered. I think this 26-minute long mixtape is enough for me for now though.