Podcast #203: MMXVI

Genghis sits down with Jill Janus of Huntress to see what makes this band tick.It's the annual New Year's show where the boys discuss the year ahead in hard rock and heavy metal, recorded live at Hubcap Grill in Houston, where some damn fine burgers are made. This year the lads look forward to some amazing music and concerts, while lamenting the passing of some big artists that didn't make the Kicks and Kisses list for 2015.

Then check out as Genghis interviews Jill Janus, lead singer for Huntress, before their amazing set opening for Black Label Society a couple of days before New Year's Eve. He swears you gotta see 'em live and you'll be a believer. So kick back, and HORNS UP!

Featured Tracks: Grave Digger - Stand Up And Rock; Motörhead - End Of Time; Iron Maiden - If Eternity Should Fail; Enchant - Juggling Knives; Huntress - Sorrow, Eight Of Swords, Spectra Spectral, Snow Witch, and Four Blood Moons

- Genghis wanted to mention that Eli Santana fucking killed at that show...

Podcast #203: MMXVI

Chronos Zero - Hollowlands

Italian progmetal bad-asses Chronos Zero are back with their really long album titles to rock you hard.Italian prog masters Chronos Zero have returned to bang your head to odd time signatures. After showing their prowess on their impressive debut [deep breath] A Prelude into Emptiness - The Tears Path: Chapter Alpha, the band is back to up the ante with Hollowlands - The Tears Path: Chapter One, and a renovated line-up which includes new vocalists Margherita Leardini and Manuel Guerrieri.

Chapter Alpha had an aggressiveness to it that put it up there with one of my all time favorite progmetal bands, the grandiose but quite ballsy Symphony X. That heavy, menacing bottom end serves as a counterpoint to the mythic - and often overblown - scale of the storylines in your average progmetal outfit. Having lost a dedicated keyboardist in Giuseppe Rinaldi, the guitars and keys are both handled by Enrico Zavatta who fills in nicely. And Enrico clearly has a Michael Romeo distortion pedal cuz that guitarwork is heavy in the best way. Things on Chapter One take the predictable path of building a storyline to a crescendo with bits of rest between such as On The Tears Path, where Margherita takes the spotlight. She's good, make no mistake, though the song gets a bit long at just over five minutes. Metalheads are not a patient breed. but it's overall more killer tunes for the balls and chunk™ crowd

Still, there's an impressive bit of music on this album - especially if you're Symphony X fan. Future albums would not surprise me if they included guest spots with Romeo or Allen, but don't take that to mean that the music can't hold up on its own. This is a band with the talent to take it as far as their ambition allows. We'll be here waiting after all in mosh postition.

The Bottom Line: Fans of progmetal gods like Dream Theater and Symphony X will prolly dig this European take on the genre as Enrico Zavatta and company, armed with some new co-conspirators, take their musical mythologies to the next level.

- Genghis is itching to catch some live progressive metal really soon...

Podcast #202: Chestnuts

Merry Christmas, peeps, and HORNS UP!It's that time again, kids, time for The Right To Rock's annual Kicks & Kisses List. Genghis & Ragman have made their lists and checked them twice to find out what hard rock and heavy metal events of 2015 were naughty or nice. So, grab a seasonal ale, light a festive cigar, and kick those feet up as the lads wax nostalgic for the year.

As per usual, this is a special end of year mega-episode so while there's no interview, you get to hear the sultry voice of Mayor McCheese as he croons a Christmas classic. Plus you get to compare your year's ups and downs with these two jamokes'. Happy holidays, everybody - and HO-HO-HORNS UP!

Beer of the Show: Neapolitan Stout (Parish Brewery)
	Appearance: 4.0 Aroma: 4.0 Palate: 4.0 Taste: 4.0 Overall: 4.0	"Parish Brewery deserves a medal for helping us finish strong in the beer department for 2015 with this delicious, if hard to find, stout. So, so good."

2nd Beer of the Show: Rare Bourbon County Stout (Goose Island Beer Co.)
	Appearance: 4.0 Aroma: 4.0 Palate: 4.0 Taste: 4.0 Overall: 4.0	"Words can hardly describe how amazing this special version of the venerable Bourbon County Stout is with hints of vanilla, caramel and smoke. Perfection."

Featured Tracks: Motörhead - Run, Rudolph, Run; Megadeth - Moto Psycho; Bulletboys - Saving You From Me; Bulletboys - For The Love Of Money; Jorn Lande & Trond Holter - True Love Through Blood; My Brother The Wind - Misty Mountainside; Heaven - Where Angels Fear To Tread; Nevermore - We Disintegrate; Crazy Lixx - Ain't No Rest In Rock And Roll; U.D.O. - Words In Flame; Cyrax - The Seventh Seal; Ranger - Defcon 1; W.A.S.P. - Last Runaway; Sweet/Lynch - Dying Rose; FM - Call On Me; Damian Murdoch Trio - Funky Desert Rider; Twisted Sister - Ride To Live, Live To Ride; District 97 - Snow Country; The Answer - Cigarettes and Regret; Agent Fresco - Dark Water; Motörhead - Sympathy For The Devil; Disturbed - The Light; We Are Harlot - Someday; Act Of Defiance - Throwback; Niche - Exiled To Islands; VLY - Headache; Sons Of Texas - Baptized In The Rio Grande; Devil's Train - Hollywood Girl

- Genghis loves these Kicks & Kisses shows - but dreads the mixing...

Podcast #202: Chestnuts

Hell In The Club - Shadow Of The Monster

Italy's Hell In The Club is back with a new platter of 80s/90s era hard rockin' so recognize.You may remember my review last year of Italy's (that's right, Italy, dude) Hell In The Club's sophomore release, Devil On My Shoulder, wherein I praised the band's totally authentic turn of the 90s hard rock club sound. These cats have the goods, to be sure, and they're at it again with their latest album Shadow Of The Monster.

To be fair, it's basically more of the same, but as I said in my review of their previous album, these cats are the real deal amongst the new wave of bands paying homage to that particular OG sound. The music has an authenticity that belies a genuine love and appreciation for the source material that you don't get with a cash-grab, wannabe situation. The title track has every trademark of the genre: harmonized anthemic choruses, blazing solos, club-shaking rhythms, and bawdy lyrics, of course. And the same goes for pretty much the rest of the album. Lead singer Davide "Dave" Moras has that nasal tenor that fits the music perfectly, while guitarist Andrea "Picco" Piccardi keeps the energy going with crunchy, swaggering riffage and impressive solos. It's all there for you waiting for a party to break out on cuts like the title track with its metallic stomp-ending verse beat. If you didn't get their last album, but need some feel good hard rock, this is the stuff.

The Bottom Line: Fans of Guns N' Roses, LA Guns and other hard rock bands of the Sunset Strip circa late 80s/early 90s, this is totally up your alley. Check them out.

- Genghis needs to get his old Levi's jacket cleaned...

Midas Fall - The Menagerie Inside

British quartet Midas Fall scratches my shoegazing itch like a custom-made, ivory-handled apparatus.UK-based quartet Midas Fall is grounded in that classic alternative/shoegaze sound that is quintessentially British. Trebly guitar textures are the stock in trade, processed with that trademark lush, liquid chorus that makes for a perfect canvas on which the singer's melancholic voice can trace her pains. In this case we're talking about Elizabeth Heaton, whose heartfelt wailing give the music its soul.

Speaking of Heaton, one of my favorite aspects of this album is that along with guitarist Rowan Burn, we are presented with a wholly female voice in terms of the guitarwork. Strangely you don't get a lot of that in the genre despite the deeply personal sound of the music, and I'm always fascinated with just how the layers of sound and texture are worked out where atmosphere is almost as much a member of the band as the actual players. It's easy to put too much into it and create a cacophanous melange that takes away from the delicacy of the lyrical content. And that aforementioned texture plays out perfectly on tracks like Afterthought through Burns' deft use of harmonics, feedback, delay, and arpeggiated melodies. Considering that the album was recorded live in the studio, I have to believe their live shows must be amazing to witness.

The Bottom Line: Fans of the whole alternative/shoegaze sound will likely revel in the beautiful, British somberness of Midas Fall, whose female-scripted guitar textures keep the listener floating on soft, gray clouds of introspection.

- Genghis is liking this album more with every subsequent listen...