Album Review: The Lion The Beast The Beat

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals hit the mainstream with their last release thanks to the single "Paris," (that song with the Ooh La La's) which was featured in all sorts of network advertisements and promos. Now, with a larger following behind them, the group returns with The Lion The Beast The Beat and utterly delivers an album worth the continued attention.

Wasting no time, the first track (also the title track) is one of the best openers of an album I've heard in quite a while. Miss Potter absolutely knocks it out of the park with the song, kick-started by a drum solo and a mix of distinguished vocals. Then it ratchets into high gear with classic guitar riffs and screechy pitches. Frankly, it's the perfect hook to keep you on for the rest of the disc.

Grace follows the raucous introduction with a string of "slower" songs that veer in a heartbroken (and sometimes country) direction. Continuing on with "Timekeeper," Potter keeps the melodic flow moving with drawn out electric guitars and one hell of a refrain.

"Loneliest Soul" is an odd track, right smack dab in the middle of the album. It uses what sounds like a sitar for the hook, but it doesn't jive well with the rest of the instrumentation. Aside from the peculiar choice in hardware, it's not a bad tune by any stretch.

From there, The Nocturnals turn the amp back up to eleven with a slew of excellent jams. If you're looking for sexual metaphor-based rock action, look no further than "Turntable," which is exactly as much fun as it sounds. With lyrics like "shut your mouth and put your hands on my hi-fi," it's your huckleberry. One of my favorite tracks on the record, "Keepsake" exemplifies Grace Potter to a T. It's got a groovy guitar, a great hook, and an unparalleled vocal track thanks to Potter's unique delivery.

"Runaway" gets the funk into the mix and doesn't let up. It's straight out of a 70's crime flick. "One Heart Missing" puts Potter's more country roots on display. More akin to the earlier tracks, Grace is a mite heartbroken as she croons here. Don't let that deter you, it's still a great song. Wrapping up the album, "The Divide" has a guitar-laden intro that just screams to be turned into the theme for the next James Bond film. Just listen to it. You'll see what I mean.

If you can't tell by now, I'm a wee bit nuts about this album. While I appreciated Grace Potter's previous entry, it didn't strike the same way The Lion The Beast The Beat did in its first moments sounding in my ears. The album doesn't ebb and flow well after the initial track with its indecision between country and rock styles, but it ramps up on the latter half, keeping you engaged for the long haul. Potter is an absolute badass and this disc illustrates that point far better than her prior efforts. Though if you don't like badassery, I'm sure Rebecca Black might have a new single out. (That was not in a judgy tone, I swear.)

Review complete! What did you think of the The Lion The Beast The Beat?

Judge Nerdd: Prometheus

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For.

We finally have another installment in the Alien universe. But was it worth the wait? In my several discussions with friends and contemporaries in my short time since seeing Ridley Scott's Prometheus at midnight, I keep going back to one word to describe the film: muddled. But before I run through all my criticisms, there are some clear positives.

Visually the film is stunning. I could even notice several parts where seeing it in 3-D would have been a desirable experience. Michael Fassbender is fantastic (as always) as the android David, who is the first of his kind. Noomi Rapace has chilling moments as Elizabeth Shaw, fighting her way through sequences that will likely leave you cringing or heartbroken for her. Idris Elba, as always, is too school for school as the ship's captain. Charlize Theron gets in on the fun as the corporate pitbull Vickers. And let's not forget Guy Pearce, who for some reason was cast as the old man Peter Weyland instead of an actual old man.

There are plenty of call-backs to the original flicks, ranging as far as the "We are leaving!" exclamation to the film's sign-off that is unabashedly the same as Alien. Some of them work seamlessly into the film while others feel contrived as a way to give Prometheus a similar aura. Scott caves (likely at the hands of the studio) into giving a sequel-teasing tag-on at the end of the flick. I cannot tell you how forced that scene felt to me. It went on for WAY too long and was utterly unnecessary. And now the evolution of the xenomorph makes no sense to me.

***Now for the questions to which I'd like answers. If you haven't seen it, avoid this next paragraph. I'm gonna spoil the crap out of some parts.***

SPOIL ZONE

How the hell does PILOT Idris Elba know what everything is before all the SCIENTISTS do? After racing back to the ship, Elba's Janek walks right into a room with our main character and spells out everything there is to know about the ruins and its contents with little explanation as to how he possibly came into this knowledge. So it's a biological weapon? And they wanted to send it to Earth? But it turned on them so they buried it here? Uh... okay. 'Cause you shouldn't really know any of that.

That wasn't the only odd character development we saw either. Don't ask me why Noomi was willing to go along with the recently revealed old man (who clearly has an "evil" vibe) just for the sake of seeing this new life form. Whether she was "seeking answers" or not, I feel like she should have sat that out. (Not to mention she probably would have needed to, judging from the fact that she just had major surgery. But it's the future. Whatever.) And speaking of David, why DID he poison Holloway? I can only assume it's because they wanted a quick way to figure out what the black goop was, but that was extraordinarily unexplained.

And why does the Engineer have to get right up out of bed and start killing everything? It seemed like such a convenient horror movie cliche to depend on in order to get the action ramped up. Was that Engineer not in the least curious or willing to speak to his genetic kin once they proved capable of speaking in his language? No? He'd rather just take the black ooze and fly it to Earth? Sure.

It's obvious that that planet was not LV-426 and that was not the ship that the Nostromo discovers on their fateful trip. And the alien showcased at the end of the flick is not the final iteration of the Xenomorph that we saw in the previous installments. So it's very clearly a series of movies being planned. Now instead of one film, I need three to get me to where Alien picks up? Somehow that alien needs to be taken off the planet by another Engineer's ship which then has to crash land on LV-426. Hey 20th Century Fox, I know how your final movie needs to end. Do you wanna pay me to write it?

SPOIL ZONE ENDED

THE VERDICT

Ultimately, Prometheus is probably a solid movie, apart from the (sometimes major) plot gaps. It looks gorgeous, has a eerie feel to it, and has a tremendous cast of actors that fill their roles to the best of their ability. However, the movie gets bogged down and falls short of its own lofty expectations, which are heavily tied to the franchise of which it is now a part. I'm sorry, but I can't treat it as a standalone entry. It takes too many nonsensical jumps in plot and character motivation to be a great movie and is weighed down by its desire to be approachable by the non-Alien crowd while satiating the hardcore fans.

Am I being too hard on Prometheus? Probably. Do I feel bad about it? Not really. It should have been better. For someone who is deeply entrenched in the Alien lore and mythos, I came away from Prometheus sorely disappointed. I find it to be an amazing achievement that Scott gets lost up the ass of his own mythology. If you can get past those connections (or don't care about them), then I would recommend the theater trip. 


Nerdd judgement rendered! I AM THE LAW!

Album Review: Tenacious D: Rize of the Fenix

I couldn't believe it. I was stunned. I laid on my bed with this stupefying thought: I had just listened to a Tenacious D album that I didn't find all that funny. How the hell did this happen? Ever since 2006's soundtrack to The Pick Of Destiny, loyal fans of The D have been waiting for a return to their spectacular roots by way of a legitimate successor to Tenacious D. Rize of the Fenix, while a worthwhile release, is the farthest from their comedic roots that the duo has traveled.

Still the best album cover of all time. Phoenix Penis FTW.

You might be just as shocked to hear this revelation as I was to type it, but for those of you that haven't taken your own stroll through Fenixdelphia, I can back this up.

From the very first track (also entitled "Rize of the Fenix" ), it's easy to hear the ambitious scope of the The D's latest effort. No longer just a pair of guitars, Jack Black and Kyle Gass are backed by a band that provides a rich, full sound akin to what you heard on their movie's soundtrack. The Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl is back at the drums, keeping the trio from the prior albums intact. The D bounces around genres with a Mexican-style groove on "Senorita" to a very BNL-sounding turn on "Quantum Leap" (available on the physical CD).

Despite all this versatility, it's just not enough.

Don't get me wrong, I fully appreciate how well arranged and produced this album is. It's a testament to The D that their music has never suffered in favor of their comedy, even at times rising to its parallel. Their effort ensures that on the 349th listen-through, the album still has a redeeming trait even if I've heard all the jokes. Unfortunately, the music's forward momentum carries past the humor on tracks like "Roadie." It's a fantastic song, but aside from the fellatio reference, I'm not sure any lyric within is laugh out loud funny. 

Most of Fenix's tracks feature amusing themes or subjects, but fall short of the hysterics created from earlier albums. "39," a tune where JB wails in the style of a coked-up and over the hill Springsteen (so you know, Springsteen) about his "young enough for me" 39-year old lady. It's a decent enough firestarter, but the track drags too long, clocking in at an unheard of (for The D) 5:16. The flame peters out halfway through and is blown on for another two minutes until it finally dies. "The Ballad of Hollywood Jack and the Rage Kage" tells a nice story, but again, aside from a reference to snorting coke of the posterior of a prostitute, where's the funny? At 5:06, this diddy also suffers from prolonged exposure.

Other tracks don't last nearly long enough. "They Fucked Our Asses" has a great start, but doesn't last long enough to see it through. It may say 1:08, but it feels like 40 seconds at best thanks to its guitar solo intro and winding end. Right after it, "To Be the Best" gets all 80's Rocky montage on you with some synth action, but only goes 1:01 on the timer! At just over 46 minutes (including the two bonus tracks), the disc leaves you wanting.

And just to remind you, NONE of these tracks are bad. In fact, most of them sound fantastic. It's just that they fail to really strike the funny bone the way these comedians are known for. And therein lies the issue. Rize of the Fenix struck me closer to a Rock album than it did a Comedy album. If this release had the same ratio of songs to vocal comedy tracks like on their debut (which was about 1:1), it would have been far more palatable. Unfortunately, there's only two strictly vocal tracks, leaving me all alone without enough hilarity on an album from a comedy duo. To me, that is nigh unacceptable.

Still, I've listened to Rize of the Fenix 20 times already. It's Tenacious D. Ergo, it is awesome. I just hope it isn't another six years before they have something new for me.