Patach's Full Review: Hell Below/Stars Above by Toadies
What? There’s a band called Toadies? Not only is there a band called Toadies, but they’ve been around for how long?! Almost ten years?! And how did I never hear of this band before?
It was pretty much the case when I heard about this rock band, Toadies from cdnow.com. Being the music lover that I am, I went out and purchased myself their newest album Hell Below\Stars Above, which was just released March 30th. Having absolutely no knowledge of the band’s previous works, I think I am probably the only one right now that can give you an entirely new perspective on the band.
From what I have heard from “Hell Below\Stars Above” is the lack of “new age rock”. In fact, forget all that Papa Roach, Limp Bizkit, KoRn stuff. We have people that have pretty much threw all of that genre out of their mind, and pull around their rock from the 70s and 80s. That’s pretty much the case of this album, and to tell you the truth, new age or old… this album is certainly pretty good.
It all starts off with very Van Halen-like song, Plane Crash, which simply doesn’t fit the 90s (or 2001) at all. It’s more of the wacky rock your dad would’ve been into, but with a more improved quality in sound, and a somewhat feel of the new age in it.
You aren't done right there, Push the Hand, now a music video on MTV2 (don’t expect it to be on MTV, since that channel doesn’t show music videos anymore) pulls you even further into this somewhat “Van Halen-like” group. Before you know, each song pulls you even further into their 70s and 80s like rock. Motivational however, is a song that sounds a lot like Grunge Rock, something not used at all anymore. But at the end of the song after hearing the repeated words “Get your head around it” again and again, I grew tired of the song, and switched back to their more “older oriented” songs, such as the fun song, Little Sin.
Like many albums, this album however loses its spark near the end of the album. Certainly a lot like Smashing Pumpkins that seems to put their best songs on the first tracks and their more boring and elevator-like songs on their last. Most of the songs after Heel are softer than the first songs on the album. Which isn’t always bad, since a soft song like You’ll Come Down has its own addictive and unpredictable beat. But eventually, near the end of the album, you just stop listening and pretty much stare into space… thinking about something else because, like I said before, it loses its spark.
For people sick of the new age rock bleeding through MTV everyday, this is a great album to own from people that aren’t really that old, but are willing to play in that direction. I guess all those drunk kids back in the 70s were right when they said “Rock will never die”. Toadies seems to be one of the only bands to carry the flame of old age rock with them, even if it means dumping their own modern culture with them. For almost any sort of rock fa
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