If I were another kind of reviewer I’d say that “Blind Tiger” is a nonsense album or a joke. But I’m not that kind. When I hear an album with so many things that are out of the box I pay more attention to it. I really don’t know why the band chose to name each track after a town – yeah, I read the press release and there they confirmed all names are from towns – but I do get the bricolage and cauldron of influences the album brings. Bottomline, here we have a musical subversion of many styles; Extreme Metal, modern Metal, Jazz, pop and others that I cant remind of right now. There are times as in “Abbeville” that I remember System of a Down by the way Blind Tiger use the dissonances and the clean guitars. The track has some some Acid Jazz features with the dossonant saxophone and the guitars that sound a bit out of tuning. I don’t have to say that all those out of tuning is not accidental. They are all planned and figured out. It’s a part of the music.
In “Blind Tiger” those features are being slowing inserted in a crescendo. From first and album opener “Jacksonville” to last track “Panama City” the band goes inserting more and more out of the box influences. Vocals in “Panama City” sound often out of tune. In this vocalist Nick Lundy on purpose tries to go higher and give vocal pitches that he knows he can’t reach. The outcome is pretty amazing. I mean, that’s the spirit of Metal music; to subvert, to shock, and to make one thinks. Following tracks go slowly introducing Jazz and Free Jazz elements and more, and more dissonances and out of tune melodies. The main idea is to create a kindpf cacophony, but still with some pleasantness to the fan otherwise the music gets too hard to listen.
I’m still trying to get the link among the names of the tracks. There must be a reason, or reasons to it. Well, if you my fan gets it, please do tell.
Blind Tiger “Blind Tiger” will be self-released on November 05th.
Track Listing:
- Jacksonville
- Atlanta
- Vero Beach
- Blountstown
- Denton
- Abbeville
- Panama City
Watch “Vero Beach” official video here:
I’m just a lucky guy who has chosen metal to live with for a long time. Metal changed my life for good. It made me more confident and stronger. Metalheads are naturally far away from the mass mediocrity and don’t accept impostures from anybody else. Metal is more than music, it’s a life changing oportunity!