Sepultura – Roorback (SPV)
Latest in a series of under-appreciated albums from these metal veterans. I’m so glad to see them pushing the boundaries and limits of their imaginations and also extending the grasp of a tired genre. What started out as death/thrash evolved into the best of thrash, was mixed with groove, became nu-ish, and now is stomping into hardcore. This is awesome. Without a doubt, one of the best albums of the year. Raw, stripped down, intense, very in-your-face. Loud guitars, excellent drums, throat-tearing vocals, some amazing melodies, bass experimentation, what more can you ask for? I’ve read reviews of this where people ripped the album for being bad, etc, but they’re wrong! Also, the second disc is a series of covers, all of them worth checking out.

Tracks:

DISC 1:
1) Nice groove after a noise start, and then just pure rage-filled hardcore with FCCs. (“fuck” twice in the verses, easily predictable).
2) Another groove type intro, and it stays that way except for the choruses when it picks up. I really like this song.
3) Faster, more metal, but still very groove-laden, this one even manages to spontaneously burst into a breakdown. Kickass!
4) A good mid-tempo song, interesting political message, and excellent drum and bass interaction.
5) Whoa! Melodic hardcore/metal? Me gusta!
6) Killer riff on this one, total breakdown madness, oh my god, I can’t even imagine what this must be like live, but it’s filled with FCCs (“shit” and “fuck” in the one verse that’s repeated three times. Easy to predict and bleep out, and if you catch it the first time, you’ll get it the second and third times as well).
7) Awesome slow, down-trodden riff, just oozes along with some neat harmonics over it. Is that a bass solo? Holy shit, this song smokes!
8) Short little chaotic hardcore tune that just oozes metal. FCC at -0:53 (“fucked up world” easily bleeped).
9) Not that good a song, and FCCs, so, you know, skip it.
10) Fast, heavy, and Andreas solos again! Woo!
11) Two FCCs at -2:51 and -2:46, but an otherwise spectacular doomy song, with lots of layered guitars, clean vocals, and an awesome guitar solo.
12) Short, to the point, sounds real stripped down, and has a great drum beat.

DISC 2:
1) Messiah! By Hellhammer, this version is pretty damn good.
2) Originally by Massive Attack, don’t know the original, but this a pretty awesome mellow, doomy tune that picks up in a very new-wave-ish kind of way and just kills.
3) Originally by Public Enemy, this doesn’t work as well, but it’s worth a bunch of laughs, and it’s not really bad. One of the verses is in Portuguese.
4) Devo? What the fuck? This really doesn’t work well, unless you want laughs, in which case this song should provide plenty.
5) Jane’s Addiction? Getting worse, it seems. Sounds a little out of place, but the guitar solo is cool.
6) Welcome to the best cover song of the last decade. Holy shit! This works like none other. Derrick’s vocals give the song the edge that Bono’s over-whiny, rockstar, bullshit, weak-ass voice could never even fathom. This, I bet, is what U2 had in mind when they wrote the song. Simply superb.
7) Old-school thrash performed pretty much identical to the original. Which is to say, great song!