Adrenaline Mob
Men of Honor
Century Media Records
2014
This band (?) is now beginning to look more like a project, with a revolving door of musicians seemingly passing through, as John Moyer and AJ Pero from Disturbed and Twisted Sister respectively on bass and drums respectively take over from Paul Di Leo (Fozzy) and Mike Portnoy (you know him) to make up the numbers alongside with Symphony X mainman Russel Allen and guitarist Mike Orlando. This band started up playing this “godawful” groovy Pantera inspired metal, that is most of the times pseudo-macho, as it soon, goes soft… and wooshy... and continues to do so in an even more tedious way. With AJ, behind the kit, the hits tend to be a little less aggressive… a little less complex, let’s be honest there are things he’d have a hard time to replicate, or would like to keep as complex... so he opts for a slightly less adventurous style that however, feels close enough and not a million miles away from that of “Omerta”, more even in the production department as well.
The songs are to me, I dunno, the equivalent of “some sort” or arty rap maybe? It’s like White man wanna be wiggas... gangsta... talking about being tough... fair enough, if one wants to do something as a “silly” masquerade... but apparently, I suppose this, is like trying to sell this as some “real deal” badassery image, which I find just amusing…
All you get is some nice yet quite repetitive riffs, by a quite competent guitarist, put down with some conviction.... Russel Allen who’s one of the greatest modern singers, doing a bad Chad Kroeger, just as if he’s had a frog installed down in his throat, just in order to sound “evil/mean/tough”, even though, here he flexes his singing even more than on “Omerta”, and well, this whole “groove” thing... rhythmically too that just has been done over and over and over and over and it’s old and retarded...
Sure enough the opener “The Mob is Back” had some impressive enough, moments, (even though if at times I was just trying to check if this wasn't “walk” by Pantera....) as did the follow up “Come One Get Up” that really reminded me very much of a Prong tune… in places…
“Dearly Departed” starts the “Nickelsuck” worship... with all those pussywhipped mellow vocals... normally I should appreciate it, but the thing is that I like a band that sets out to be macho to be just THAT. At any rate, it’s a melodic enough song, but the chorus is average...
“Behind These Eyes” strips most of the “crap” away and leaves the essence of a great track behind... possibly one of the best of the album if the only one that “really” has some artistic integrity.
“Let It Go” reiterates some cheap treats that are a dime a dozen, but none can really pull ‘em off, as the original one did.
“Feel the Adrenaline” feels like it has just ripped off, “Fuel” by Metallica, pretty blatantly, but the singing is somewhat better I suppose! Is that really solacing though?
The title track “Men of Honor” is just a bunch or jabbin riffs that could work, in theory, if it didn’t have a “pussy” “melow-dick” chorus, right there in the middle somewhere… what happened? Is someone in the band a big fan of Justin Bieber? “What’s next?” oh-Baby-baby? Well, I guess, next up, Adrenaline Mob feels envious of Stone Sour, so they try to do a ballad in that style, to appeal to that demographic as well... you know a little empty, shoegazing-whatever... obviously Allen can totally pull it off and he does so brilliantly, so it’s another great moment for the album. A so-so ballad, that gets really upped through a tremendous “performance”...
“House of Lies” borders on the ludicrous, somewhere between HIM, Pantera, TON, and who knows what-else! It’s got a dirty decadent, sleazy tone about it, not really fitting with the rest of the material, just as if, it wasn’t completely “transformed” or as if it came from a different “source”/writing session (?)…
Last on line is “Fallin’ to Pieces” not some Firewind cover by any means, haha, but a sort of semi-southern flavored quasi-balladesque-number that gets louder during the chorus .It’s not bad, all things considered. I pretty much like it, in all this mundane shit, that most of this album tends to mostly dwell upon, with this silly “Groovy or Twangy” sound, two ways about it...
For me… it’s a calculated cash in, decently done, that half lands its target which is American hillbilly audiences... and people that might look in the poop of Phil Anselmo for golden nuggets. (in all fairness)… It’s not terribly original, but it’s well enough executed.
I’d rather get good albums from the primary bands of the people involved and even a new Twisted one, rather than this... REALLY!
The songs are to me, I dunno, the equivalent of “some sort” or arty rap maybe? It’s like White man wanna be wiggas... gangsta... talking about being tough... fair enough, if one wants to do something as a “silly” masquerade... but apparently, I suppose this, is like trying to sell this as some “real deal” badassery image, which I find just amusing…
All you get is some nice yet quite repetitive riffs, by a quite competent guitarist, put down with some conviction.... Russel Allen who’s one of the greatest modern singers, doing a bad Chad Kroeger, just as if he’s had a frog installed down in his throat, just in order to sound “evil/mean/tough”, even though, here he flexes his singing even more than on “Omerta”, and well, this whole “groove” thing... rhythmically too that just has been done over and over and over and over and it’s old and retarded...
Sure enough the opener “The Mob is Back” had some impressive enough, moments, (even though if at times I was just trying to check if this wasn't “walk” by Pantera....) as did the follow up “Come One Get Up” that really reminded me very much of a Prong tune… in places…
“Dearly Departed” starts the “Nickelsuck” worship... with all those pussywhipped mellow vocals... normally I should appreciate it, but the thing is that I like a band that sets out to be macho to be just THAT. At any rate, it’s a melodic enough song, but the chorus is average...
“Behind These Eyes” strips most of the “crap” away and leaves the essence of a great track behind... possibly one of the best of the album if the only one that “really” has some artistic integrity.
“Let It Go” reiterates some cheap treats that are a dime a dozen, but none can really pull ‘em off, as the original one did.
“Feel the Adrenaline” feels like it has just ripped off, “Fuel” by Metallica, pretty blatantly, but the singing is somewhat better I suppose! Is that really solacing though?
The title track “Men of Honor” is just a bunch or jabbin riffs that could work, in theory, if it didn’t have a “pussy” “melow-dick” chorus, right there in the middle somewhere… what happened? Is someone in the band a big fan of Justin Bieber? “What’s next?” oh-Baby-baby? Well, I guess, next up, Adrenaline Mob feels envious of Stone Sour, so they try to do a ballad in that style, to appeal to that demographic as well... you know a little empty, shoegazing-whatever... obviously Allen can totally pull it off and he does so brilliantly, so it’s another great moment for the album. A so-so ballad, that gets really upped through a tremendous “performance”...
“House of Lies” borders on the ludicrous, somewhere between HIM, Pantera, TON, and who knows what-else! It’s got a dirty decadent, sleazy tone about it, not really fitting with the rest of the material, just as if, it wasn’t completely “transformed” or as if it came from a different “source”/writing session (?)…
Last on line is “Fallin’ to Pieces” not some Firewind cover by any means, haha, but a sort of semi-southern flavored quasi-balladesque-number that gets louder during the chorus .It’s not bad, all things considered. I pretty much like it, in all this mundane shit, that most of this album tends to mostly dwell upon, with this silly “Groovy or Twangy” sound, two ways about it...
For me… it’s a calculated cash in, decently done, that half lands its target which is American hillbilly audiences... and people that might look in the poop of Phil Anselmo for golden nuggets. (in all fairness)… It’s not terribly original, but it’s well enough executed.
I’d rather get good albums from the primary bands of the people involved and even a new Twisted one, rather than this... REALLY!