Fireball Ministry is a band I’ve been familiar with since early in their career and it’s been cool to watch them grow into this juggernaut with legions of fans. I’ve watched as they’ve been handed some rough times, taken a few musical missteps but lived to fight another day. Now the band is back with their newest studio offering, a stripped down, self-titled collection of ten songs that sees the band stretching their musical muscles a bit more than before.
One of the best things about Fireball Ministry is that they’re an old-fashioned rock n’ roll band. They want fist pumping and headbanging not moshing and circle pits. To prove that they open their new album with “Hard Lines” a riff oriented arena rocker that has you wishing you were listening to it in a really cool car driving through the desert. For a while it seemed as if Fireball Ministry was focused on reinventing themselves with every record, a fact that didn’t always work.
With this albumthe band has relaxed that idea in favor of just writing some great tunes. Interestingly they reinvent themselves anyway as obvious with the tune “Thought It Out” a rocker that has…gasp….a bit of pop edge to it, which is to say I could hear this on a soundtrack or on heavy rotation, especially the super sing along chorus. For the faithful of the Ministry don’t fret, there are still some classic sounding Fireball Ministry songs on here like the stomping “Followed By A Fall” or “Butcher, Faker, Policy Maker”. For me the excitement of the record comes from the stuff that shows a different side to the band, like the boogie van rump shaker “Kick Back” or the slow epic “Fallen Believers”.
One of the things that seems to have tied the album up is that the band has finally landed on a solid and permanent bass player with Johnny Chow. A band driven to groove like Fireball Ministry is really behind the eight ball without an anchor bassist and Chow fills that need nicely. Vocalist Jim Rota has a truly unique voice in the world of rock mainly because he sings and sings well. As I said Fireball Ministry is an old-fashioned style rock band so growls and barking would derail their sound instantly. With Rota’s vocals the band is free to share a stage with anybody from Dio to High On Fire and seem a perfect fit.
If I had to lodge one complaint with the album it would be how the last three songs are tracked. This is just my humble opinion but having two slower jams right next to each other really drags the energy down and though the last tune is killer I still felt as though the power had waned somehow. Regardless of my persnickety nature Fireball Ministry have returned with a new handle on their career and more importantly a powerhouse album that documents them growing as songwriters and musicians.
What else can you really ask for from a band?
Next up we have Fear Factory who couldn’t be a more different band than Fireball Ministry. Fear Factory is a straight metal band, mechanical in their execution and the new album “Mechanize” is proof positive of that. This is thousand mile an hour, crunch filled, double bass frantic heavy metal for the digital age. Fear Factory isn’t so much the soundtrack to the Armageddon but rather what the robot overlords will be listening to while rebuilding the planet in their image. I guess it’s not accident the new album title is what it is huh?
Mechanize opens with the blistering title track that once again proves that few can play faster than Fear Factory or can stuff more riffs into one song. If you can get past the cheesy opening “machine” samples then you’re head banging needs will easily be serviced here. From there the album pretty much stays on track and delivers mach 3 metal bristling with blasts of rage aimed at no one in particular. Fear Factory even manages to pull off some cool clean vocals without falling into the horrible pit of Melodrama Metal.
I guess the problem with Fear Factory really comes down to interpretation and personal choice. To me Mechanize is a cool but hollow album, a record that has been polished to such a shine the humanity has been rubbed out of it. If I wanted to hear machines make music I’d go to Chucky Cheese and watch the Bear Band. I connect with a band because of its humanity be that straight forward or bizarre. When that humanity is torn away I just don’t care. Sure I was head banging my way through riff genius tracks like “Fear Campaign” and “Controlled Demolition” but at the end I knew I’d never listen to the record again. I can’t even break down the songs for you because honestly to me, they all sound the same.
That’s where interpretation and personal choice enter the picture. Its obvious Fear Factory is a good band and to some Berkley Music guitar enthusiast this record is like an audio orgasm. The same can be said for the legions of metalheads who just want to rage and purge themselves of their demons. Mechanize is the perfect record for just that kind of thing. It’s clear that Fear Factory revel in over produced, cold sounding digital music and if that’s their goal who am I to say it’s wrong. Sure I could say it if the record sucked but it doesn’t so I’m again left at the old personal choice crossroads.
Mechanize is a perfect record for anybody who wants everything fast and brutal with little in dynamics and nothing even remotely warm or human sounding. If that’s your cup of tea than get ready to guzzle down greatness. For me Mechanize plays like a how-to album that’s allowed to go on for entirely too long. I’m wicked impressed with how good everybody is but I feel nothing for the music. This is an album that first attacks your head and I need something that attacks my gut, feeds me emotionally before I stop and analyze it. Without humanity in music then it all just becomes machine made background noise.
CraveOnline's Rating: 5 out of 10
