Pop Evil – Pop Evil


Pop Evil’s newest offering, Pop Evil (eOne), starts strong out of the gate, a glorious return to good old-fashioned, popular, light Heavy Metal. Dave Grahs and Nick Fuelling prove some nice chunky guitar work interplayed with air guitar worthy riffs. Leigh Kakaty provides vocals you can actually hear! Not only can you hear the vocals but they are also of a pitch and timbre that are pleasing to the ear. Best of all, you can sing along. Frat Boys, Norebang addicts, High Schoolers, Air Guitar and Air Drummers rejoice! An album for all of us!Continue reading


Invidia – As The Sun Sleeps


Invidia (the brainchild of In This Moment’s Travis Johnson and former Skinlab guitarist Brian Jackson) aims to be the sonic version of Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky, and makes no bones about it. The track ‘Step Up’ from their début As the Sun Sleeps (Steamhammer/Oblivion/SPV) spells this out quite literally, even lifting a line from the film that encompasses everything the band stands for: “It’s not about how hard you can hit; it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”Continue reading


Voivod – Post Society


Voivod - Post Society ep cover ghostcultmag

Voivod release their Post Society EP on Century Media records, their latest release which continues their career long war against pigeonholing. Opening with title track ‘Post Society’ one of the 2 new tracks on the album starts off with a fierce bass line from Rocky which rattles and rolls together with Away’s drumming. The slow section around the halfway mark dropping a bit of momentum, which isn’t immediately rewarded with Voivod’s spacey goodness.

‘Forever Mountain’ is a solid track and makes good use of syncopated rhythms, combining nicely with the jazzy guitar work. The overall track is lacking something which is hard to pinpoint. However, most notably it lacks the otherworldly quality of earlier releases.

Third track ‘Fall’ starts of quietly with some spoken vocals which gently build into a fairly pedestrian track, plodding along for the majority of its first half minutes. It’s only in the last half of the track that it comes alive and show some distinct promise. The last half feels more like the Voivod of old and makes me feel excited again for a new album.

Following on from that ‘We are Connected’ is a much stronger track which has a good vibe and energy about it and has a very similar feel to opener ‘Post Society’ with a good driving beat. This is followed by a cover of Hawkwind’s ‘Silver Machine’ is a harder yet faithful re-invention of the classic which is a very pleasing listen indeed. The original is rightly a classic and Voivod’s version certainly does it justice with Snake channeling his inner Lemmy to provide a suitable tribute to the departed legend.

Post Society essentially serves as a stop-gap for those waiting on a new album proper, it does only feature only two new tracks, two tracks previously released, and a cover. On that basis it’s almost inevitable that this EP whilst a very solid effort sadly falls a bit short of Voivod’s interstellar standards.

6.5/10

RICHARD PRICE

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