Whenever Myles Kennedy raises that unique and bluesy voice of his, he gives us a glimpse at his soul. Whenever he plays guitar, his signature sound, showcasing influences such as Jimmy Page and John Sykes, melt into a timeless and nuanced amalgamut. Next to the landmark releases Myles created with Slash and Alter Bridge, the exceptional singer has quietly busied himself with working on his solo debut. A piece his gigantic fan base has demanded loudly for years and years is now made flesh in form of Year Of The Tiger - an album that also gives Myles Kennedy the opportunity to process his father`s death and is therefore his most personal and emotionally challenging record yet. Tracks like ‘Love Can Only Heal‘ will suck the breath out of your lungs with their raw intensity, wrapping you in soaring guitar cascades. ‘Blind Faith‘ thrives on melancholic Americana, and frenzied uptempo blues marks ‘Devil On The Wall‘. Anthemic spirit, fragile melodies and gritty acoustic guitars don`t turn Year Of The Tiger into a sad goodbye, but into a celebration of survival and life in all its facets. © NAPALM RECORDS
Maynard James Keenan’s rock supergroup has seriously grown up in the 14 years since their last album. The Tool frontman’s band is still angry—they’ve just found new, different ways to express it. The gargantuan riffs of APC’s past now make room for strings, piano, and post-rock builds. *Eat the Elephant* is thoughtful and brooding, but still heavy as ever (tracks like “TalkTalk” would fit right in on *Thirteenth Step*). Harps and horns make slow-burning “The Contrarian” frighteningly ominous, and “So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish” sounds so uplifting it’s unsettling—but its lyrics reveal a sardonic ode to modern life, while lamenting the loss of David Bowie and other legends.
“I can’t feel anything at all,” Breaking Benjamin mastermind Benjamin Burnley sings over the burbling electronics and bruising riffs of lead single “Red Cold River.” He might be numb, but you’ll feel the metallic heft of the band’s sixth and heaviest album yet. Propelled by stuttering nu-metal grooves, “Feed the Wolf” and “Psycho” maintain a tight anthemic quality, while the band explores the sharp angles of \'90s hard rock on the high-flying “Blood” and ride a sinister chug into an emotional chorus on “Save Yourself.”
Seven albums and 20 years into their career, Godsmack retain their post-grunge power and penchant for high-gloss hooks. The tribal drums and high-flying chorus of the title track flow seamlessly into singer Sully Erna’s multilayered vocal turn and guitarist Tony Rombola’s tasteful solo on the infectious “Bulletproof.” A stadium-sized chorus shares the stage with overdriven wah-wah guitars and a massive backing choir on “Unforgettable,” while a melancholy piano and somber strings lead the way on the ballad “Under Your Scars.”
Alice In Chains, the 10-time GRAMMY®-nominated grunge icons, return with a sixth album of bluesy psychedelia and crunchy hard rock. Group founder Jerry Cantrell and co-lead singer William DuVall’s vocal melodies set the band apart, whether yearning over the throbbing metal of “Red Giant” or exploring their insecurities on the grunge throwback opener “The One You Know”. Decades after their ‘90s peak, Alice In Chains continue to mine a sound they pioneered without sacrificing the freshness and originality that makes their work distinct.
Stone Temple Pilots initially angered the grunge elite for finding ways to turn the angst into surefire radio hits. The group’s pop appeal while maintaining its harder edges made them that rarest of groups in the ‘90s: one that embraced the rock stardom that other bands professed to hate. Reunited after years of estrangement, STP sound like the perfect hard rock unit. Singer Scott Weiland can punch forth like the rock frontman he so naturally is and the DeLeo brothers provide him with his strongest backing in years. Whether it’s the brash attack of “Between the Lines” or the retro-boogie of “Huckleberry Crumble” and “Hazy Daze,” STP are practically a course in classic-rock history. “Dare If You Dare” has power-ballad scripted onto its pounding sorrow. “Bagman” sounds like a power-pop band turning the amps way up. “Fast As I Can” rocks out like Bad Company and Aerosmith finding their way down the L.A. Freeway. The deluxe edition includes several bonus cuts, including live versions of tracks from the new album and their classic hit “Vasoline.”
Living the Dream is the third studio album to feature Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators. It was released on September 21, 2018 by own record label entitled Snakepit Records. The album was produced by Michael Baskette, who also produced the band's previous record World on Fire and also produced many of Kennedy's albums such as Year of the Tiger. The record features 12 songs.
Mark Tremonti is the Grammy Award-winning guitarist and songwriter known for his work in the critically acclaimed Alter Bridge and in the multi-platinum rock juggernaut Creed. His sound is recognizable and has garnered him a loyal fan base worldwide. In 2012, Mark formed Tremonti with Eric Friedman and Garrett Whitlock as an outlet for his love of harder riffs and the band has released three full-length albums to date. On June 8th, Tremonti returns with their fourth album A Dying Machine, a concept album that showcases Mark’s unique songwriting style and vocal melodies. Anthemic choruses, punishing riffs and fiery guitar solos are showcased on the album in rockers like "From the Sky" and "Throw them to the Lions" and places them alongside the infectiously catchy "Take You With Me" and "The First The Last". © NAPALM RECORDS
One of the best damn rock bands this side of Hades is back, led as always by inimitable vocalist Neil Fallon, whose burly howl only gets better with age. *Book of Bad Decisions*, their 12th album, picks right back up where their 2015’s *Psychic Warfare* left off, peddling a similar strain of weaponized funk that’s been winning over rock-hardened hearts since 1991. Decades in, Clutch’s jammy, wide-open blend of jubilant blues, ’90s alt grooves, and Southern rock swagger is still its own kind of monster. “Are you cool? Well I’m cool. Is everybody cool? Well let’s get hot!” Fallon warbles on the barn-burning “How to Shake Hands” before segueing into the second-line stomp of “In Walks Barbarella,” playing with psychedelic shimmers on “Emily Dickinson,” and taking it down home on “Hot Bottom Feeder,” a crab-cake recipe—and homage to their Maryland roots—spun into song.
On their second album, young hardcore heroes Turnstile slice, dice, and defy genres at every turn. Leadoff ripper \"Real Thing\" cranks a turbocharged riff against melodic backing vocals and a loungey piano outro, while \"Generator\" spins a Helmet-esque groove into a psych-grunge bridge and hyper-metallic guitar solo. Bassist Franz Lyons takes over for frontman Brendan Yates on the soaring staccato groove of \"Moon\" (which also features subtle backups from Sheer Mag\'s Tina Halladay) and \"Right to Be,\" which boasts spacey production from Diplo.
If you missed Led Zeppelin the first time around and wondered what all the fuss was about, well, you’re in luck: A band of (mostly) brothers from Frankenmuth, Michigan, is here to carry the torch for blues-based howling, loud guitars, and tight pants as mass entertainment. “Rock ’n’ roll is a lost ideology,” bassist Sam Kiszka tells Apple Music in the group\'s *Up Next* interview. “It turned into a niche thing. You’ve got to hit the roots again.” That’s exactly what the band does on their debut album, which feels of another time. Swirling together the techniques and textures of rock and blues greats—The Allman Brothers Band, Cream, B.B. King, Neil Young, Jimi Hendrix, and most recognizably Zep, among others—*Anthem of the Peaceful Army* delivers monstrous riffs (“When the Curtain Falls”), jangly strummers (“The New Day”), and earnest acoustic ballads (“Anthem”). The end result is a nostalgia rush for those who know the references and a thrilling point of entry for those who may not. It helps that frontman Josh Kiszka, born with an engine of a tenor, has perfectly mastered Robert Plant’s shrill yelps and yowls (\"Watching Over”) and rock ’n’ roll attitude—which covers everything from wardrobe and stage presence to the album as a stand-alone experience in the streaming era. “We’d like people to listen to this all the way through,” Kiszka says. “And f\*\*king loud.”
*Bad Witch* was first envisioned as the final installment in an EP trilogy, following 2016’s *Not the Actual Events* and 2017’s *Add Violence*. But, wary of falling into patterns of musical predictability, Trent Reznor scrapped the concept, and instead released the project as NIN’s ninth, and shortest, full album. It feels like pure experimentation—a direct rebuttal to that sameness he was worried about. It alternates between anxious beats, jarring vocals (“Ahead of Ourselves”), and intriguing ambience (“I’m Not from This World”), clearly influenced by Reznor’s masterful score compositions for films including *The Social Network* and *Gone Girl*.
VEXES was formed from the ashes of A Life Once Lost, Vessl, Fury of Five, and Downstage. Some say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. That’s especially true when passionate artists draw from multiple sources to create striking, original compositions that retain the essence, but not the song structures of their greatest influences. VEXES love music too much to resort to wholesale theft. Yet one listen to their debut album Ancient Geometry (Due Early 2018) confirms their love for Deftones, Cave In, Thrice, Helmet and even post-metal bands like Isis and Pelican. Ancient Geometry should appeal to the fans of the bands VEXES love, but also to anyone that enjoys creative, eclectic and surprising hard rock and metal. For VEXES, the best albums aren’t the ones that are instantly accessible or easily palatable. They’re the ones that require repeat listening to fully absorb the many subtle and not so subtle layers of emotion. But there’s one rule the band adhere to: Every song, whether aggressive and chugging, fast and frenetic or slow and melancholy needs a strong, melodic chorus.
Formed in Chicago, IL in 1988, The Smashing Pumpkins released their heralded debut album Gish in 1991 and found mainstream success with 1993’s 4x multi-platinum Siamese Dream and 1995’s 10x multi-platinum Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. Following the release of Adore, Machina/The Machines of God, and Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music, the group’s original lineup disbanded in 2000. Singer/guitarist Billy Corgan reformed the group in 2005, enlisting various collaborators for Zeitgeist, Teargarden by Kaleidyscope, Oceania, and Monuments to an Elegy. In June of 2018, The Smashing Pumpkins released their new single “Solara” ahead of their monumental Shiny And Oh So Bright Tour. The track was the first song in over 18 years to feature founding members Billy Corgan, James Iha, and Jimmy Chamberlin, alongside longtime guitarist Jeff Schroeder and offered the first glimpse of music from the newly reformed lineup. In September of 2018, the band formally announced their forthcoming 10th studio album SHINY AND OH SO BRIGHT, VOL. 1 / LP: NO PAST. NO FUTURE. NO SUN. and shared its second single “Silvery Sometimes (Ghosts)”. Recorded at Shangri La Studios with legendary producer Rick Rubin, LP is due for release on November 16th, 2018 via Martha’s Music under license to Napalm Records. With over 30 million albums sold to date, the GRAMMY®, MTV VMA, and American Music Award winning band remains one of the most influential bands in history. © NAPALM RECORDS