I. OPENING THOUGHTS
So, with the induction of ASKING ALEXANDRIA's "From Death To Destiny",
along follows this record, "Aftertaste" by American metal band HELMET,
released in 1997, which I not only bought in '97, but bought on CASSETTE!
No MP3's back then, no INTERNET either, so when it came to "new music",
either off what you saw on TV, heard on the radio, or read of in magazines.
So I bought this album as a gamble, based off reading a "magazine review",
putting it over as "HEAVY and INTENSE", and what can I say, it lived up!
Not the heaviest record ever, but for me, heaviest shit I heard (at the time).
Having been exposed to it at such young age, dare I say, this mighta been
THE record that steered me in the direction of ANGRY, INTENSE music!
II. THOUGHTS ON HELMET
Helmet, gotta love the band name, HELMET! (as simple as they come by).
Tho they have reached worldwide claim and fame, upon their peak years,
mainly being 1992-1997, and 2004 (their comeback year) to some degree,
Helmet was an awesome band, despite not really having one 'big hit' song to
remember them by, "Sinatra" (my guess) being their most 'memorable' song.
Helmet, on one hand, is a band praised for their rough-edged guitar riffs,
as well as, being a "metal band", who stuck to "metal" 100% of the way
for over 20 years (no electronics, acoustic guitars, genre-mashing, etc.),
but on the other hand, they get labelled as 'bland' and 'boring', especially,
when the lead singer isn't much of a singer (like Alex Jones on a bad day).
III. TRACKLISTING
1. "Pure" (3:32)
2. "Renovation" (2:55)
3. "Exactly What You Wanted" (2:36)
4. "Like I Care" (3:19)
5. "Driving Nowhere" (4:19)
6. "Birth Defect" (2:31)
7. "Broadcast Emotion" (2:44)
8. "It's Easy To Get Bored" (3:26)
9. "Diet Aftertaste" (3:16)
10. "Harmless" (2:58)
11. "(High) Visibility" (2:41)
12. "Insatiable" (2:31)
13. "Crisis King" (3:54)
IV. TRACK REFERENCE
4. "Like I Care" ★★★★★
1. "Pure" ★★★★★
5. "Driving Nowhere" ★★★★★
12. "Insatiable" ★★★★★
3. "Exactly What You Wanted" ★★★★★
11. "(High) Visibility" ★★★★★
10. "Harmless" ★★★★
13. "Crisis King" ★★★★
6. "Birth Defect" ★★★
8. "It's Easy To Get Bored" ★★★
7. "Broadcast Emotion" ★★
2. "Renovation" ★★
9. "Diet Aftertaste" ★
V. FAVORITE TRACK
Despite the album not being a big success, yeah, it was full of big bangers,
and I mean HEADBANGERS, cause this record was damn FUCKIN' LOUD!
But if I had to choose one song, track #4 "Like I Care" deserves top mention
(though released as the album's 2nd single, not to great success, however),
for it's addictive, catchy bassline, and yeah, somewhat 'laidback' vocal style.
Helmet, a band known mainly for providing excellent (guitar) riffs and licks,
they also (in their peak years) provided one of the best full BASS sounds of
any rock band I'd ever known, and this song showed best example of that.
What I like most with the song, is how the bassline starts off dry/chuggy,
and then gets switched to *OVERDRIVE* and literally fries my brains out!
VI. OTHER STANDOUT TRACKS
So yeah, I remember playing "Aftertaste", in my small Sony cassette player,
for the first time, while on the (Pickering Transit) bus, on my way home,
and yeah, being blown away by track #1 "Pure", and how HEAVY it was.
I also remembered a commercial on TV (...back when I watched TV, LOL,
now I don't) promoting this album, with a snippet of the video, for track #3
"Exactly What You Wanted", another one of the many wonderful, yeah,
ANGER FUELED songs on this album, an album that's just full of them,
you would think the whole band was on STERIODS during its recording,
and track #12 "Insatiable" highlights this best, yeah, downright VICIOUS!
As well as, track #5 "Driving Nowhere", music that makes you RAMPAGE!
VII. LEAST FAVORITE TRACKS
Not all tracks on "Aftertaste" are awesome, which is fine, amongst the duds,
track #8 "It's Easy To Get Bored", not that the song is 'boring' or anything,
lol, it's just not that good, (and to me) the rhythm itself sounded like "filler!"
Also, TAMBOURINES have no place on this album, which was on that song.
Let's see, track #9 "Diet Aftertaste" (title-track, I guess), most boring song on
the record, hands down, right next to (boring) track #7 "Broadcast Emotion".
There is one flaw early on the record, this being track #2 "Renovation", and
its poor placement, one of the few "up-sounding" (and not so good) songs,
placed right between 2 of the more ANGRIER (and indeed far better) songs
on the record, but whatever, I eventually got used to *skipping* that track.
VIII. ARTWORK
The album cover art of Helmet's "Aftertaste" shows all 3 band members
walking in a "smoky, debry" like setting, dare I say, similar to that of "9/11",
as well as the band members edited/dimmed/blurred for whatever reason.
It's a pretty cool looking cover, and MUCH, MUCH better choice of cover,
compared to their previous album (Betty, 1994), which was quite strange,
how a band, who puts out such pulverizing music, would name their album
"Betty" (while having some random 1940's era "blonde babe" on the cover).
Had the band opted with another poor choice of cover, as opposed to this,
hey, maybe I may not have viewed this album in the serious light as I did,
but yeah, I considered it the most serious album I'd ever bought, for the time.
IX. CLOSING THOUGHTS
Quite sad in saying, as much as I LOVED this album, it wasn't quite LOVED
by the masses, and yeah, HELMET ended up breaking up a year later for
no explainable reason, my assumption, they gave it their all with this record,
not only musically, but financially, with a major label (Interscope) behind it,
but it didn't *perform*, and maybe, that kinda caused the band to disband.
They would end up reforming 6 years later, and yeah, they still exist today,
but yeah, all their recent albums, with exception to their 'comeback' album
(Size Matters, 2004), completely suck, and find them a BORE to listen to.
Previous to "Aftertaste", Helmet had released 3 albums, and those ones
I also found (mostly) BORING, but they really had me, with this one record.
(FRONT COVER)
(BACK COVER)
(INLAY, FULL)
(INLAY, LYRICS)
(INLAY, CREDITS)
(VINYL, SIDE A)
(VINYL, SIDE B)
(ALL TOGETHER)
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