FEAR, EMPTINESS, DECIBEL: BARONESS GRACE THE COVER OF THE JULY 2012 ISSUE!
Before there were blogs there were these things called magazines, and the only metal magazine we still get excited about reading every month is Decibel. Here’s managing editor Andrew Bonazelli…
Your MS overlords are just as geeked on Baroness as us, bringing you live renditions of “Take My Bones Away” and “March to the Sea,” Yellow & Green’s two catchiest/most anthemic songs, i.e., the ones that are nothing like the rest of the record. You’ve read here and elsewhere that the former Savannah/now Philly-and-Virginia-based quartet have taken a leap on their third Relapse full-length. I’ve listened to the thing a zillion times now (get a job as a metal “journalist”; trade dreams of homeowning for occasionally hearing records a month in advance), and while it may not be an Indiana Jones-at-the-end-of-Last Crusade leap, it’s up there.
John Baizley and Pete Adams have come up with some rousing harmonies before, but nothing this accessible. Pretty much 95% of the album’s lyrics are totally comprehensible, and they’re no longer adorned in florid, mystical, deep South metaphor. These are tunes that a lot of people from many walks of life can and will get into, maybe some people you don’t particularly like. We think it still rules on multiple levels without trading in their trademark compositional complexity, but them’s the facts. So, why have Baroness “gone there” and what kind of response do they anticipate? J. Bennett talked it out with the band, and finally got a legitimate (and pretty funny) explanation from Baizley about the whole titular color theme. The issue’s in our webstore now. Hopefully the record takes your boner away—not in the walking in on adult baby/diaper lover cosplay sense, but the damn, that was good—let’s smoke sense.
-AB
The July 2012 issue of Decibel also features Nile, Fear Factory,a Dying Fetus Hall of Fame, and an awesome Unsane flexi disc, and can be ordered here. But why not just get a full subscription to ensure that you never miss an issue?
