All right, we all have heard the criticisms about the first album, some of us thought he went a little too overboard with the production (trying to re-create
The Crimson Idol) and others (like myself) thought it was just Blackie being Blackie, well regardless of any bias that anyone of us has for WASP material, the second half of Blackie's latest creation tends to be more "to the point" as far as the performance goes, but yet satisfying expectations, and regardless of what anyone expected, we know what Mr. Lawless is capable of. Looking back a bit, the first part,
The Rise, had quite a bit of filling material that included instrumental material and interludes that would lead up into the understanding of the concept. With this conclusion, however, it's as if that whole path is out of the way and now it's just time to rock.
Now that we have all digested the first album, the second, more or less, has nine tracks that are complete songs that flow in a collective manner, being an "album" rather than a "rock opera." Conceptually,
The Demise, goes along with the whole "why am I here" concept, continuing the story of the "orphan" who in the first, has risen to power (and discovered he has "powers" as well), however, on this one he falls from grace and discovers what his real reason for living is.
Opening up with
"Never Say Die," complete with its hook ridden catchy title phrase, playing out aggression on a fast pace, making the second half of this concept open abruptly without the need for an overture, not to mention that the track itself could have opened just about any WASP album. Among the record's opuses you have more melodic riff driven tracks such as
"Resurrector," "Tear Down the Walls," "Come Back to Black" (hmmm, quite an egotistical title), and the title cut, adding more dark but yet hard driven material throughout the record, but with all fast cuts, there has to be contrast somewhere. Ballads like
"Clockwork Diary" and
"All My Life" are the typical dark and emotional "Blackie Lawless" patented doom, both lyrically and musically of course.
The final track, the thirteen-minute
"Last Redemption" is the most concept endearing, with its structural changes, the vengeance cries within the chorus, and the overall thick atmosphere provided, ending the story of
The Neon God on an hostile note, closing the book on Blackie's latest opus, proving that the guy can still bring his music up to epic proportions.
The production, like the first, is fairly dense, layers of guitars, Hammonds, and plenty of reverb, again being fairly warm sounding. Like I said in the review of
The Rise, it was going to be fairly interesting to see how things would turn out with this one. Well, I don't know if he recorded this one after the first one was released or finished/tinkered with the production on this one afterwards, maybe looking at the type of reaction he might get with the first, you can tell that there is a difference with this one. Listening to the two back to back, they fit well together (even if it was released as a two disc set, being a single release), but the sequel stands out on it's own, almost as if musically (disregarding the concept), it is it's own record. With
The Neon God, now behind Lawless and Co., it will be interesting to see what is next for these guys down the road.
Written by
Hashman Tuesday, November 2, 2004
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