Butterfly Convict - Eponymous EP

Genre: Alternative / Progressive Rock
Name: Butterfly Convict
Album: Butterfly Convict EP, 2010
I found this EP somewhat... arresting

Well, Coheed & Cambria are currently doing a promotion of various bands made by their fans, and so Butterfly Convict appeared on my radar with this 37-minute exposition, which is not particularly atrocious; They're from Long Island, but other than that they're actually quite good.

Musically, the five piece is interesting, with interesting song structures; for example the opening track, Opus One, has two very different verse riffs, thus bringing into dispute whether it is a verse or not. Vulpic has two seperate choruses. Tension Grid has about 5 different verse styles. There are, in addition, many excellent riffs. The vocalist, while he at first seemed to be a little shipshod, actually grew on me the more I listened, and on the whole is rather good

It is worth noting, however, that the band has recently expanded from a four-piece to a five-piece, with the drummer taking up the duties of second guitarist, with the intention, according to Ross, the drummer-cum-guitarist, to "fill out our sound more and create complimenting guitar parts", which will certainly enhance the music, I feel. This should give their next release a more interesting flavour, which I am certainly looking forward to.

Lyrically, it is somewhat of a mixed bag - there are several moments of poetic excellence: "This spark of different colours; / A vulpic flare." (Vulpic) and "Sleep, baby, sleep. / Til the demons have gone away. / They prowl the night in search of loving homes." and the iambic "It's time to tame the Tension Grid" (both from Tension Grid) strike me as brilliant. However, there is the somewhat clichéd political song, with the immortal (in as much as that they just won't die) lines "While the rich stay rich & the poor get poorer." (Break My Faith). However, this is their first release; you must give them time to find their feet.

However, as you reach the end of the up-til-then mediocre EP, you find Tension Grid, which is much more of a magnum opus than Opus One was. At 12 minutes, it makes up about a third of the time, but is by far the best song: lyrically excellent, musically more diverse and interesting and in general just rather good. Here, everything fits together a lot better, nothing seems contrived (although there are a couple of moments of atrocious cheesiness) and you can see why Coheed & Cambria felt that they could promote them - indeed, this song sounds very much like the aforementioned band both melodically (to a certain extent) and structurally, and the lyrics, whilst on a completely different subject, hold an air that is not too dissimilar from Sanchez's works. It is for this reason that I felt this EP worth a few moments of your time.

Summary: An interesting final song, making an otherwise common-or-garden EP much more worthwhile.
Lyrical Themes: Love, politics and Tension Grids
Rating: 7/10

Track listing:
1. Opus One
2. Vulpic
3. Break My Faith
4. Catharsis
5. Tension Grid

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Steel Panther - Feel The Steel

Requested Review:


Genre: Hard Rock, Metal, Glam

Name: Steel Panther

Album: Feel The Steel (2009)


My apologies for the vulgar language below..

Talk about a one-track mind...

Well, I think that Metacritic has got it dead right for once: They gave a review (at time of press) of 55/100. Steel Panther have been around since 2001, and this is their second release (the first that is all music) and fourth name (the others being Danger Kitty, Metal Shop, and Metal Skool). If you glance at the track listing below, I think you'll get an idea about what their songs are about.

The album can be summed up by the fact that the first word is "fuck". If Corey Taylor can be lampooned for his overuse of particular four letter words, I fail to see why Steel Panther can get away with it: there a 32 uses of "Fuck" or derivatives in the album, excluding repetitions (in choroi, for example), and those are only the ones in the booklet. In total there are 77 words that have been obscured with at least one asterisk, by either the record company or Steel Panther themselves, though I fail to understand why: it's not as if anyone who's reading this is going to decide not to complain because of a couple of asterisks.

Even if you do not find this annoying, the lyrics aren't exactly imaginative: "I wanna f*ck you, you f*cking wh*re" (their asterisks) is standard, and the fiery torments of Beelzebub and all of his minions take place in an area described as "really really really really really hot" (which takes up two lines). To be honest, if you asked my dog, he could probably come up with better lyrics than that.

There is only one song that is not based around what the vocalist would like to do to members of the opposite sex, and only one of those that's not completely vulgar (Eyes Of A Panther, which is, aside from "Death To All But Metal", the only actually acceptable song on this). I can understand songs making fun of things - Two acquaintances of mine have done a pair of songs, one of which is called "Two Fatties On A Bench" (but the title of the other one eludes me), based on this. I remember fondly the song "London Underground" which made the circuits in 2005. But this is "an exercise in taking jokes too far."

There are occasional moments of musical flair when "Satchel rips it up", and the hammered dulcimer at the start of the second track is an interesting touch. Party All Day sounds, for the most part, a little like Bon Jovi (take that how you will). There are these occasional moments, but not enough to compensate for the sheer lack of even vaguely interesting acoustics elsewhere: the bass is incoherent, the drums could fit any song, and the riffs are more often than not predictable, dull, or simply standard. In short, their is no prowess to be found in this veritable peal of pandemonium.

But I could abide all this - I'd never listen to it again, but I wouldn't actively hate it - if they hadn't brought down a variety of other people with them: hidden on the CD are Brett Anderson and Allison Robertson of The Donnas, Matt Nelson, Justin Hawkins from The Darkness, Anthrax's Scott Ian and one of the Atomic Punks; namely, Joe Lester. None of those particularly annoy me either. But then they brought in the aforementioned Corey Taylor on three - three! - tracks and M. Shadows on another. That's a total of eight guest musicians (far too many, in my opinion) and
lowered two of my favourite metallic heroes to their level, thus incurring my wrath. I know, it's terrifying. But at least you guys won't damage your ears. Please, take my advice and burn any copies of this CD you may happen to see. If you don't take them out of the shop first, it's not stealing!

And just to show that I'm not the only one who finds this atrocious, I thought I'd give you a few other quotes:
"Steel Panther's ability to create songs that sound like they came from 1987 is commendable. That's about as close to clever as it gets, though. As David St. Hubbins said, "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever," and Saenz's locker-room humor wears thin quickly." - Allmusic - NME
"only those with a retarded grasp of comedy would want to sit at home and listen to fifth-rate, crass glam-metal parodies with titles such as ‘Asian Hooker’ and ‘Stripper Girl’."
"They can still be fun dealing with other topics than sex." - TheLineOfBestFit.com

Rating: 2/10
(Below that, and it's classed as hip-hop, R'n'B or rap)

Summary: It's vulgar, unimaginative and is much like the "Girl From Oklahoma" - she sucked, too.

Track listing:
1. Death To All But Metal
2. Asian Hooker
3. Community Property
4. Eyes Of A Panther
5. Fat Girl (Thar She Blows)
6. Eatin' Ain't Cheatin'
7. Party All Day (F*ck All Night)
8. Turn Out The Lights
9. Stripper Girl
10. The Shocker
11. Girl From Oklahoma
12. Hell's On Fire

If, despite all this, you really want to hear this atrocity:
They don't have Myspace, but here's their website
You want to download them? Really?
All right, if you insist... Download