VINNIE PAUL RETROSPECTIVE, PART VII - "Rebel Meets Rebel" and "Hellyeah"
Welcome back to our retrospective on the career of the late, great Vinnie Paul. It's been a minute, mainly because I've been working on year end countdown stuff (and went through a bit of personal upheaval), but we back now, and I figured this would be a great opportunity to kick some rust off this machine known as Nick Nutter. So it's fitting that these two albums are Vinnie Paul tying up loose ends, picking up pieces and moving on to a new future. How did they fair? Let's take a look:
REBEL MEETS REBEL (2006) ***
At the time, I ranked this as my third favorite album of 2006. That was the first year I started writing blogs on MySpace, and MAN was it a bad one. It was one of the thinnest fields I've ever seen to date, nobody seemed to have any idea what was happening anymore and nobody had any inspiration left. One thing this project had going for it was it was recorded between 1999 and 2003. The other is it was "trying" something "new" in attempting to fuse hard rock and metal with outlaw country. A lot of outlaw country winds up sounding like twangy blues, which was a major building block of hard rock to begin with, and on down the line, so it's not that big of a stretch when you get down to it. So spoiler alert: it isn't much of a melding. It's Pantera letting their macho bravado down and putting more "southern" in its place, fronted by David Allen Coe.
If you're not familiar, David Allen Coe is a controversial figure in country music. He has a helluva story: Spent most of his first 30 years in and out of prison, did time with Screamin' Jay Hawkins who inspired him to start music, then lived in the back of a hearse he parked in front of the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. He penned a couple of famous country songs, the most well known of which is "Take This Job And Shove It", then went on to do a few "comedy albums" with songs, according to journalist Neil Strauss, that are "among the most racist, misogynist, homophobic and obscene songs recorded by a popular songwriter." Judging by some of the titles, yeah, probably, but I don't even want to bother checking them out. I was never into Coe enough to do research before now; I knew he had a reputation, but honestly didn't want to know.
So does that make him better or worse than Phil Ansemlo, sleeper agent white supremacist? Isn't that like wondering which is better between hours of water boarding or minutes of serrated rectal insertion? They're both torture that does lasting damage. Let's just get this over with.
"Nothin' To Lose" has more life to it than anything since "Vulgar". I'm not saying it's better, but it feels more alive, which of course has a sad irony attached given the timing of its release. The song just feels more natural than any of the 90's aggro posturing they put up. It's a pure, simple thrash number. It does what it needs to do and does it well.
"Rebel Meets Rebel" is your first test of "How much country can you metal heads take?", as it comes through with a twangy-as-hell whamm-ified lapsteel sound. I've always liked the audacity of this line; it's not pleasing to the ears, yet it's perfect for the song. The lyrics on this album are pretty meat-headed. When they provide a quotable, it's because of how head-scratching or dumb they are.
Never more so than on "Cowboys Do More Dope". Helluva groove, not the worst idea for subject matter, especially given the crossover they're attempting, and the piano really adds an extra dimension, but holy shit is this dumb. That might be the point, but you should go in expecting it.
"Panfilo" is a beautiful acoustic number which should by no means be its own track, but we've only got 40 minutes of material, so we gotta make it look like there's twelve songs. It runs right into "Heart Worn Highway", which fucking rips. This is the best song on the album, hands down. It's Coe's best singing, it has atmosphere, it kind of tells a story, even if the tale of the outlaw coming to the end of the road has...been done...a lot...but the disparate elements at work come together best on this track. I think because it's not a gimmick. "Rebel Meets Rebel" is Hank Williams Jr's Monday Night Football theme but about metal. "Cowboys Do More Dope" is trying to be edgy and funny, and not succeeding at the former at all. But "Heart Worn Highway" gets it right.
"One Night Stands" is the most needless, joyless song on here, and that includes the caterwauling completely improvised "NYC Streets" at the end, which is just them bullshitting and making up lyrics on the spot (at least I hope he made them up). The cadence is the same as "Nothin' To Lose" and "No Compromise", but the lyrics are about wanting one night stands, and some random facts about how he's been making music since the 60's and used to play football. As a song, it's passable, but the lyrics take it down a peg from even that.
"Arizona Rivers" is definitely on the southwestern, desert-y slide guitar tip. It's a little over two minutes, but it's firmly it's own song; an oasis in the middle of ideas that really needed more work. It's cool for what it is.
"Get Out Of My Life" is "Cowboys Do More Dope" played for the nu metal lyric set, as in "We need a song to play on the radio that tells people to "go away" or "not step to me" or something." It sounds just like track 3, but not as good, without the piano, played way more straight. The only good part is just before the second chorus, Coe demands in exhausted exasperation: "Get out of my motherfuckin' life!" I feel like I could sample that for something, but given Coe's history, I'm not sure if it's worth the trouble.
Then there's "Cherokee Cry". It's not a bad song, it just sounds too much like "Heart Worn Highway". The message is sound, trying to be a voice for tribal rights and against the corruption of tribal leaders. But from what I looked up, I can't seem to find anything saying whether David Allen Coe is Native American or not. I think he is, but Google and Wikipedia both failed me and I don't feel like waiting until Monday to go to the library to track something down for a review of "Rebel Meets Rebel".
"Rebel Meets Rebel" isn't a real album. It's a polished up collection of what they managed to track with David Allen Coe when their paths managed to cross. With a little more work and a few more songs, this could have been a real thing. Instead, it's a bit of a curiosity with a handful of songs that rip and another handful that are...fine, I guess.
So. Here we are. The last five albums to review are different than the first twelve, because I've never heard them before. The only one I attempted to listen to was "Blood For Blood", and only because AOL Music used to have streams of albums the first week or the week before they came out, and that one was up there. I didn't finish and I don't remember anything about it. Other than that, my only exposure to Hellyeah has been the singles from the first two albums. That being said, let's unleash some fresh hell(yeah) unto my ears with:
HELLYEAH (2007) **
Oh...kay. Never thought I'd be doing this. But I guess this album deserves its day in court.
The song "Hellyeah"...excuse me, "HELLYEAH" is a brain-dead version of Damageplan. Dumbed-down from the riffs on "New Found Power" and way more "RAWK"-ified lyrics. I guess this is what we're in for. The breakdown's kinda cool, though.
When I first heard "You Wouldn't Know" is when I made my mind up about Hellyeah, and the ensuing 11 years haven't really changed my mind at all. It's every radio rock song you've heard since 2002, but with verses that aren't in half time. I guess that makes it different enough, but man I couldn't be arsed to pick this out of a lineup in 2007.
"Matter Of Time" is a lot more thrashy than expected, but definitely in the "Step up motherfucker, step up" vein of the time, which makes a lot of sense because "Waging War" is Chad Gray's best attempt to imitate Phil Ansemlo on "War Nerve". The tough guy attitude of nu-metal is largely Pantera's fault, so it should surprise no one that Hellyeah should assume the mantle of the archetype.
"Alchohaulin' Ass"...you've gotta be fucking kidding me, right? They play it so straight. I don't even know how that's possible, but they play that song STRAIGHT.
"GodDamn" is a lobotomized Mudvayne song. It's got some of their riff trademarks, but it's got a really straight up and down pump for the beat with a little double-kick in there to keep up appearances. Another reason I was down on this album is because I'd been falling out of love with Mudvayne steadily since 2002. "The End Of All Things To Come" came out at a time when I was deeply disinterested with "normal" music, and even though Mudvayne was still plenty weird, I was into jazz fusion and electronic nonsense by then and anything that could pretend to be conventional was too normie for me. "Lost & Found" in 2005 (three weeks after Will Smith released his album of the same name) had me jumping off the bandwagon altogether. I didn't get back on until the self-titled at the end of 2009, and that was a side project by then because Hellyeah was way more successful. I went back and found a few things to like from "Lost & Found" and "The New Game", but they're never gonna be my favorite or anything. So to hear a lesser version of their already simplified faire doesn't make me feel like I missed out.
"In The Mood" is a nifty little interlude, better than half this dreck. "Star" would actually be pretty tight if not for the meh lyrics; instead it splits the difference. It's a song I could have on in the background and be okay with, but if I paid attention to it it puts me off. "Rotten To The Core" is halfway between Damageplan and Disturbed. And that's the only distinguishing characteristic it has, if you can call it that.
Oh no. I have a bad feeling as "Thank You" starts up. Is this one for the fans? Oh God, it's WORSE. It's a badly written tribute to Dimebag. Think of the most cliché lyrics a song like this could have. That's exactly what you'll get. I mean, it's not specifically about anybody; it's the most generic words that may have ever been committed to record; but rest assured, this is a tribute.
"Nausea" is dull. That's all there really is to say. It's got beef, but...presentation matters, y'know? "One Thing" is a weird choice to end the record, but I'm not complaining because that means this'll be over soon. It sounds like it should've been second or third from last, like it's the song they thought was juuust good enough to make the cut, but doesn't really fit the flow of the album so they bury it towards the end so no one notices. But then it just stops. That was the last song. What an anti-climactic thud. It's not even terrible or anything, just...kinda "eh".
The takeaway from this is Hellyeah is picking up largely from where Damageplan left off, but adding the influences of Mudvayne and Nothingface, who were bisected to make up the other four members of this group with Vinnie Paul. It's definitely aiming for simplicity, if I'm going to be nice, and I've got to admit this album isn't the worst thing I've ever heard, but it's not exactly setting my world on fire. "Matter Of Time", "Waging War" and "Star" are the only ones I wouldn't skip if they came up on random. In the end, it's...competent.
Okay, so that wasn't so bad....wait, what?! THERE'S FOUR MORE OF THESE?!? HOW?!? Fuck that noise, I'll deal with it next year. Next time is the Top 20 Songs Of 2018. That might actually be GOOD.
PART I: The 80's
PART II: Cowboys From Hell and Vulgar Display Of Power
PART III: Far Beyond Driven
PART IV: The Great Southern Trendkill
PART V: Official Live 101 Proof and Reinventing The Steel
PART VI: Damageplan
PART VIII: Hellyeah (2010-2016)
REBEL MEETS REBEL (2006) ***
At the time, I ranked this as my third favorite album of 2006. That was the first year I started writing blogs on MySpace, and MAN was it a bad one. It was one of the thinnest fields I've ever seen to date, nobody seemed to have any idea what was happening anymore and nobody had any inspiration left. One thing this project had going for it was it was recorded between 1999 and 2003. The other is it was "trying" something "new" in attempting to fuse hard rock and metal with outlaw country. A lot of outlaw country winds up sounding like twangy blues, which was a major building block of hard rock to begin with, and on down the line, so it's not that big of a stretch when you get down to it. So spoiler alert: it isn't much of a melding. It's Pantera letting their macho bravado down and putting more "southern" in its place, fronted by David Allen Coe.
If you're not familiar, David Allen Coe is a controversial figure in country music. He has a helluva story: Spent most of his first 30 years in and out of prison, did time with Screamin' Jay Hawkins who inspired him to start music, then lived in the back of a hearse he parked in front of the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. He penned a couple of famous country songs, the most well known of which is "Take This Job And Shove It", then went on to do a few "comedy albums" with songs, according to journalist Neil Strauss, that are "among the most racist, misogynist, homophobic and obscene songs recorded by a popular songwriter." Judging by some of the titles, yeah, probably, but I don't even want to bother checking them out. I was never into Coe enough to do research before now; I knew he had a reputation, but honestly didn't want to know.
So does that make him better or worse than Phil Ansemlo, sleeper agent white supremacist? Isn't that like wondering which is better between hours of water boarding or minutes of serrated rectal insertion? They're both torture that does lasting damage. Let's just get this over with.
"Nothin' To Lose" has more life to it than anything since "Vulgar". I'm not saying it's better, but it feels more alive, which of course has a sad irony attached given the timing of its release. The song just feels more natural than any of the 90's aggro posturing they put up. It's a pure, simple thrash number. It does what it needs to do and does it well.
"Rebel Meets Rebel" is your first test of "How much country can you metal heads take?", as it comes through with a twangy-as-hell whamm-ified lapsteel sound. I've always liked the audacity of this line; it's not pleasing to the ears, yet it's perfect for the song. The lyrics on this album are pretty meat-headed. When they provide a quotable, it's because of how head-scratching or dumb they are.
Never more so than on "Cowboys Do More Dope". Helluva groove, not the worst idea for subject matter, especially given the crossover they're attempting, and the piano really adds an extra dimension, but holy shit is this dumb. That might be the point, but you should go in expecting it.
"Panfilo" is a beautiful acoustic number which should by no means be its own track, but we've only got 40 minutes of material, so we gotta make it look like there's twelve songs. It runs right into "Heart Worn Highway", which fucking rips. This is the best song on the album, hands down. It's Coe's best singing, it has atmosphere, it kind of tells a story, even if the tale of the outlaw coming to the end of the road has...been done...a lot...but the disparate elements at work come together best on this track. I think because it's not a gimmick. "Rebel Meets Rebel" is Hank Williams Jr's Monday Night Football theme but about metal. "Cowboys Do More Dope" is trying to be edgy and funny, and not succeeding at the former at all. But "Heart Worn Highway" gets it right.
"One Night Stands" is the most needless, joyless song on here, and that includes the caterwauling completely improvised "NYC Streets" at the end, which is just them bullshitting and making up lyrics on the spot (at least I hope he made them up). The cadence is the same as "Nothin' To Lose" and "No Compromise", but the lyrics are about wanting one night stands, and some random facts about how he's been making music since the 60's and used to play football. As a song, it's passable, but the lyrics take it down a peg from even that.
"Arizona Rivers" is definitely on the southwestern, desert-y slide guitar tip. It's a little over two minutes, but it's firmly it's own song; an oasis in the middle of ideas that really needed more work. It's cool for what it is.
"Get Out Of My Life" is "Cowboys Do More Dope" played for the nu metal lyric set, as in "We need a song to play on the radio that tells people to "go away" or "not step to me" or something." It sounds just like track 3, but not as good, without the piano, played way more straight. The only good part is just before the second chorus, Coe demands in exhausted exasperation: "Get out of my motherfuckin' life!" I feel like I could sample that for something, but given Coe's history, I'm not sure if it's worth the trouble.
Then there's "Cherokee Cry". It's not a bad song, it just sounds too much like "Heart Worn Highway". The message is sound, trying to be a voice for tribal rights and against the corruption of tribal leaders. But from what I looked up, I can't seem to find anything saying whether David Allen Coe is Native American or not. I think he is, but Google and Wikipedia both failed me and I don't feel like waiting until Monday to go to the library to track something down for a review of "Rebel Meets Rebel".
"Rebel Meets Rebel" isn't a real album. It's a polished up collection of what they managed to track with David Allen Coe when their paths managed to cross. With a little more work and a few more songs, this could have been a real thing. Instead, it's a bit of a curiosity with a handful of songs that rip and another handful that are...fine, I guess.
So. Here we are. The last five albums to review are different than the first twelve, because I've never heard them before. The only one I attempted to listen to was "Blood For Blood", and only because AOL Music used to have streams of albums the first week or the week before they came out, and that one was up there. I didn't finish and I don't remember anything about it. Other than that, my only exposure to Hellyeah has been the singles from the first two albums. That being said, let's unleash some fresh hell(yeah) unto my ears with:
HELLYEAH (2007) **
Oh...kay. Never thought I'd be doing this. But I guess this album deserves its day in court.
The song "Hellyeah"...excuse me, "HELLYEAH" is a brain-dead version of Damageplan. Dumbed-down from the riffs on "New Found Power" and way more "RAWK"-ified lyrics. I guess this is what we're in for. The breakdown's kinda cool, though.
When I first heard "You Wouldn't Know" is when I made my mind up about Hellyeah, and the ensuing 11 years haven't really changed my mind at all. It's every radio rock song you've heard since 2002, but with verses that aren't in half time. I guess that makes it different enough, but man I couldn't be arsed to pick this out of a lineup in 2007.
"Matter Of Time" is a lot more thrashy than expected, but definitely in the "Step up motherfucker, step up" vein of the time, which makes a lot of sense because "Waging War" is Chad Gray's best attempt to imitate Phil Ansemlo on "War Nerve". The tough guy attitude of nu-metal is largely Pantera's fault, so it should surprise no one that Hellyeah should assume the mantle of the archetype.
"Alchohaulin' Ass"...you've gotta be fucking kidding me, right? They play it so straight. I don't even know how that's possible, but they play that song STRAIGHT.
"GodDamn" is a lobotomized Mudvayne song. It's got some of their riff trademarks, but it's got a really straight up and down pump for the beat with a little double-kick in there to keep up appearances. Another reason I was down on this album is because I'd been falling out of love with Mudvayne steadily since 2002. "The End Of All Things To Come" came out at a time when I was deeply disinterested with "normal" music, and even though Mudvayne was still plenty weird, I was into jazz fusion and electronic nonsense by then and anything that could pretend to be conventional was too normie for me. "Lost & Found" in 2005 (three weeks after Will Smith released his album of the same name) had me jumping off the bandwagon altogether. I didn't get back on until the self-titled at the end of 2009, and that was a side project by then because Hellyeah was way more successful. I went back and found a few things to like from "Lost & Found" and "The New Game", but they're never gonna be my favorite or anything. So to hear a lesser version of their already simplified faire doesn't make me feel like I missed out.
"In The Mood" is a nifty little interlude, better than half this dreck. "Star" would actually be pretty tight if not for the meh lyrics; instead it splits the difference. It's a song I could have on in the background and be okay with, but if I paid attention to it it puts me off. "Rotten To The Core" is halfway between Damageplan and Disturbed. And that's the only distinguishing characteristic it has, if you can call it that.
Oh no. I have a bad feeling as "Thank You" starts up. Is this one for the fans? Oh God, it's WORSE. It's a badly written tribute to Dimebag. Think of the most cliché lyrics a song like this could have. That's exactly what you'll get. I mean, it's not specifically about anybody; it's the most generic words that may have ever been committed to record; but rest assured, this is a tribute.
"Nausea" is dull. That's all there really is to say. It's got beef, but...presentation matters, y'know? "One Thing" is a weird choice to end the record, but I'm not complaining because that means this'll be over soon. It sounds like it should've been second or third from last, like it's the song they thought was juuust good enough to make the cut, but doesn't really fit the flow of the album so they bury it towards the end so no one notices. But then it just stops. That was the last song. What an anti-climactic thud. It's not even terrible or anything, just...kinda "eh".
The takeaway from this is Hellyeah is picking up largely from where Damageplan left off, but adding the influences of Mudvayne and Nothingface, who were bisected to make up the other four members of this group with Vinnie Paul. It's definitely aiming for simplicity, if I'm going to be nice, and I've got to admit this album isn't the worst thing I've ever heard, but it's not exactly setting my world on fire. "Matter Of Time", "Waging War" and "Star" are the only ones I wouldn't skip if they came up on random. In the end, it's...competent.
Okay, so that wasn't so bad....wait, what?! THERE'S FOUR MORE OF THESE?!? HOW?!? Fuck that noise, I'll deal with it next year. Next time is the Top 20 Songs Of 2018. That might actually be GOOD.
PART I: The 80's
PART II: Cowboys From Hell and Vulgar Display Of Power
PART III: Far Beyond Driven
PART IV: The Great Southern Trendkill
PART V: Official Live 101 Proof and Reinventing The Steel
PART VI: Damageplan
PART VIII: Hellyeah (2010-2016)
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