METALSUCKS GETS FED THROUGH THE RED CHORD’S TEETH MACHINE
Friday, October 16th, 2009 at 1:00pm by Axl Rosenberg
Only history will tell us for sure, but I suspect that The Red Chord’s 2002 debut, Fused Together in Revolving Doors, will end up being regarded as one of the most influential metal records of its time. Its title is truly appropriate; it’s not a death album, it’s not a grind album, it’s not a hardcore album, it’s basically just a “play whatever the fuck we want album.” There are now hordes of bands aping it, and most of them are doing a shit job.
Meanwhile, three albums, seven years, and a whole bunch of line-up changes later, The Red Chord are just as uncompromising and self-assured in their vision. I have no idea what a teeth machine is – apparently it has something to do with zippers – but Fed Through the Teeth Machine certainly makes me feel as though that’s exactly what I’ve experienced.
This album is HEAVY. Like, kill small animals in the back yard heavy. If Jaws listened to metal before he tooth-raped some poor girl’s innards, this is what I think he’d listen to – this is hunter’s music.
But more than just an excuse to punch the wall until your knuckles bleed, Fed Through the Teeth Machine is a challenging album that requires your full attention. The Red Chord don’t make background music. Like Pig Destroyer or Converge, The Red Chord’s music is novelistic and impressionistic; you probably won’t be able to fully wrap your head around what you’ve just heard after a single listen. Teeth requires your full attention. Guy Kozowyk remains one of modern metal’s great poets; his lyrics alone demand that you engage with the music.
Then there’s the rest of the band. The Red Chord used to be a quintet; now they’re a quartet. With all due respect to Mike Keller and Kevin Rampelberg and whomever else I may be forgetting, it doesn’t seem to have hurt them one bit. There’s places where they cheat a little and pretend like they still have two guitarists, but it’s not egregious; plenty of awesome four-pieces throughout history have used the same trick.
And besides, with all due respect to the always and forever awesome Greg Weeks and Brad Fickeisen, who both do a characteristically excellent job, guitarist Mike “Gunface” McKenzie is the album’s real all-star, and I’ll take as much of his playing as I can get, thank you very much. He sounds more nimble than ever, and while I’ve always really dug his solos, he’s stepped up his game here – they all absolutely slay. The solos in “Demoralizer” and “Mouthful of Precious Stones” are truly fucking EPIC, while the one in “Hour of Rats” has a melancholic, almost oddly classic-rock feel. And “Embarrassment Legacy” is fueled by what is easily one of my favorite riffs of the year.
Oh yeah, also seems worth mentioning: the band self-produced this bitch.
The oft-heard lament around the MetalSucks Mansion as of late has been “HOW THE FUCK ARE WE GOING TO DO YEAR END LISTS?!?!” There’s just been so much great metal this year. And lemme tell ya, Fed Through the Teeth Machine ain’t making my life any easier.
(4 out of 5 horns)
-AR
way too excited for this
“If Jaws listened to metal before he tooth-raped some poor girl’s innards, this is what I think he’d listen to”
fuck yes, that made me laugh. but yeah this new red chord from the track ive herd is going to be amazing
Good, I was hoping this cd was gonna be awesome. 2009 is shaping up to be a good year in my opinion.
Why only four stars? From what I just read this seems to be one of the best albums out this year and possibly the last few years. Although I completely agree with your ideas on Guy’s lyrics. He is one of the last great poets of our day.
I saw them right after the lost the other original guitar player, with just gunface playing. Even though a lot of what was on clients and fused together in revolving doors had two guitar players and used them well, it was difficult to tell that there was only one guitar player.
What i’m saying is, dude is good. Real, real good.
so pumped to purchase this
Best band ever – cannot wait until this comes out
One of the most influential albums ever? Bad joke? Yeah, it’s good, but not Best of 2009 good, let alone “of all time”.
Emilie Autumn does whatever she wants on her cds, too. She’s light years ahead of TRC in terms of musical ability, but neither she nor TRC are nearly popular enough to have even a moderate influence, let alone a major one, on their respective music genres.
There’s also no such thing as “They don’t fit into a genre” anymore, since you all are so fucking obsessed with either finding, or creating (re: “Sumeriancore”) a metal niche genre for every fucking band out there (yet somehow lunp bands as dissimilar as Korn, Limp Bizkit, and Static-X into the same genre).
” nor TRC are nearly popular enough to have even a moderate influence, let alone a major one, on their respective music genres.”
Sorry, that’s just wrong. Fused Together is a hugely influencial record in underground metal. Saying otherwise just shows how misinformed you are.
Misinformed? Not really. It’s a brand-new fucking album, so it can’t even be proven by anecdote, let alone empirical evidence, that it’s been influential. Plus, “influential in underground metal” doesn’t exactly mean a whole lot, at that, and Axl’s claim was “most influential albums of all time” without other qualifications, meaning it’d have to best a lot of much better, much more widely-acclaimed and truly important albums. You really think some album by a niche metal band ranks up there with Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Elvis, Jimi Hendrix, Metallica, or Black Sabbath? I don’t really think “spastic noise metal” ranks up there with the power players of history.
Like I said, it’s a bad joke at best, brainless nutswinging at worst.
They aren’t talking about this album, you dolt, they’re talking about The Red Chord’s first album, “Fused Together In Revolving Doors”. Why don’t you read all the words they wrote instead of shooting off your elitist mouth? That album IS truly important and is one of the reasons new bands sound like they do today, i.e. just about every Sumerian band.
And something doesn’t have to be “popular” in the mainstream to be influencial. Mr. Bungle, anyone?
None of them are genre-influential, although I did read it wrong the first time. A bunch of talentless bands on a mediocre label sounding like a band that came before them isn’t exactly “one of the most influential metal albums of its time” requirement as stated.
Could it possibly be influential to a couple of shitty bands in another niche metal genre – one created by the authors of this site? Sure. That’s not exactly “one of the most influential albums of its time”, though. If it was, those influences wouldn’t be constrained to one set of bands on one label in underground metal, now would it? “Noise metal” and all the shitty little bands in that genre will be gone here soon, with no more influence on the overall metal world than boy bands left on the pop music world.
Lol @ comparing Emilie Autumn to The Red Chord, in any way. I agree, for the most part, with what you said even though I enjoy The Red Chord, but that comparison was just stupid.
If you don’t like the music, then leave. Go live in your pop world with your Beatles and your Madonnas and leave us metal folks in peace. Please, you’d be doing us all a favor. Maybe you’d “influence” some others to do the same. Oh wait, you couldn’t, because your shitty uninspired posts are unimportant and obscure when put next to the Zoltan’s of the MetalSucks.net world. So no, you couldn’t “influence” anyone. But still, leave. Not my chair, not my problem.
Pardon my ignorance, but was/is Fused Together In Revolving Doors REALLY that influential? I’m not questioning it, but I’d never heard that that album was THAT great (though I’d heard it was very good). I’d always been under the impression that Clients was the most beloved TRC album.
fused spawned countless hybrid grind/deathcore bands and is arguably trc’s best record.
YOU FORGOT JONNY FAY IN THE LIST OF GUITARISTS
I just wish Sean Hand reviewed this so we could download it and listen while we read the review. I think we would get so much more of it that way.
I have seen this band live twice and both times was not impressed.
I love metal and can appreciate many of this different styles but this bands music is not good. Anybody could go out and just rub their dick on guitar strings and somebody or some group of people would consider them groundbreaking and influential.
Just saw ‘em with GWAR last night. They were pretty good, definitely one of the better bands that played, but (since I have to bitch about SOMETHING), the new Tshirts suck. They say “the RED CHord” across the whole front, sleeve to sleeve, which is cool, but the slogan on the back ruins it: “Eating all the food didn’t even help”
wtf? worst phrase on a metal shirt ever?
Eating food is br00tal!
lol at the argument
“Clients” will be whispered in the same breath as “Far Beyond Driven” and those other albums metal fans think of as seminal. The Red Chord will go down as history makers.
im seeing them in montreal, and i already pre ordered 4 shirts lmfao looks like im getting 4 cds hahahaha