Customer Reviews

The War Of Art

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I have absolutely no idea why people mention Slipknot every time they review a heavy band. I love Slipknot's music and I love American Head Charge's music but the two styles are chalk and cheese. What American Head Charge have in common with Slipknot is a grade-A vocalist but that's where it ends. This is a fantastic debut album and if we are going to make any comparisons, let's talk about Faith No More. AHC are basically a heavy FNM. Period. Listen to most of their tracks and that's what they are - they've taken all the best (i.e. heavy and Mike Patton's voice) elements of FNM and stuck it through a meat grinder to procude the BEST heavy album of last year (and this is against some pretty stiff competition). If you like your vocal range from soft to scream, guitars heavy and loud and rythym tight and varied, this is for you. BUY IT, you will NOT be disappointed.

this is one hell of an album and it comes from the band setup to suppport the mighty slipknot in november. That bagins to tell you that this is not an album for the faint at heart. Lots of growling all the way through this album, and if thats your thing, like it is mine. One of the best songs on this album has to be never get caught, which really displays how good this band are. They have a lot of potential, and having seven members, i think they could go a long way in this business.

When i first heard this i was in awe, like nothing id heard before, the production is flawless, the music is intense, powerful and intelligent.
A few songs stand out on this album, namely "self", my particular favourite, filled with intense sounds and a highly emotionally charged vocal.
The rest of the songs are almost as good, this is one album you really must own, a groundbreaker.

American Head Charge's debut album The War Of Art is a much-underrated release from 2001, at the height of the oversaturated Nu Metal scene. The band gained some publicity when Slipknot's Shawn Crahan remixed their single `Just So You Know,' but never broke as big as they initially seemed to be destined for, and eventually collapsed.

Their style draws influence from artists like Ministry, Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson as well as touches of early Korn and Deftones beside their normal heavier metal influences. These influences can be heard in the actual songwriting and structuring as well as just in the use of samples and keyboards. For the most part, this is one of the heavier albums to come out during the Nu Metal era and still sounds good to this day.

Singer Cameron `Martin Cox' Heacock has a superb voice and vocal range, handling harsh and melodic vocals equally well. The band are all competent musicians who deliver fun and memorable riffs and simple pounding drumbeats from a former Keyboardist who turned-drummer quickly in the wake of a line up change.

The album is full of great memorable songs, with very few weak moments. If you were deliberately looking for flaws it wouldn't be unreasonable to say that they are a little derivative at times and that the album is perhaps overlong. As a whole though, this is a solid collection of great turn of the century metal songs.

Standout tracks include `Americ*nt Evolving Into Useless Psychic Garbage," which evokes some of the feeling of Irresponsible Hate Anthem as well as "Never Get Caught," "Seamless," and "A Violent Reaction" all of which are great examples of the album's overall sound.

In summary, The War Of Art is a fantastic album that still holds up remarkably well today. It is sort of a shame the band never got any bigger because then this record would likely be hailed as the classic it seems like.

At first hearing this album I was not blown away at an instant as it is the case with some brillant metal albums. However, the one thing this album needs is time. Give it time to listen through the whole album. You will intrigued. The more you listen to it the more you love it and each time noticing new. Its great just listening to the lyrics and being amazed by the vocal range. Yet its worthwilde picking out the individuals instruments on a listen just to realise the great complexity of this music and the quality of this album. The overall blend between guitars, drums, electronica samples, soaring and screaming vocals. The blend of theese elements to make one coherent masterpiece is the best I have heard.

Altogether I believe this is the best album to come out of the band. The good things that came out of it that in their style the songs are very hard hitting and makes you itch to get your air guitar out which is always good in my books. A lot of the tracks, especially Violent Reaction, Seamless and Just So You Know hve that effect where you just want to play them over and over. On the other hand, all the songs are very similar but the album is definately worth getting your hands on at some point.

American Head Charge's debut album was produced by Rick Rubin, and some people seem to think that he was trying to create 'his own Slipknot' with them. There are some similarities, but they have more to do with the band's image and how they have been pigeonholed than their music, which is much more interesting and original than that of the Masked Fools, though perhaps not as intense. The three stand out tracks are, in my opinion, 'All Wrapped Up', 'Americ*nt' and 'A Violent Reaction'- a fantastic opener. While most of the other songs on the album are good, with some brilliant moments, they do not consistently have the intensity that these three songs do, the album does have weaks spots and a couple of poor songs which spoil the flow and prevent the album from being worthy of 5 stars. Live, this is completely not the case. American Head Charge are able to play even their average songs with a rare intensity, and the best tracks on the album are always insane.
This is an album that i have listened to regularly since i got it after seeing them supporting .......... Slipknot, in Febuary. I have also seen them play at the Underworld and Garage and supporting Rammstein, when in my opinion they vastly upstaged the headliners and their Hellfire and Dildos shennanigans.
Hopefully their will be a follow up to this album at some point, and if you get the opportunity to see them live TAKE IT, as they are spectacular, and very nice young men.

It's time for something special, this album rocks. It starts in a great way, with the majorly infectious 'A Vioent Reaction', and never reduces the quality at all. It can often happen that an album more than an hour long can get a bit boring towards the end, but this really doesn't. It finishes on the same level as it starts, but with a different style. Tracks which stand out are 'A Vioent Reaction', 'Song For The Suspect', 'Never Get Caught', 'Just So You Know' and 'Seamless'. And yes, I do realise that they are all at the start, and that I've said it doesn't get boring towards the end, but that's just because these five are totally top quality songs in a very high quality album. The style of the singer varies from song to song, with changes in songs. He goes from unusually intelligible screaming to great singing throughout the album, as shown in 'Just So You Know'. Heavyness and great singing are the two weapons adopted by AHC, and they mix brilliantly well. The music goes from little electric piano parts (in 'Song For The Suspect') to simply heavy (most songs) to a little bit of what seems to be industrialist metal ('Seamless') to just mindless banging and screaming ('Americ**t Evolving Into Useless Psychic Garbage'). this album is possibly the strongest debut album to come from almost any nu-metal band, and should be bought straight away by anyone. And just to finish off, the other reviewers are right in getting frustrated at comparisons to Slipknot, because these are nothing like them, and should not be compared to music of an inferior nature to themselves. Not that I have anything against Slipknot, it's just that this is soooo much better.

what an amazing debut album!a definet must by for any moshing fan.the only thing that annoys me is that people say that AHC are more of this slipvayne nonsense,their not at all.i mean sure they all make heavy music but in a different way.They have heavy but meaningful songs,thrashing songs and stupidly heavy songs which just roll into one emotion and make a great album.key tracks are:a violent reaction,seamless,never get caught,pushing the envelope,just so you know and fall.trust me but this album its worth every penny!

put quite simply, this album is brilliant from start to finish. AHC combine a perfect balance of aggressiveness and melody in a completely different way to most other bands, check out the track 'just so you know' for proof. AHC have a very distinctive sound and very high levels of originality when you consider the density of the new metal genre. this album is harsh yet touching in equal parts and is a must for any heavy music fan.