The first Flowerland release in 15 years comes on October 16 and is bringing back the old school energy of the 90s. Flowerland formed in New Haven, CT, in 1991, and is presenting the original line up composed of vocalist Roger Guimond, guitarist Steven Christofor, drummer Jon Lichatz, and bassist Jef St. George. The band has now returned to the scene with The Caffeine Disk EP, containing six Flowerland classics  remixed by John Agnello, producer of Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr. and Kurt Vile just to name a few.

Core part of the East Coast independent music scene in the 90s, Flowerland stays faithful to the counterculture releasing the EP via the independent record label ‘Gypsygarden records.’

Opening with the roaring ‘Crazy Horse,’ the EP instantly feeds the listener with raw and outflowing energy. The record goes on with ‘Glass i,’ which maintains the magnetism already expressed in ‘Crazy Horse’ adding a darker feeling to it, with vocalist Roger Guimond delivering an admirable performance.

‘(Jim Brown’s) Military Country’ starts off on the same page as the previous tracks, and then develops a sweeter touch, which cuddles your more instinctive feelings from the first two tracks. The highly adrenalinic vibes are taken back by the agitated ‘Low’.

‘Kill Alice (slowly)’ might be the best track of the EP. Angry, violent, but with sparkles of a fragile attitude, it brings the listener into a hypnotic atmosphere. The bass awakes the deepest thought of the listeners, Christofor’s guitar is magnificent and Lichatz’s drums exceptional, almost delirious.

Finally, the track ‘Flow’ becomes the perfect closing to the EP as it wraps up all the agitation and bass of its predecessors and releases the build-up although keeping the power.

Clearly influenced by the Grunge movement of the 90s, Flowerland mostly takes from it the punk instinct and its raw and natural inspiration which translates into passionate creation. The band then mixes this with a more classic-oriented rock approach, creating a delightful result.

The EP is easy to listen to, almost half an hour of genuine hard rock. It goes on smoothly and does not get old; it seems to acquire quality after each listening instead. It is a tornado of emotions, surely not a record to play as a background activity. It wants and deserves attention, and easily gets it. The biggest merit is probably to be able to show how relevant those sonorities still are.

Rating:  EXCELLENT 4/5

http://youtu.be/Pkw59s6JjdQ

The article Flowerland’s First Release in Fifteen Years Reviewed appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

The Heritage Hunter Tour is a rare event, bringing together two hard rock giants: Opeth, of Swedish death metal fame; and Mastodon, the American progressive rock powerhouse. If you’ve yet to hear Opeth’s September 2011 release Heritage, the two seem an unlikely pair.

Heritage, though, brings Opeth’s sound to the next stage in their evolution, which is ironically rooted in the past. The release takes inspiration from Opeth’s longtime influences and even their own past records.

The tour also celebrates Mastodon’s The Hunter, released about the same time as Heritage. The two albums, both on Roadrunner Records, have been received with largely positive reviews, although Heritage has been met with some push-back from longtime death metal fans.

Ghost joins the North American tour as the opening band, and with only one major release, the group has already built a major presence in metal. Opus Eponymous, the Swedish band’s debut full-length album, was released in October 2010. A new album is slated for release later this year.

Ghost’s stage presence is wrapped in enigma, as the five backing members known only as Nameless Ghouls wear black cloaks and masks, with only hands exposed for instrumentation. Papa Emeritus, the frontman and vocalist, wears a prosthetic mask resembling wrinkled skin painted like a corpse. He wears a pope’s vestments and mitre, dangling a smoking incense ball. None of the members’ true identities have been released.

Also proving to be a chance event was May 9 show at The Fillmore Silver Springs in Silver Springs, Maryland. Opeth was absent from he previous show on May 8 in Maplewood, Minnesota, after Opeth frontman Mikael Åkerfeldt took a trip to the hospital following a head injury. Instead, concertgoers saw an extended headline set from Mastodon.

Toonari Post caught up with Opeth bassist Martin Mendez before the show in the Washington, D.C., metropolis, where we talked about Mikael’s recovery, the tour and Heritage.

Toonari Post (TP): How is Mikael recovering from his mishap?

Martin Mendez (MM): He’s doing good. It happened right before the last show, when me and him were on the bus taking bags, and he just passed me the keys. He didn’t watch and just hit his head.

TP: What about Mastodon drew you guys to co-headline the tour with them? How were all the bands pulled together for this tour?

MM: Mastodon is great; we love to tour with these guys. They’re really a good band, and we really like the co-headlining thing, because we very much like to play before them, and they like to play before us. It’s pretty fun.

All three bands are really different, and you can’t compare really one to the other. It’s a mix of different types of music there. I think all three bands on this tour are pretty original, it’s a strong package. When you go and see a concert now, I don’t think you’ll see many tours around more interesting than this one. That’s my opinion.

TP: With such a variety of sounds in Opeth’s background, how did you choose the set list for this tour?

MM: We focus mostly on the latest album now, but it’s always been difficult because we have such long songs and now we have 10 albums. So we try to cover some of each album, but it’s impossible to play all of them now with 10 albums, because the set is 8 songs. We play 4 or 5 songs from the new album, so there’s not much room for all the albums, but we try to.

TP: How did you pair with Ghost?

MM: I think Axe [Martin Axenrot, Opeth drummer] knew some of the guys, because they are from the same area [Stockholm], but we just heard the band and we liked the band. We knew the kind-of hype now, too, so it was good.

TP: How would you describe Heritage’s place in the evolution of Opeth’s sound? What were your influences?

MM: It’s a difficult question, because we don’t know what’s going to happen, so it’s impossible to say. But, for sure it’s a new chapter in our career because we always try to do something different. We’ve done Damnation in the past, which was very different, but this time it feels like we actually managed to do something that we really wanted to do in the past.

I think the most influence in this album is more ‘70s prog rock bands, not much new bands. This is the kind of music that we’ve always listened to. I think that’s the strongest influence.

TP: The album incorporates a significant shift to entirely clean vocals, which has been controversial among the death metal community. How was that decision made?

MM: It was a kind-of natural movement on this one. Growls I don’t think would fit in this album. For us it’s impossible for us to just drop some growls because people want it, but the idea was to do something different from the beginning, and of course clean vocals fits better in this album.

TP: Your bass writing has also made an interesting shift since Axe joined the band, bringing a very different drumming style than Martin Lopez [previous Opeth drummer] had.

MM: Everything kind of came naturally, because we had the songs in mind before we recorded. We knew the sound we wanted to have on this album, and this type of music requires bass to be higher in the mix. So it’s nothing that we planned, that, “Oh you have to have the bass up, or this or that.” It just came naturally and, at the end, the bass came up. This type of music is more friendly for bass.

TP: Heritage’s reception has been generally positive, but met some mixed reviews with a divide between longtime metal fans and broader music critics. How do you cope with mixed reviews on any album?

MM: Every time we try to do an album or record an album, we don’t think about the kind of reaction people are going to have. So we don’t really care in that moment what people would say. We know what we think is good at the moment. And I don’t know, I guess we are getting older and better as musicians as well, so you want to experiment and explore new styles.

It’s just the five of us, we don’t really take so many influences from outside. We knew when we went to record the album that since we have been doing death metal for such a long time, we knew people were going to get crazy. We didn’t care, though, because we were so happy with this album, and that was a stronger feeling.

It kind of sounds arrogant sometimes, you know, I get this question often, and I say, “Ah, I don’t care,” but I’m not trying to sound arrogant. That’s not the idea. I think we do good music, and I think people should appreciate that after it works. I mean, if you listen to the people or the fans, you can hear something new or something original. I don’t know, many people get pissed but at the end some of them will be happy, I guess.

TP: What are you listening to these days? Are there any albums you’ve been stuck on?

MM: Lots of music. I like lots of music. It feels like I’ve been stuck the last 10 years with the same kind of music. I listen a lot to a kind of tango, instrumental tango. I like jazz, heavy metal, blues.

TP: Are there any new releases you’re excited for?

MM: I would be interested in the Mars Volta new album and Tool, of course. There’s not that many bands coming out with albums soon.

TP: What’s next for Opeth?

MM: Home for three weeks, actually. We have four shows left on this tour, so we’ll be home in a week. Then summer festivals, and then I think coming back to the US in the fall. I think it’s going to be headline touring, but it’ll be smaller cities this time.

The article Opeth, Mastodon Rock U.S. on Heritage Hunter Tour appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

Hard Rock is on the hunt for rock stars on the rise to take the stage at the 2012 Hard Rock Calling music festival in London’s Hyde Park. Hard Rock Rising, the global battle of the bands, will give one local band from this international competition the chance of a lifetime – to be on the bill with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band at one of the world’s most-anticipated concert events.

Rising to the Occasion – the Road to Hard Rock’s Main Stage

Hard Rock, in partnership with ReverbNation, will host an open registration for bands wishing to participate in the global battle from Friday, January 6, 2012, through Tuesday, January 17, 2012. The combination of Hard Rock’s iconic brand and ReverbNation’s extensive network of over 1.8 million artists around the world will give great undiscovered bands an international stage to jumpstart their careers.

“Hard Rock believes it is critical to support emerging artists and discover new musical talent through the Hard Rock Rising program,” said John Galloway, Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for Hard Rock International. “We are confident our partnership with ReverbNation will help us secure world-class talent that we can showcase to the international music community at this year’s Hard Rock Calling festival.”

“Hard Rock is a worldwide icon of music, the perfect brand to provide this opportunity to deserving artists,” added Mike Doernberg, ReverbNation CEO and Co-founder. “From day one here at Reverb, we’ve been all about the artist and opportunities like Hard Rock Rising extend that mission exponentially.”

To register, future rock stars can visit one of 86 participating Hard Rock Cafe Facebook pages. Following open registration, fans decide who moves on to the live performance phase of the program and can vote on any Hard Rock’s city-specific Facebook page by downloading free tracks from bands of their choice.

After fans choose their favorites, participating Hard Rock Cafe locations around the world will host a series of live competitions featuring these local bands. One winner will be selected from each location by the other participating bands. These local winners will be narrowed down to the top ten bands worldwide via fan voting on participating Hard Rock Facebook fan pages. Finally a panel of celebrity judges and music industry professionals will select the top three winners.

The first place winner will be flown to London for the ultimate rock star treatment, including a spot on the bill at Hard Rock Calling 2012. Second and third prize winners will receive $5,000 and $2,500, respectively, in ReverbNation PROMOTE IT credits, a revolutionary tool that creates targeted, highly effective Facebook advertising campaigns for musicians and venues promoting songs, Facebook pages, and concerts.

Greetings From Hyde Park – Hard Rock Calling 2012

Hard Rock Calling, an iconic festival now in its seventh consecutive year, has established itself as one of the UK’s premier outdoor music events. The 2012 festival will take place from Friday, July 13 to Sunday, July 15 in London’s Hyde Park. Headliners for the festival will include Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, who will take the Main Stage for their second Hard Rock Calling performance.

Hard Rock Calling 2012′s performers will join a long line of rock ‘n’ roll greats who have taken the stage at this iconic festival including: Aerosmith, Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder, The Who, Pearl Jam, Peter Gabriel, The Killers, The Police, Rod Stewart, and Bon Jovi.

Hard Rock Calling, produced by Live Nation and presented by Hard Rock International, is a unique and historic musical event with a main stage, second stage, renowned bands, on-site Hard Rock Cafe, as well as a variety of additional attractions.

Mat Hayward / Shutterstock.com

The article Up-and-Coming Bands Can Compete at Hard Rock Calling 2012 appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.