Canadian rockers ‘Famous underground’ are just releasing their debut album. However, Nick (Frontman) and Laurie-Anne (Bass) are no strangers to the scene. Their first band ‘Slik Toxic’ were a sleazy glam band and managed to bag a Juno award (Canada’s answer to a Grammy). Unfortunately when grunge music started making an appearance in the early 90’s it left no room for bands like this. So they called it quits. After a long hiatus, in 2011 Famous Underground were born.
Straight away, taking no prisoners with the first track ‘Wasteland’, the Axl Rose styled vocals and the ass-kicking riffs are all over the place, a good start indeed! The guitar solo is definitely interesting, although I’m a tad unsure if it fits with the rest of the music. With ‘Overdrive’ however it seems we now have some Dave Mustaine pipes going on with the vocalist. Can’t grumble about that though! But I sure can have a moan about the track being a little flat which personally, I think it sounds like the guys need a good kick up the arse to get them going! ‘Dead Weight’ is another that sounds very similar. I’m sure it would appeal to the younger big fringed wannabe rockers though!
‘Love Stands Still” has some potential! The riffs are full of groove yet still, no “umph’! It can be done with this type of teeny rock, the likes of Hardcore Superstar have hit the nail on the head with it. Maybe Famous Underground should take a leaf out of their book if they wanted to be famous anywhere else than “underground’ (See what I did there)
A bland ballad in ‘Forever and a Day’ reminding me a lot of Brett Michaels’ solo stuff… (Yawn).
The Mustaine vocals return in ‘Necropolis’ and its starting to get a little painful to listen to. You can tell the band have talent. BUT and that’s a big but! The vocalist needs to grow some balls and try that little bit harder; the guitars seem great but the drumming tastes like chips without salt and vinegar! Bland!
I will stop having a whinge for a second though to say ‘On Broken Wings’ has a killer riff, sounding very old school… and well the vocals suit it perfectly, quite impressive the guitar solo is brilliant from start to finish, it’s like a different band!
The last track and I’m saying last, even though there’s 2 bonus tracks, has a nice little crunchy riff going on and even the drums sound better. The vocals again, brilliant!! Why couldn’t they all sound like the last two?
Bonus Tracks
A live, acoustic version of ‘Dead Weight’ is not so bad. I could see fans of the band liking it and to be fair, it sounds better that the album version! There’s more energy in it and the vocals are much better and raw. Then there’s an alternative version of the track ‘On Broken Wings’ which isn’t as good so I can see why it was an alternative version yet fail to see why it was recorded in the first place?
It’s not a brilliant album, yet it’s not crap either. I felt throughout that the whole thing needed some balls and energy added to it. Buy it if you will but it certainly wasn’t the rocking album I’d expected it to be.
(3/10 Charlene Rance)
http://www.famousunderground.tv/
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