Marmozets and the current state of rock.

So this week, I've been browsing the world wide web in my current plethora of free time, looking for unknown and unsigned bands. During this time, I happened to find a rare gem amongst a lot of bands. A truly raw and powerful band. Marmozets are exactly that. Whilst the rest of the rock world seems to be turning to synths and dubstep styles, such as Korn teaming up with Skrillex for Narcissistic Cannibal, these guys have stayed raw and pure. They let the amazing guitar riffs, with only simple distortion effects, and an amazingly talented woman with powerful vocals do the talking. There are limited effects on the actual songs, the only track of their amazing EP 'Passive Aggressive' (You can download it here -> http://marmozets.co.uk/download/), with any sign of edited vocals, being 'Lives', and even that is only a slight Reverb; nothing close to today's auto-tune artists.

Becca MacIntyre (vocals), despite having a clearly awesome last name, has such strong vocals, she needs no more than a microphone to make us know she means business. Sam MacIntyre and Jack Bottomley (guitars), the heroic guitarists of this quintuplet, produce amazingly powerful riffs, with a strong rhythm line, needing little in the way of actual effects. Give 'em a guitar and an amp with only the most basic of distortion, and these guys will blow your mind! Even underneath all these riffs and licks, we can't escape Mr Will Bottomley's (bass guitar) incredible, heavy, and outright delicious bass riffs. Most rock bassists now, seem to pick simple bass lines following the rhythm line to a tee, however, the Marmozets bassist goes against this, and seems to more commonly follow the lead, or have a completely different line. Last but not least of this awesome little set up, we have Josh MacIntyre (drums). These drum lines could put even the best of the professionals to shame, providing a solid, but very unique, backing to each one of the amazing songs of this album.

No matter how incredible the album maybe, it brings to light a problem I have recently seen among rock artists. Whether they are of a heavier persuasion, or more pop rocky, more and more artists seem to be ditching the guitars and heading for the synths. Artists such as Muse, Korn and Maroon 5, (although it is more believable from the latter), have started producing more synth based music recently. Maroon 5's album 'Hands All Over' and the recent single 'Moves Like Jagger', have taken a turn from the Piano, and Guitar being more frontal, to ditching the Grand Piano for a Synthesiser keyboard, and using the guitar just to fill the sound a little bit. Although this is not so suprising for the pop-rock quintuplet's fans, the same is not entirely expected of hard rockers Korn. The recent collobaration with Skrillex and Kill The Noise, still has the same raw, occasionally explicit lyrics of a Korn song, but it lacks the annihilating guitar riffs, powerful bass, and ear-drum-ripping drum lines, and instead we are left with dubstep style synth riffs. I hope this does not foreshadow the future of Korn. Muse seem to have also joined the synth band-wagon (see what I did there. It's clever really. I promise.), with 'The Resistance' album.

The title track, 'Resistance', whilst still keeping the Muse flare alive, lacks the punch of any previous titles, and has a reasonably different and a considerably more mainstream style to it. Whilst two other tracks (MK Ultra and Unnatural Selection) still have the powerful Muse riffs, they are the only ones of the entire album. 'United States of Eurasia' has really only one call to older Muse tracks, being the fact that it has a beautifully composed piano piece. Whilst I can embrace this change for now, I see it as a foreboding fact that true rock is dying. However, this brings me back to my original point...



Marmozets have restored my faith in the music industry, being a powerful band, who ignore the current conventions and cliques, and go their own way, and with the power of that raw guitar still ringing through my brain, I urge you to give these guys a listen, and definitely drop them a like/follow on your social network of choice.

Spilling Vinyl - An Introduction

Hi. My name is Chris, and I'm a music enthusiast. I eat, sleep and breathe it. It is, literally my life. I've decided that I want to be a music journalist, so whilst I study Music and English at my College, I believe it would be good to start my own blog, sharing my passion for all things music. I, myself, am actually in a band, bet I'll get more to that at a later date. Throughout my (hopefully) weekly posts, I will go through the weeks major news in the music world, and my personal opinions about the matters at hand. My actual favourite genres are more rock based, but I will be as unbiased as I possibly can be, and pay attention to the world of RnB and Pop. So, Let's get the stone rolling.

R.E.M. - Mike spotted the streaker in the
distance.

This week, alternative rock giants R.E.M. have announced they have split up, supposedly due to some 'shake-ups' with their record label, Warner Bros. R.E.M. have always been quite an influential band to me, and their music has always struck a chord within me, quite literally. Listening to probably their most well known track, 'Everybody Hurts' I decided I wanted to start playing guitar, and got to work learning the soulful and very meaningful song. On a (slightly) happier note, this Saturday marks the 20th anniversary since the release of Nirvana's breakthrough album 'Nevermind'. The fact that the album is still remembered is a testament to how influential the album is. Many bands that are around today would not be, or at least wouldn't be the same, without it. You can funnily compare the likes of Kurt Cobain (Nirvana) and Michael Stipe (R.E.M.), as within today's plethora of 'Hip Hop' artists, their soulful and captivating voices, can still stir emotions encased in the core of our very being.