Review Summary: This is the reason why nu-metal failed in so many ways.
Here we are today; nu-metal is a faint glimpse in the distance with its Drop D power chords and over emphasized, melancholic lyrics about misunderstood teenagers ***ty lives. I shouldn’t sit here and dwell on the whole sub-genre itself. Rather, I should be focusing my disgust towards nu-metal bands that combine rap and metal elements into some of the most derivative, pompous crap I’ve ever heard. Besides the odd rap/ metal album that does this combination well (I’m guessing most of you have never listened to
300 Percent Density by Candiria?), the rest of these ‘waste of life’ bands such as Stuck Mojo just fall flat on their faces.
Declaration of a Headhunter falls into this latter category with its patriotic, fist pumping lyrics about gun touting (look at the booklet for Christ sake) republican assholes and why America should be known for kicking the most ass in war. The previous sentence above has about as much effort put into it as these guys have put into their patriotic lyrics. Retarded, immature bull***!
I’m all for freedom of speech and I would never discredit someone for speaking their mind. But when the message that you speak comes across as a juvenile rant like the lyrics contained on this album, one can’t help but laugh. These lyrical atrocities come across as this (taken from the song ‘Set the Tone’):
When the cards are stacked against me
and my heart is full of envy
I’m feeling wiser as the days go by
It’s the game I play
Me and my boys set the tone
With a decade in our pocket we saw the
world and always rocked it
This is easily the biggest fault on this album and the rapping doesn’t really help their case either. When Bonz (lead singer) combines this awful rapping diarrhoea with his terrible singing, you might want to take this album and chuck it out the window. His cleans come across as flat and uninspired and when he sings lines like
Yaaaaaaaaaaaahaaaaaaahaaaaaaaaa, the laughter just keeps on coming.
At least some of the music on this album makes up for the lousy rapping/singing/ growly screaming etc. However, the simple machine gun guitar riffs that guide the album along are accompanied by the most basic rhythm sections (bass and drums) and drags the music into boredom territory. The band at least tries to spice things up with some interesting organ and piano parts, creating a more lush contrast to the crunchy feel the music gives off upon first listen. Keyboard and sound samples are also utilized but not to any amazing effect. The song ‘April 29th’ is like listening to one of Linkin Parks pointless instrumentals. Generally speaking, songs that are named after dates, no doubt have some type of personal meaning to them. I don’t see how using electronic samples in a 45 second song gives any meaning to whatever message that is being conveyed. Besides the odd solo and nice little guitar riffs sparsely distributed throughout, it’s an unoriginal approach that will make you laugh or cry (depending on how much you like *** like this).
So you like rap metal and your looking for a new album to check out? This is not it! The only use for this album that I can find, besides a coaster, is to use it as a humourous look at how not to do rap/metal. Even the names that the band members have given themselves in the booklet (Rich Ward, guitarist, calls himself ‘The Duke of Metal’) will have you rolling around in hysterics. What’s not so funny is the fact that Andy Sneap, producer of many great metal albums, would ever want to be associated with a dreadful band that plays garbage like this. Why Andy, why? I could go on all day about how terrible this album/ band is but I won’t waste your time. Stuck Mojo have destroyed any message that they had through their awful lyrics and mediocre song writing skills.
Declaration of a Headhunter…………more like
This Album Sucks Large, Gun Touting Cock.
.This Message Edited On 08.04.08
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