Beast Needs Beast : Not a lot of lyrical content, but the angry delivery makes up for it. The music is rhythmically powerful and harmonically uncomplicated, as appropriate for the genre. Played with intensity, mixed and recorded with crisp clarity, and featuring regular changes of arrangement, it holds interest for the full two minutes. There's nothing outstanding or unusual about it, but it's well done.
Everybody Hurts : With its haunting open arrangement, full of cavernous hollows and spooky musical twists and turns, this entry stands out texturally and compositionally. I have trouble making out the words, but the first verse seems rich in imagery. The rest of the lyrics are repetitive, not helped by the flat chorus melody. The guitar tuning sounds like it's open, adding a refreshing difference. A potential vote for the imaginative arrangements and subtle emotional nuances of the verse.
Freddie Wilson Overpass: The lyrics poured out of me in about five minutes. McHaggis suggested the basic chord patterns (though their treatment evolved to be unrecognizable), sent in a great drum track, and offered much-appreciated support, advice, and additional lyrical inspiration. Unfortunately the song seems to be in the wrong fight compositionally, attitudinally, and in terms of recording volume. I kept it under 6 dB and used compression only on the vocal -- a mistake in this punky, angry, ear-bleeding collection.
IXTXI: This is an exciting track, with lots of unusual happenings, and yet by 1:33 it wears me out. It sounds clear, but leaves a feeling of subliminal muddiness. Are there subsonics lurking in the tracks? I can't always make out the lyrics, but I don't think I'm missing anything spectacular. The "What was I thinking" interlude is fun but also a bit distracting. Overall, highly vivid and expressive, with a great vocal for the genre, but it leaves a static impression.
Johnny Cashpoint: The vocals are muddy, which is too bad because the lyrics are more articulate than many of the others in this fight. But you've posted them to the lyrics forum, so good. The emergency-siren guitar at the start is evocative, and the mid-song lead work really adds to the composition. I love the controlled/uncontrolled chaos of the second half. The closing statement could be subtler and doesn't feel like it belongs with the rest of the song, but to vote I would just have to overlook that, and I guess the quality of the vocal recording.
Pigfarmer Jr: Not what I expected from you, but it suits this fight very well, and it's great. Solid lyrics -- are they actual Shelley, modified Shelley, or just in the style of Shelley? Reciting rather than singing them is a good choice, although the delivery is a little light (I'd love to hear ixtxi doing them). The mob-like chorus is sufficiently anarchic. I could vote for this.
Zealous Noise: I'm not the only one who forgot to peg the meters. That's OK, I'll just turn up to the normal listening position. The hard-left vocals with a hard-right bounce are a little weird, I don't know if that works or not, but the delivery is engaging. Expressive lyrics, rich in imagery, but more thrown-together than calculated in the story they tell. The music is interesting enough, nothing too fancy: unison playing, hard-hitting drums, occasional breakdowns and rhythmic variety. The change of intensity at about 2 minutes is welcome (just in time, actually), and the build back up is promising, but for the last minute the song settles in to where it was in the first minute, which makes it feel just a bit long.
