Hy Pro Glo

It can’t be stated plainly enough how putrid and horrible a creature the whole grunge craze was. Everybody and their fucking mother wanted to be from Seattle at this point in history, like it was Beverly Hills or something. You had a couple of token bands who essentially embodied the best elements of what the whole scene was trying to emulate (Black Sabbath), and both of them have been included here on the archives, but even with them you didn’t have any of the charm that defined the 80s metal scene at all. So the idea of a well respected thrash album imitating something so devoid of musical direction or originality seems unthinkable, unless it’s 1993 and your name is Scott Ian.

Leaving aside what the hell a “Hy Pro Glo” actually is, the song itself is an up tempo rock homage to Stone Temple Pilots, and an extremely poor one at that. Picture a comical 3 note, pentatonic based, rock groove and you have about half of this song figured out already. We’ve got a really dry, weak, and short as hell guitar solo that sounds like Scott Ian specifically wrote it out for Dan Spitz to play note for note; man do I feel bad for him having his good name as a guitar soloist tarnished by this piece of shit song. And as for the vocals, let’s just say that if John Bush is planning on taking this horrid Layne Staley meets Scott Weiland imitation to either Broadway or Las Vegas, he would do well to make sure that all of the audience’s margaritas are spiked with some pretty concentrated LSD before turning the microphone on.

The Smith’s cover would be a pretty damn awesome remake if it weren’t for that thin guitar tone, but even then it sounds pretty cool until John Bush’s goofy vocal farts mess everything up. The live version of “Room for One More” is just as groovy and muddy as the original, only Bush’s vocals are hoarse and crackly, in addition to sounding like a dying cow. At least the guitar solo on here is half decent, although it sounds extremely tame compared to well conceived epic solos like on “I am the Law”, and uninspired when compared to the melodic sweetness heard on “Medusa”.

It’s hard to say what the bigger tragedy is here; the fact that one of the forefathers of thrash metal has been morphed into a half assed version of the now defunct STP, or that the vocalist who put his all into 4 solid Armored Saint albums ended up singing in a voice that only a rabid, nymphomaniac goat could appreciate. Avoid this at all costs, lest its poisonous sound will work it’s way into your brain and transform you into a mind dead douche with a goatee, flannels, a jumbo sized inferiority complex, and a general hostility towards good music.