Plastic Green Head

I like what Trouble have done with this album, Plastic Green Head. The music sounds fairly dissimilar to the completely doom-laden, crushing riffs present on the earlier material, but what Trouble do here sounds every bit authentic. Not to mislead you, this definitely still sounds like Trouble, but they seem to have adopted a more laidback, stoner metal approach; sacrificing sinister atmospheres for more upbeat ones. For the most part, the band pulls this off nicely, but there’s a few dodgy moments here and there.

The first few tracks are completely awesome offerings of vintage Trouble. The playful, thrashy riff of the title track, which opens the album, is a great introduction to the music at hand and Eric Wagner’s distinctive vocals sound powerful overtop. The chorus on this one is especially catchy, and I love the solo that closes the song. Following this impressive opener is perhaps an even more memorable number. The Eye is a mid-paced beast that thunders along, led by a catchy, splendidly heavy riff. There’s also a great chorus on this one, and the lyrics are fairly interesting, if you’d like to sing along. At first when I heard Flowers (a very soft, relaxed song in comparison to most of the other material) I thought it was a fairly lame way to follow up the blazing awesomeness of its predecessor, but after a few listens, I’m able to appreciate it for what it is; an opportunity to chill out for a while amongst heavy fury of its surroundings. I wouldn’t call it a highlight, necessarily, but I’m glad it’s there. The doomness is quickly cranked up a few notches on Opium Eater, which is satisfyingly heavy, if not as memorable as the first two tracks. Hear the Earth packs a very badass riff and features the most scorching solo on the album. The latter songs on the album are a bit wavering in consistency. Requiem is another soft tune, but I find it to be one of the lesser convincing moments of the album. Plastic Green Head closes with a cover of the excellent Beatles song, Tomorrow Never Knows, but unfortunately Troubles version doesn’t really work for me. The vocals sound pretty cool, but I don’t think the song suits what they’ve done with it.

If you’re looking for a nice dose of stoner metal, you’ll find just that right here. There’s plenty of memorable riffs which provide good replay value, and although you won’t find as much doom as you might expect from Trouble, it’s still there if you look for it.

Trouble haven't changed a whole hell of a lot over the years, though they started out dark and eerie, worshiping at the altar of Sabbath. On this album there is silly plenty of Sabbath worship, but also more of an upbeat, hard rock feel. I would even say that a little grunge has crept into their sound(to be fair, it's probably the other way around, Trouble influence crept into grunge.) Some 60's pop rock, psychedelic influence as well, including two covers, one by The Beatles, and the other by The Monkees of all people. And surprisingly it's the latter that is actually really good.

The album is almost kind of split in half, the first half which are the good songs, and the second half which are the not so good songs. "Plastic Green Head," "The Eye," "Flowers," these are all what you would expect from Trouble, huge churning riffs, 80bpm drumbeats, Eric Wagners nasal yet powerful voice. They are simple, they are catchy, and they are just plain good. "The Porpoise Song" is a cover of a song by The Monkees, and strangely enough it's very good. Big wall of guitar noise, and Eric singing in a less nasal and more melodic voice. "Opium Eater" sounds like it could easily be an Alice in Chains song, everything from the riff to the vocal patterns, especially the pre-chorus. It sounds so much like an Alice in Chains song, you could easily fool a casual fan with it. I don't mean that in a bad way, it's a great song for sure. "Hear the Earth" has another big riff, and catchy chorus, and sounds like the first 3 songs.

From there the album takes a dive, none of the remaining songs are really memorable. The cover of The Beatles "Tomorrow Never Knows" is pretty awful and the intro to it is just plain silly. "Requiem" is an attempt at a ballad and it's really boring. "Below Me" sounds like a punk song, and it's the worst one on here. Bonus track "Till the End of Time" is crap. The rest of the songs are ok, but nothing to write home about. All though "Long Shadows Fall" isn't bad, and has a killer main riff.

Could have made an excellent 7 or 8 song album/EP but instead it's merely a mediocre full length.