The Monsterican Dream

I grew up with Lordi, being a little kid when they hit it big with Eurovision and subsequently spending an inapproptiate amount of time researching their every minutae. As a musician myself, and a fan of technically complex music, Lordi is about as close as it comes to a unashamedly guilty pleasure for me. You get what you get, 3-4 minute straightforward Heavy Metal songs, simplistic horror lyrics with cheesy puns and fantastic costumes.

Monsterican Dream strikes me as a little bit different, however. Their debut, Get Heavy was firmly rooted in the past. It was bright, cheesy and could basically be described as hair metal, with a 70's guitar tone and really cheesy euro synths. The Monsterican Dream, however is a decidedly less commercial and more "metal" effort.

Though it's impossible to separate Lordi and cheesiness alltogether, this album has a decidedly heavier feel. The guitars are tuned lower and hit heavier. The lyrics, while still dealing with monsters and horror movies have moved to far darker places, going from straightforward tunes about supernatural stalkers and biomechanic men to songs about spousal murder, Jack the Ripper and in at least two cases (possibly) some sort of supernatrual rape. The musical style itself is also less polished and "poppy", with songs like "Wake the Snake" and "My Heaven is Your Hell" walking the line of being thrash and groove metal, respectively.

While most songs off Get Heavy and their commercial opus, The Arockalypse would by most be described as hard rock or hair metal, I'm quite comfortable labeling almost all of these tracks as heavy metal, although definitely not anywhere near the extreme spectrum.

The instrumentation is fine; there are no virtuoso performances, although the bassist in me holds a certain level of admiration for "Kalmageddon" and B-side track "Pyromite" for their sweet bass lines, but everybody does their job functionally. The vocals are fine, although Lordi's later efforts would feature a much more developed vocal style.

All in all, this is probably Lordi at their most non-commercial, and it shows. This album fared far worse commercially than it's predecessor and the next two albums, but I find beauty in it's musical honesty. My personal favorite tracks are the catchy but overlooked "Haunted Town", the thrashy "Wake the Snake" and the single B-sides "Pyromite" and "To Hell with the Pop"

To start off this praising of Lordi, be aware that I have no fucking clue what they are. I don't want to know either, so don't try to explain them to me.

Fresh from Finland, ten times as evil and pissed off as Children of Bodom, Lordi (named from their vocalist) is constantly spawning killer music, with originality that can't be matched. I didn't believe what I was hearing at first, I thought perhaps that it was Rob Zombie on steroids with a power metal twist! Which in a nutshell is what one could say to describe Lordi, but don't bother. You're just going to get side tracked again and hear something else that sounds different, something closer to Classic Rock, but heavier than hell!

The band isn't as catchy throughout the rest of the album as it is on the third track; Blood Red Sandman. At least not until you hear Wake The Snake, then you'll want to kill everyone in sight, it's so good! Lordi (their singer) doesn't have much talent in actual performances (again, much like Rob Zombie) but easily compensates for this with insanely fun song writing, and coolness. By all means, the band is rather cliche in principle, but what they have done with their (arguabley) Power Metal roots is outstanding. They capture all the hilarity of "Errg, I'm A Monster, Metal", and all the cheese of Power Metal to create something that only comes along once in a generation.

Assuming that what they have created was done intensionally, the music is heavy, yet only during the chorus in most cases! Jumping up and down and stomping your feet is something that IS going to happen upon the first listen, even if one only hear three or four tracks.

Highlights:

Intro: (Theatrical Trailor), this little bit of the album is not music but more of a cheesy trailer to a 50's horror movie. Nice touch!

Wake The Snake: fast, thrashy, and for most metal heads-that's all I need to say. Dwelling into it further, however, is complex. The track is catchy in terms of the chorus, but Lordi often changes the lyrics, so to get it completley one must listen to it more than once. And I'll take as many reasons as I can to listen to it!

My Heaven Is Your Hell: the track has a short little intro of that cliche horror movie music during that shower scene in Psyco. This signaling the begining of a moderately paced thrash riff, that sinks into an erie (but still Power Metalesque) breakdown that results in a firey blaze of corny Power which makes you want to head bang harder than a paint mixer!

Blood Red Sandman:Sweet Zombie Jesus, it still gives me goosebumps! Easily this song is one of the heaviest moments on the album. It all commences with another erie Power Metalesque intro (provided by the Keyboardist). An intro that explodes into (completely not Power Metal in any way) a shitstorm of a guitar riff. I don't know how, but still Lordi manages to morph something that I would never expect to be related to Power Metal into one of the most sensational songs to sing along with.

There is, however, one other element that seperates them from campy costume Metal to a genre (whatever it is specifically) that reqires well rounded musicianship: Solos. Had they not done these I would have not given them such a good review, but there they went and did exactly what I thought was missing! By no means does their guitarist possess the Shredder Metal capabilities of Kostas Karamitraudis (aka, Gus G. formerly of Dream Evil), but good enough to keep their credibility soaring.

One other little thing. The Monsterican Dream comes with an enhanced CD portion that contains a music video for Blood Red Sandman. Wich only made me like the song twice as much. the video was (supposedly) inspired by "Evil Dead", a Bruce Cambell movie that suites the band better than their Monster Latex. If I ever hear from them in the future, it won't be soon enough!!!