MACHINE HEAD 'Burn
My Eyes'(Roadrunner)
Review by Jeff Maki
It was 1994, back when there wasn’t
any easy access to new music and no peer-to-peer downloading.
We had to go out and buy our CDs the old-fashioned, every
now and then on nothing more than impulse and a hunch. My
friend and I were doing our thing on the weekend: record shopping,
shootin’ the shit and finding things to do, when he
came across this disc on sale at Tower Records for about
$10. “Machine Head, are you sure man?” I asked.
“Why the hell not?” he replied. The album cover
looked cool enough and a sticker proudly proclaimed something
like, “The heaviest debut release ever, from this new
Bay area band!” So he picked it up, and we were on our
way home. It didn't hurt one bit that we had two 12-inch kickers,
mounted tweeters and a brand new CD player in the Honda Civic.
When we popped the disc in, we were absolutely blown the fuck
away! As the the opening drum roll started for “Davidian”
and the guitar riff began, we looked at each other, jaws dropping.
“How the hell did we not know about this?” I asked.
“Why the hell did you even think to buy it?” Thankfully
he did, and this release now goes down in my book as one of
the top metal releases of all time.
Machine Head features vocalist/guitarist, Rob Flynn, formerly
of the Bay-area thrash band Forbidden. His vocals at the time
of Burn My Eyes were very different for a metal band.
They were almost like an angrier, louder, meaner James Hetfield.
While most other bands of the time had high-pitched screamers
or guttural growlers, his vocal style was clear but aggressive,
a perfect fit for the music. By the time “Davidian”
was over, I was sure it is without a doubt one of the heaviest
and best metal songs ever recorded. How could it not be with
a chorus of “Let freedom ring with a shotgun blast”?
Track number two, “Old,” is a jam that will make
you want to jump up and down out of your seat to the up-and-down-style
riffing. “A Thousand Lies” has a long introduction
before launching into a Pantera-style riff with a technical
structure and one of the album’s most memorable choruses.
Where do I go on from here? After these three songs alone,
the purchase was an outstanding one. Anything after this point
would merely just be a bonus. Next up is “None But My
Own,” a ballad-type song that builds to an exploding
bridge, then a lightning-fast part, followed by a “New
Level” Pantera-style chorus. The guitars combined with
some of the best drumming I've ever heard and perfect production
from producer Colin Richardson come together to blow away
anything else I'd ever heard up to this point in the metal
genre—Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, Testament—all
of ‘em.
Other standout tracks are “Death Church,” a slowed
down, chugging slab of doom-esque metal; “Blood for
Blood,” where the band just lets it fuckin’ rip
in Slayer-esque speed metal fury; and “Block,”
now a Machine Head staple with the unforgettable chorus of
“Fuck It All!” There are no fillers here and no
bullshit, just balls-out heavy thrash/speed metal that still
holds strong today. This is without question a monumental
release in metal history that should be included 50 years
from now when someone is trying to explain the history of
heavy metal. This album changed the landscape of metal, showing
that you didn't always have to have lyrics about demons and
wizards, and that a metal band could remain brutally heavy
and still have somewhat of a commercial appeal. Burn My
Eyes is where a bulk of the material you hear today came
from.
