Search - Roadrunner United :: Allstar Sessions

Strictly For The Fans...

D'Ann | AZ | 08/07/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"When it comes to heavy metal, no label can hold a candle (or maybe it's a lighter) to Roadrunner Records. One of the few independent labels of any size still left in an increasingly mega-corporate music world, Roadrunner is responsible for bringing the world such genre heavyweights as Fear Factory, Sepultura, King Diamond, Type O Negative, Machine Head, Opeth, Chimaira, Killswitch Engage, and of course Slipknot. In celebration of their 25th anniversary, rather than release a been-there-done-that boxed set, the Roadrunner brass came up with a rather novel idea, one that could only be accomplished in this era of digital recording: select four of Roadrunner's best-known musicians to be "Team Captains," ask each to write and produce four or five new songs, and perform them not with their own bands, but with cherry-picked "supergroups" of musicians, chosen by each captain, from the cabal of Roadrunner artists past and present.



The four chosen captains--Dino Cazares (Fear Factory), Robert Flynn (Machine Head), Matthew Heafy (Trivium), and Joey Jordison (Slipknot)--have produced a total of 18 tracks featuring 55 musicians, and the results are pretty much what you would expect them to be: VERY loud, chaotic, and uneven. Some of the tracks are solid pieces of metal: Team Cazares' "The Enemy" and "Baptized in the Redeption," and Team Flynn's "The Rich Man" (anti-war song; you have been warned) and "The Dagger" (featuring the always superb Howard Jones of Killswitch Engage) are particularly good. But many of the songs sound like the musicians are trying too hard to out-shred each other, while their producers/captains are trying too hard to give each player his day in the sun, and blend the music they wrote with lyrics, penned by the singers who perform them, that don't always mesh. Team Captain Jordison is particularly guilty in this regard, and also of trying to cover too many musical bases, using his five tracks for ventures into death metal ("Annihilation by the Hand of God"), straight-up thrash ("Constitution Down"), emo punk ("No Way Out"), melodic hard rock ("Tired `N Lonely") and goth ("Enemy Of The State"). Sticking to just one or two styles might have yielded better results.



There are also questions about selection process for the Team Captains. It's been reported that Max Calavera of Sepultura/Soulfly fame and Adam D of Killswitch Engage were asked to be Team Captains, but unfortunately declined. Perhaps that explains why the inexperienced Matt Heafy was thrust into a Team Captain role he clearly wasn't ready for. He may be one of Roadrunner's most promising new talents, but he is only 19 years old, and it shows in the tracks he wrote and produced. All too often, they sound like demos recorded in Mom's basement by a kid with dreams of being a rock star. Heafy has a long way to go before he can consider himself a peer of his fellow team captains.



Overall, Roadrunner United gets points for its original concept, and fans of the label and its bands will likely enjoy banging their heads to this cacophonic mob. If this album is intended to be strictly for the hardcore Roadrunner fan, it succeeds. But it certainly isn't going to win over the uninitiated."