Search - X :: Hey Zeus

A fine album

JadeRain | Juneau, AK United States | 09/08/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Can't believe I'm the first to review this, am I the only guy who bought it?! This was X's last proper studio album, the "Unclogged" was not all new material. I am a HUGE fan of this band. What can you say? They are BRILLIANT. John, Exene, & DJ are just incredible, and I love Billy Zoom's guitar SO MUCH, but he isn't on this release. Tony Guillikson (spelling?) is the guitarist, and he is just SUPERB. I've seen X twice, both with Tony on guitar (even chatted him up in Seattle once) and like I said, it was damn good. X still tours and Billy Zoom is back in the band, which is great, maybe I'll catch them sometime. Anyways, with regards to this album, I already had every X album, so had to get this, and there is some great material on it, I know it will fall into obscurity when looking at the legacy of the band X, I guess that is ok when you look at their other classic albums (first three must owns, Los Angeles, Wild Gift, Under the Big Black Sun). But if you like X, then you will like this album."

GREAT STUFF- TOO BAD THEIR LAST!

John M. Sepe | New York, NY United States | 05/09/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"One of the greatest musical acts of all time, this was X's last proper release. It is superb, John and Exene sing together just like in the old days and Tony Gilkyson is superb. The only let down is the final Drawn in the dark. the slow strange ballad should get points for being different,with the usual superb Exene lyrics and supreme Tony playing but no cigar for me. Rest is incredible, Big blue House , New Life, Country at war, Clean like 2moro and Arms for hostages are all time X classics. If you like or love X , you willlove this! and what a price!"

Better than you might expect... but terrible

E. Kutinsky | Seattle, WA | 03/23/2008

(2 out of 5 stars)

"It pains me that X, one of the great artists of the last 30 years, tainted their great punk legacy with a couple of half cooked pop records in the late 80's - Ain't Love Grand and See How We Are. It must have pained them too, because in making 1993's Hey Zeus, X seems to have abandoned any of the contemporary trappings of those two records and gotten... well, contemporary, but or 1993. The guitars sludge and grind, and are pretty clearly influenced by the grunge and noise that had passed in the years since See How We Are was released. However, those two radio-friendly releases, while being overwhelmingly lousy, each had a great song or two ("Burning House Of Love" "4th of July" "You"). On Hey Zeus, I'm a much bigger fan of the final product - I think it's closer to the type of beat-poet punk they'd like to make. Yet the songs are half cooked at best - "Someone's Watching Me" is dull paranoia, "Clean Like Tomorrow" entices with its lyrics then fails at creating any interesting melody, and songs like "Baby, You Lied" and "Lettuce and Vodka" don't even try. Bad idea as it may be, the grunge sound make the full product better than See How We Are, and it does, actually, create one truly extraordinary song (and, credit where it's due, "Big Blue House" and "Arms For Hostages" would be good filler in a different album) - "Drawn In The Dark," the atmospheric, blazing closer of a song hints at the scuzz that could have driven this band if the rest of the album had earned it."