This past week I was given an advanced copy of the new Stone Sour album, ‘Audio Secrecy’. Once I started playing the album on my iPod, I couldn’t put it down.
When I play albums for the first time, I listen to them at least 10 times (I’m on my approximately 30th listen of ‘Audio Secrecy’ at the moment). With each listen, I focus on every single part of the album as I am a musician and I love to see how bands put together each individual component of a given album.
Stone Sour’s lineup consists of vocalist Corey Taylor (Slipknot), Shawn Economaki on bass, guitarists James Root (Slipknot) and Josh Rand, and Roy Mayorga (Soulfly, Sepultura) on drums.
After all the iPod listening, the one component of ‘Audio Secrecy’ that, to me, is ‘the backbone’ of the entire album is Corey Taylor’s singing.
For years, rock fans may have known Corey Taylor as the voice of Slipknot. The Slipknot version of Corey Taylor is a voice of anger, passion and unfiltered rage that has helped define Slipknot as a master of heavy metal and thrash for over a decade. The band’s songs are a masterful example of what happens when tact is not applied to their music and lyrics. However, they have yet to break into the upper echelons of the rock elite around the world.
Here’s an example of Slipknot in action:
With the release of Slipknot’s ‘Vol. 3: (The Subliminal Verses)’ the band displayed that they were teetering on the verge of rock superstardom with one of the most well crafted albums in metal history. Slipknot’s next album, ‘All Hope is Gone’, found the band taking a step sideways with their music instead of taking the next step forward. They continued with another solid album in ‘All Hope is Gone’ but nothing that would be considered ‘the album’ that would launch them into the company of rock or metal’s elite bands.
Enter Stone Sour’s ‘Audio Secrecy’.
Here fans are presented with a different side of Corey Taylor’s voice. On ‘Audio Secrecy’, Taylor sings in a more refined, direct, channeled and tactful manner while losing none of the passion and hints of anger in his voice that has defined Slipknot’s career.
In ‘Audio Secrecy’, Stone Sour has crafted an album that has the potential to launch the band into the mainstream of rock and to a larger audience. From the opening tracks (‘Mission Statement’, ‘Digital’, and ‘Say You’ll Haunt me’), Stone Sour sets a blistering tone and pace of what’s to come for the rest of the album. Even when Stone Sour ventures into the ballads or slower songs like ‘Dying’, ‘Miracles’ or ‘Hesitate’, the band still maintains their hard ‘foot to ass’ edge on the album without venturing into sissy territory. This is a standard for rock albums that has been lost over the years.
Here’s a live version of ‘Mission Statement’ from the 2010 Download Festival (UK):
‘Audio Secrecy’ has many solid tracks that have the potential of being rock classics such as ‘Pieces’ (which is my favorite of all the 14 great tracks to choose from). This album was crafted to reach the most amount of people possible. This includes the most important demographic that defines if a band can reach the rock mainstream or not….acceptance by women. If there is one album that Corey Taylor’s voice can help launch into the mainstream of rock, ‘Audio Secrecy’ is it.
Stone Sour’s ‘Audio Secrecy’ is one of the rare gems that stand out in the vast sea of terminally putrid pop and rock albums today. From start to finish, ‘Audio Secrecy’ is a lesson in how rock albums should be made. In this age of pop artists focusing on creating individual tracks for iTunes, Stone Sour has created a pretty damned impressive album of music.
For you rock fans who have been waiting for a solid album to drop your hard earned money on, ‘Audio Secrecy’ is it. ‘Audio Secrecy’ has the staying power of an album that, with proper promotion (key term here), can be eventually become a rock classic for years to come.
One of these days, the two different versions of Corey Taylor (the Slipknot Corey Taylor and the Stone Sour Corey Taylor) are going to meet in a recording studio. What will result is destined to be a landmark and legendary album.
Stone Sour will be appearing during day three of the Arizona Fall Frenzy as part of the Rockstar Energy Drink Uproar Festival on September 19th.
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