Band: Helmet

[hogknob]

Helmet.

[Mr. Chimp]

Not Crap, but with a waffle of 9.

They redefined the power of live music for me, 'lo these many years ago.

Strap It On was brutal and beautiful

Meantime was razor-honed and massive and taut

however,

Betty was lukewarm and juicy

Aftertaste was a sedative.

I did see them at the Empty Bottle pre-/post-Aftertaste, and they killed.

[yawn]

Strap It On was good, the production seemed so muddy though. Meantime rocked hard. Betty sounded like noodlewater, Pitchfork gave Aftertaste a good review so it might suck, even so NOT CRAP.

[bdp]

Few, if any, do harmonicall-saturated-razor-sharp-stop-start-dropped D crunch like Page Hamilton.
John Stanier gave militaristic precision to Bonzo-esq beats (and refused to tape down his snare).
Henry Bogdan - well, he kinda kept it simple and stayed off the high frets.
The other guitarists didn't manage to leave much of an indellible mark, but they were mainly Page's bitches anyway.

I'd buy additional copies of any Helmet album over most of what passes for "rock" these days. I miss 'em.

[adsr527]

like I care

[OptionsR]

Holding Helmet accountable for bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit is kind of like saying The Eagles were The Byrds' fault. Sort of. Didn't like them as much as I did Band Of Susans, but if the world needs to be subjected to drop-tuned drill-press metal, I preferred Helmet's variant on the formula. Something did seem amiss from "Betty" onwards, though. Maybe Peter Mengede contributed more than I thought. 4

[OptionsR]

ignore this space - how did I show up twice?

[ubercat]

I just got a look at Page's POS guitar. You damn well know he doesn't play that thing. He's busy playing reverse birds and shit.

Cockbag supreme.

Helmet = Crap, utterly.

[SecondEdition]

"Bad Mood" alone kills your crap votes.

most everything after Meantime was lacking, though I hear Monochrome was actually good - a return to the Meantime style - but c'mon. Strap It On is a monolith, a half hour of pure power.

[NerblyBear]

MEANTIME is the only one I've heard, but I really enjoy the heck out of it. I think what made Helmet's music unique is that they didn't just focus on only being a "heavy" band--they made the songs interesting by using compelling vocal melodies, washes of detuned double-guitar dissonance and Stanier's almost hip-hop-like drumming.

They also played around with interesting time signatures, shifting around the riffs and beats until they glided together like tectonic plates creating the perfect earthquake.

I don't listen to them that much, and they were far less interesting than the Jesus Lizard (who were a contemporary of theirs with whom I sometimes associate them), but I will gladly drink a beer and crank a Helmet song any morning of the week.

[Isabelle Gall]

Strap It On-awesome.

Meantime-great, but not as good as the 1st album.

Betty-good, but not as much as the album before.

Aftertaste-okay, but not as good as the previous album.

See the pattern?

Still, NC. I used to have a black Helmet t-shirt with a vice on it. It was really big, but I wore it anyway.

[chet]

Strap it On is such an amazing record. Everything about it is great.

All the other records are just ok.

Monochrome wasn't half bad, and it was a semi-return to form. Nothing beats Strap it On though in their catalog.

[HOUSTON_M]

Isabelle Gall wrote:

Strap It On-awesome.

Meantime-great, but not as good as the 1st album.

Betty-good, but not as much as the album before.

Aftertaste-okay, but not as good as the previous album.

See the pattern?

The same pattern as Liz Phair and Neil LaBute.

The passage from 1:58 - 2:21 in "FBLA" is enough in itself to earn Helmet a not crap vote from me.

I like the early non-album material collected on Born Annoying as well.

[Hexpane]

Betty is misunderstood genius. People wanted Meantime 2: The untold stories

I spent many hours listening to that album over and over.

Aftertaste has a great first 5 songs. If that were an EP instead of an LP it would be pure bliss

People love to bash Aftertaste but its like a Rap album in a sense, its got 5 AAA songs and a bunch of filler. If you simply ignore everything after the 5th track, that release rocks

[Pasta]

"This Is Sinatra's world, we just live here"

Starp it On Is freakin' perfect. Meantime, was definitely a welcome antidote to the Alice in Chains/Pearl Jam/STP "Heavy Rock".

After that. EH......

[The MayorofRockNRoll]

I pretty much tuned out after Peter left.

I used to correspond with Page Hamilton. He's a nice guy, or he was. Maybe he still is.

Still...I hate to do it, but I do kinda have to dole out a little blame for nu-metal, especially given the line up he's played with lately.

[ubercat]

Yeah. This guitar rocks soooo hard... Awesome video on 'work' included gratis.

[BClark]

what can i say, they got those riffs. to get picky, i'd say the feedback-chours stuff could be executed a bit better.

really, really boring lyrics. which is made worse by how the lyrics are kind of sparse throughout each song's time, as if theyre meant to have some succinct weight to them.

i'm thinking a helmet vs quicksand thunderdome might be in order. its really the same band; they sound similar and have pretty much the same place in rock music history. i suppose quicksand is the more "real deal" band of the two; i could never picture quicksand appearing on "the crow" soundtrack with pantera, fear factory, etc.

hmmmm, helmet = not crap.

[mr.arrison]

Maybe Peter Mengede contributed more than I thought. 4

I saw Helmet live once in 1991 or so, at Virginia Tech (with Vockins I think!!)- right before they were signed to the big major label. Mengede had a crushing sound, a full stack vintage marshall JMP, a Les Paul and a menacing stance for such a well dressed guy. I liked it a great deal when he contributed to the solos in the one or two songs he played them on. Fingernails on a chalkboard.

Mengede and Stanier were the well-coiffed dudes in the band. Paige was just a tennis player with an ESG (or a PRS) and a fancy rack-of-lights guitar rig.

Still not crap for the first few albums. Everything after Betty was dumb. Actually, most of Betty is dumb too...

[world of pee]

saw them open for primus in 95. thought it stunk. wonder what i'd think now.