blackleatherbookshelf | Entries tagged with rage against the machine

Tempering The Rage, Unslaving The Audio
3 Out Of 5 Stars

Tom Morello's first album under his Nightwatchman persona was out to destroy his old reputation as an electric guitar gunslinger for Rage Against The Machine and Audioslave. While he keeps the political bent of RATM in full blast, he's decided that a whisper will work better than a scream. So now he's channeling Woody Guthrie, Pete Seger and Bruce Springsteen ala "Ghost of Tom Joad." This is one wicked lefty political diatribe, and Morello is relishing the part.

I really enjoy what Morello is doing with this phase of his career. I've seen him live twice now, and he's got one charismatic stage presence. However, his songwriting here is not as good as the albums that followed. While I do not underestimate his commitment to this new-found folk music, there's only about half that really catch fire. There's too many songs that merely offer up slogans instead of songs, an issue that he'd overcome in spades by "The Fabled City" a couple of years later.

It's the songs that hit the bulls-eye that really impress. The title song blasts through any complacency the acoustic guitar based songs might lull you into. "The Gardens of Gethsemane" is a powerful narrative of a revolutionary on the prowl, haunted by "I've seen the things I should not see." Offering no viewpoint, you have to ascertain for yourself what kind of man he's singing about. With a haunting guitar whispering behind Morello's strumming, it packs a velvet wallop. "One Man Revolution" needed more of these songs. Like I also said, by "The Fabled City," his songwriting had evolved to the point where every song was an acoustic hand grenade. I'll recommend this to current fans of the likes of Steve Earle or Billy Bragg, but better was on the way.

Current Mood: angry
Current Location: Philadelphia
Current Music: "One Man Revolution" Tom Morello

Do You Feel Safe?
4 Out of 5 Stars

Far too derivative and depressing to rate higher than 4 stars, Tom Morello's Nightwatchman side-gig releases a second album of politically based folk rock. "The Fabled City" is a richer sounding album than "One Man Revolution" and maybe even more of a downer. Embittered immigrants (the title track) share space with frustrated soldiers ("The Lights Are On In Spidertown") and doomed workers ("Night Falls") in a series of minor key rumblings.

Each song on "The Fabled City" is delivered in Morello's growl or a barked out shout. He is channeling a lot of influences (Springsteen on the title cut, Johnny Cash on "King of Hell," Woody Guthrie/Pete Seeger Union Songs on "Night Falls."), what is missing is any sense of optimism. Even a rabble rouser like Steve Earle knows to throw in one sing-along per CD, and "Saint Isabelle" comes closest here. It doesn't make the songs any less affecting, but it does make "The Fabled City" a tough disc to sit all the way through.

What you do need to wait for, however, is Morello's take on Post-Katrina New Orleans. "Midnight In The City Of Destruction" sounds deeply personal and direct, and hurls this epithet:

"I lost my guitar, my home and my good fortune.
I lost my Grandfather, two neighbors and a friend.
I pray that God himself will come and drown the President
if the levees break again."

"The Fabled City" is a big old lefty diatribe, and if you can live with that, you'll enjoy the darkly intense folk-protests Morello spits out. Just be prepared for the fact that this is one angry fellow folkie and Tom's making it clear that he is not going to go quietly.

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Current Mood: cold
Current Location: Philadelphia
Current Music: "Midnight In The City Of Destruction" Tom Morello

Tom Morello Turns up The Heat
4 Out of 5 Stars

In his guise as The Nightwatchman, Tom Morello's first two albums were low key visceral affairs, heir apparent to Joe Strummer and Pete Seger protest folkies. Sometime in the last couple of years, he realized that his powerful guitar playing was not antithetical two his new music, and he began work on a new set of songs. Events of 2010 put even more urgency into his writing; Morello was one of the first musicians to take a stand with Wisconsin's Union Members when that state's Governor tried to crush the Wisconsin Unions. It's the place he debuted, on a snowy, cold Wisconsin street, "Union Town."

If you think political rock is a passe genre, then "World Wide Rebel Songs" will probably make you mad. Yet, in a world where tightly controlled radio-playlists won't play anything that rocks the corporate boat, Morello is coming on swinging. "Politics, apocalypse, start to look the same/The price of my redemption will mean the end of living" he barks (with Ben Harper on "Save The Hammer for The Man"), as if the world of conservative politics and rightwing religion were all too happy to get to the same end result. The pun is all but unavoidable in that Morello is raging against the machine on almost every track. "Speak and Make Lightning," he calls out. This time, with his guitar and a full band attack, "World Wide Rebel Songs" lift Morello to his best solo CD and a fighting fit of an album.