What do you think of Meshuggah?

[Porksoda]

I have a hard time deciding what I think about this band. I enjoy "Nothing" quite a bit. Lots of good riffs and patterns and, as always, some pretty impressive music theory.

My thing with this new album, "Catch Thirty Three", is that there is very little real music in it. The bulk of it consists of only a couple ostinato riffs with syncopatic variations for each verse... not all that much material in over 12 mins of music.

I went to the official Meshuggah forum to see what fans of the band were saying about it, and they were lining up to suck the albums proverbial d*ck! Words like "monumental", and "incomparable", and "cacaphonic symphony that will transcend time" were being applied to this album, and everyone was nodding in agreement.

Okay, so they can play in 5/8, then 7/8, then 1/4, then 3/4, then 11/2 without completely falling apart. Cool. So they can play whole tone and semitone scales, use tone clusters, and all kinds of instrument-specific tecnique. Cool. But how much actual music IS there in that album?

I feel like they are a band where if you sat down and transcribed what they were doing, or worked out the tabs, you would say "oh, that's cool!", but I mean at what point are you sacrificing music for musicianship?

Math metal has an appreciation for good technique and intelligent music, so I feel like it is a kindred spirit to prog. But at what point do you go too far?

Thoughts, comments?

 

[Horus]

I've heard of them, heard they were alright, never actually heard them.

 

[zakk_hate_me_666]

i liked nothing when it came out, but i havent touched it since. now when i listen to it i just hear the same thing over and over again in each song, open note, fretted note, open note, fretted note, open note, fretted note, open note, fretted note, until im like play somethin other than the same two notes you jackass!!!

 

[ThornsOfSorrow]

When I listen to them, it makes me feel like my head is about to explode. I always have a picture in my mind of people's heads blowing up at their shows because of the time signature changes in their music. They're still not as bad as the Dillinger Escape Plan though. To me, good music has to flow, and neither of these bands write many songs that do.

 

[Noble Viking]

Wow, the guy who wrote this thread seems to know what he's talking about! But anyway, about the two note thing, if you're listening to Meshuggah to hear some crazy over the top soloing, then you're listening to them for the wrong reason. They're all about the low end of the sound spectrum (drums, rhythm and bass). They're not some band that has high end (treble) going off within their music, although the guitarist does some crazy Alan Holdsworthish solos.

 

[zakk_hate_me_666]

they do solos? never heard em, but i never listened but to one album and thats been a couple years ago.

 

[Progbass]

I think some of the riffs and polyrhythms are cool, but why do math in music if there was enough of that at school. heh

 

[PRauhala]

Meshuggah's time signatures are "always" going 3\4, 4\4. The accents are just quite hard. Yeah, Thordendal plays good Holdsworth'ish solos in older cd's (None, Destroy Erase Improve). I think he knows much about improvisation, hes not copying Holdsworths solos like some people does. Check those cds!

 

[ElPredicador]

I like meshuggah a lot. I like most of their albums. Catch 33, however, I have mixed feelings. When I manage to hear it completely (I mean, play on first song, stop on the last one, no shuffle), I kind of like it. But, if I listen to a determined song, it is kind of what you said, some kind of chaotic stuff going on. However, it must be remarked that Catch 33 is not a "production album". I don't remember where I read it, but Meshuggah considers this album an experiment, and advised the fans not to expect an album quality release. I truly believe them because: Why on earth would a band with such a superb drummer release a CD in which drums are programmed?

 

[Androz]

When I listen to them, it makes me feel like my head is about to explode.

I couldn' have say it better

 

[Thraxz]

Sorry, I really really don't like it. A step above radio...

 

[PRauhala]

I dont like the new one. I dont like the sounds of None either. But check the older cds. the First ones sounds occasionally
like Metallica

 

[BlackenedDawn]

Meshuggah has come a long way. Their first full length record (Contradictions Collapse) almost has a Metallica-esque might to it, and as the years went by the band continued to become more complex, with 2 distinct sides of their musical vision. Destroy Erase Improve and Chaosphere are my favs, and are the machine gun like, almost death metal aspect of the band. Nothing and the recently released Catch 33, both equally as heavy but nowhere near as speedy and a more groove oriented side of the band. They also have a 20 minute 1 song ep entitled I, which is more on the extreme side, and in my opinion a hell of alot better than the entire new album.

 

[Katana Overlord]

I really appreciate their style of music and the technicality. It's also really unique. But I can't listen to them all the time.

 

[proulxski]

They're not half band, if you can get past the differ stlye of music

 

[II=I]

My thing with this new album, "Catch Thirty Three", is that there is very little real music in it. The bulk of it consists of only a couple ostinato riffs with syncopatic variations for each verse... not all that much material in over 12 mins of music.

Here's the thing you have to remember when listening to 'Catch-Thirty Three'

Thomas Haake - "We always want to do something different with each album, but this one is definitely more of an experiment than the others. We wanted to do something unique with this one, and go for the vibe full out more than the technical or brutal aspect, and maintain that vibe for the whole album. Also the dynamical aspect of the album, once you take it down we really let it take its time before we take it back up again, and I think it makes for an album that’s really an entity on it’s own. We’re really happy with the way it came out."

I also read in an interview that having very similar riffs throughout the album was intentional. They wanted it to have an organic feel and for it to seem like the songs were evolving and growing off one riff. Although there is a great similarity to the songs and I, too, was disappointed at first, when I kept what they said in mind the album began to make a lot more sense.

Why on earth would a band with such a superb drummer release a CD in which drums are programmed?

Thomas Haake - "The way this album was written is very different from the way we normally write stuff, and a lot of the guitar stuff were done on a spur of the moment type of thing. We had the guitar plugged through a Line6 straight through to a PC digitally, and as soon as someone would come up with an idea for a riff, he would record that riff immediately, all four guitars and the bass, because a lot of the things are really, really random, like the notations and the actual finger placements on the neck, there’s a lot of real quirky stuff going on. Maybe we could have done it, but it would have taken so much time to record drums to go along with these riffs, which had been changed like ten times each, at least, that I would have had to re-record and re-learn the drum parts over and over again. It would have taken too much time. That’s one aspect. The other one is that once we were like 15-20 minutes into the album we noticed that the programmed drums sounded really good, the samples sounded so good even before we mixed them, and it just supported the overall feel and vibe of the album, the super steady, no fills, almost emotionless type of drumming, even though it sounds like a real drummer. We just felt it went well with the style of music we were writing, so we said “fuck it” and went with it. We have always been about breaking taboos, and as a metal band, and maybe especially as a metal band like us, we have a lot of musician followers, so maybe for us it’s a little more taboo to use programmed drums, but to some extent maybe that’s another reason why we did it."

So, that should help the album make a little more sense. It certainly helped me. I'm just happy that they're going to be able to start on the next album so soon after 'Catch Thirty Three'.

By the way, those quotes came from a short interview here.

 

[mawdyson]

I think they're awesome!!

I haven't heard "Catch Thirty Three" yet.

 

[-Rivfader-]

I like their stuff alot.

 

[!Aviso!]

I liked them when I saw them open for Tool. I think they're a really cool band, but I have a hard time listening to that kind of stuff for too long.

 

[Thraxz]

Thomas Haake - "Sorry fans, we're too lazy to learn the drum lines for you while in the studio. I hope you don't mind us short changing you like that. Also, we also like to contradict ourselves by saying that we want the album to sound organic and then use the most inorganic thing in the world, a computer, to do our drums."

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