There's something wonderful about a dose of good heavy metal - it soothes the soul.
And Soulfly's latest album, 3, is all about good heavy metal.
The band, fronted by ex-Sepultura singer Max Cavalera, has a distinct heavy rock sound mixed with a Brazilian influence that reaches out and forces you into a chokehold.
That's what successful heavy metal should do - choke the hell out of you and leave you gasping for more. In an era where hard rock and heavy metal have taken a strange electronic turn and spit out generic bands such as Godsmack and Disturbed, Soulfly inserts a little old-school flavor. Cavalera's throaty screaming lyrics and the thrasher electric guitar riffs take one back to the good old days. 3 pays homage to a time when Metallica didn't suck and people paid proper respect to bands such as Machine Head and My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult.
The band includes Marcelo Dias on bass, Mickey Doling on guitar and Roy Mayorga on drums. Soulfly will be gracing Albuquerque with its presence Saturday, Oct. 19, at the Sunshine Theater and fans can expect a rocking show with some quality metal to pound the hearing out of their ears.
Soulfly's 3 is a terrific playback to true metal. Songs such as "One" lead the album into a heavenly metal combo, and a distinct melody is mixed in with the anguished screaming. Soulfly has an interesting religious hook that isn't the clichÇd satanic junk that most metal bands ascribe to.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Track seven, "Tree of Pain," fronts haunting vocals, then cuts into the thrasher tones that Cavalera lays down. It's a tribute to a different style of music, more melodic and rhythmic - tapping into mellower roots. But it's still down-home metal, that's what it's all about.
Cavalera knows his band is growing into something new and fresh with enough staying power to make a difference in the normally dull industry.
"This album is definitely an essential album in the Soulfly career," Cavalera said in an online review at www.soulflyweb.tk. "It's the album where we reach the level of maturity that we were looking for with the last two records.
Definitely neither repetitious nor boring, the band also has a depth that deserves props. Track nine, called "9-11-01" is one minute of silence that pays tribute to the Sept. 11 terrorists attacks. That single minute of silence speaks volumes to anyone who has been affected in any way by the attacks. Who says heavy metal is without any soul?
