siLLy puPPy
PIKE 311 - FURNACE FOLLIES 9th installment of 2022 Everything played by BUCKETHEAD Total playing time 29 minutes exactly All instrumental as always!
This one features only four tracks each titled one through four
“One” is a bouncy heavy rocker that features some serious guitar shredding Which BH carried over from the previous PIKE This one however has more of a hard rock bluesy groove going on The tempos shift around a great deal though with some outlandishly fast fact melters Sounds like guitar torture to me which is why i like it! The track also has some moments when the guitar drops out and weird keyboard runs ensue Then jumps into an AC/DC style boogie rock This one is rather cool in how it jumps around but never too dramatically
“Two” picks up where “One” left off. In fact it’s impossible to distinguish the two tracks. It pretty much just carries on with the same nonchalant methodologies of hard rock, heavy metal and experimental weirdness. Lots more guitar soloing on this one. Also some alt metal moments and crazy unclassifiable weirdness.
“Three” also seamlessly transitions but becomes more bizarre with a slow bass groove and an even more frantic guitar meltdowns. It does however escape total chaos with a bluesy hard rock shuffle. The tension between avant-garde chaos and mainstream sounding hard rock is the name of the game here. It’s like a volleyball match between the two however the chaotic parts are fairly freaky. This one is over 7 minutes in length so it goes on for a while alternating between the easier on the ears parts with crazy experimental outbursts of guitar wankery.
“Four” is also rather indistinguishable from the preceding tracks and in all honesty this is really just one PIKE’s worth of mind fuck music. Even the riffs are recycled between the four tracks. This one is technically almost 13 minutes long but none of that matters. It’s all just a random shuffle of the continuation of accessible hard rock sounds, avant-metal run amok, freaked out electronica, funk, avant-prog time signature complexities and extreme energetic wildness. Nice use of dynamics on this one with some strange excursions into various sonic palettes. Given the length of this one it’s allowed to take the weirdness even further down the rabbit hole.
OK, this is the kind of PIKE that really gets my juices flowing. This is the real experimental deal and exactly why i listen to BH despite so much mediocrity in between greatness. This showcases both technical prowess, astute creative overflow and utter disregard to convention. This is sensory overload music and exactly what takes me to the happy zone. This is the best PIKE i’ve personally enjoyed in quite some time and thus far the best of 2022!