topofsm Ask any Strapping Young Lad listener and they will point to one of two albums: Alien and City. While Alien is fantastic too, this came before all the over the top synthesized orchestras, gigantic layers of sound, and orchestrated goofiness. So basically what you're left with is an over-the-top pissed off album.

This album is mostly industrial metal with a few thrash elements. It's difficult to categorize, but most of Devin Townsend's work is difficult in that respect. You can see where Fear Factory got a lot of inspiration since there are tons of dry, pounding riffs all over the place. Admittedly, there is a lot that nu-metal seems to have taken from the album as well, most often through Devin's singing voice (The Track AAA is egregious in nu-metal too). But overall if you know Strapping, you know what you're getting into.

The album starts of great. The intro, "Velvet Kevorkian" is a crushing intro. It leads directly into "All Hail the New Flesh", which is filled with bombastic melodies and melodramatic singing that is completely headbanging worthy. The first half of the album is all a total mosh-fest. "Oh my Fucking God" and "Home Nucleonics" are particularly insane, as they are filled to the brim with blasting tempi and gritty riffs.

My main beef with the album is it slows down as it goes. After the blast that is "Home Nucleonics", you're treated to "AAA", which already stated is a midtempo groovy nu-metal track (albeit a good one). A couple songs later, "Room 429" and "Spirituality" close off the bunch, which are pretty slow tracks that don't add much to the album. Overall there's just a couple tracks that don't stand out as much as they could on the album.

However, as for most of it, it's a very cyberpunky angry, blistering, over-the top sandwich of metal. Devin Townsend and Strapping fans will of course have it, and it has a rightful spot in anyone's collection.

topofsm Who knew Canada could be so insane?

Strapping Young Lad pulls off one intense listen with Alien. Although this may be more progressive than their early offerings, it's far from an easy listen. Right off the bat the album opens up with three crazed songs typical of Townsend's anger and insanity. The opener "Imperial" is as grandiose as it is crushing, and it is very very crushing. The next song "Skesis" is probably the best on the album, a pure showcase of the raw insanity inside the crazed atmospheres of SYL. Just when you think things have to let up they hit you again with "Shitstorm", probably the biggest contender for the embodiment of anger in musical form. All three are big, dark, and heavy beyond expectation.

Most of the albums cools off a bit after this, though not by much. "Love" and "Possesions" are more downtempoed than the others and become more of a groove metal style, though they're still top notch materal. "We Ride" gets back to the thrash style, fast and relentless, with an excellent blistering solo reminiscent of the early 90s. It should also be noted that the atomic clock Gene Hoglan is all over the drums on this one. The masterful technique is obvious, and the drumming is fast and brutal. If you want a nonstop drum performance, this would be an album to hear it in.

Of course, although this album contains crushing metal prowess it's far from standard thrash. There is typical Devin Townsend wall of sound that envelopes the listener, making the listen all the more heavy, even though melody pours all around. Xylophone can be heard occasionally, and an eerie choir of haunting children voices sometimes appears through, most prominently in "Shine". Things even cool down completely with the ambient Floydian "Two Weeks" with tongue in cheek cheesy lyrics. But that's no reason to be comfortable, since the following song to that is "Thalamus", staccato and quiet at first, until everything hits at once with a gargantuan metal assault where double bass, relentless guitar, and Townsend's voice attack from seemingly everywhere. Then everything drops away again into cool synth backed beauty. Truly one of the most creative metal songs out there.

The final track is comprised of ten minutes of static, with faint voices in the background. This is mainly the letdown of the album, though thankfully it's at the end and nothing occurs after it, so it's quite passable.

Overall, if one wants to be assaulted by crushing riffs, giant atmosphere, pummeling drums, and the insane screams of Townsend, then you can't get much better than Alien, a near masterpiece that shines out among a discography of an already great band.

Negoba Raw Anger and More

So the boss has been on your arse all day with some total crap and you go home, head into the garage to lay into the heavy bag or lift and jam out to some intense music. Metal has been for just these moments for a long time. Back in my day, I listened to Master of Puppets and Cowboys from Hell for this purpose. But even 15 years later, there may be no better album for beating the hell out of something than City.

Of course, raw anger is in alot of metal, but nowhere is it quite as intense and intelligent at the same time as here. "Detox" and "OMFG" are some of the most intense music ever made. (This has been said about this album so many times, but this is the first review here so I had to get that out.) Other songs like "All Hail the New Flesh" are actually just extremely intense versions of Devin Townsend's usual wall of sound.

Devy is perhaps the most talented metal musician of his generation and on City he lets his maniacal self free. Like Mike Patton, Devy can be twisted and complex and still appeal to very deep in the stomach emotions. And the feelings boil over, enough to recruit a fantastic supporting band including the hellacious Gene Hoglan, one of the most precise and brutal drummers ever.

Bottom Line: The Best Album from Evil Devy and the Boyz

UMUR Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing is the debut full-length studio album by Canadian metal act Strapping Young Lad. Band founder/ guitarist/ vocalist/ producer Devin Townsend had recorded and toured with Steve Vai and then toured with The Wildhearts before getting tired and angry at the music business. He needed a place to let out some steem and as he had been blown away by Fear Factory´s aggressive, industrial and technical take on extreme metal, Devin felt that he had the right ingredients to make something aggressive and unique. The 2006 Century Media re-issue of the album includes a 12-page booklet with extended liner notes by Devin Townsend where he recalls the troubles he had with getting a record contract. I found one anekdote particularly entertaining. After Devin Townsend had spend a lot of time sending demos and going to business dinners with Roadrunner Records, his project was rejected. He promtly responded by sending Monte Conner from Roadrunner Records a package full of rocks and a picture of his asshole, having promised Monte Conner that it was a project he had been working on that sounded like Type O Negative. That is some great dark humour in my book. Fully displaying the madman genious of Devin Townsend.

It´s pretty hard to explain how the music sounds, but edgy thrashy riffing, loads of samples and sounds and some often manic sounding vocals are some of the ingredients on this album. The trademark Devin Townsend wall of sound production is also very present on this album. Headphones is a good idea if you want to experience this album and get the most out of it. The songs often sound a bit too much like experiments and not enough like compositions for my taste but on the other hand those are some very interesting experiments. The two tracks that open the album S.Y.L. and In the Rainy Season are probably the songs on the album that reminds me the most of later material by the band. The former is an absolutely brilliant track. The 2006 Century Media re-issue of the album includes 4 bonus tracks and the video clip for S.Y.L.. None of the bonus tracks add much value to the album IMO. The cover of the Judas priest song Exciter is not among Strapping Young Lad´s finest moments that´s for sure.

Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing walks the fine line between madness and genious, noise and brilliant compositions. It´s a very difficult album and it won´t please everyone and to be honest it doesn´t please me all the time either. Therefore a 3 star rating is warranted. All Strapping Young Lad albums have a distinct and unique sound, but Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing is probably the one that stands out the most from the rest. For better and worse.