Fans of classic rock and amped out metal bands, pay attention, because Italian “hard rock” group Voodoo Highway (not to be confused with the Binghamton-based jam band of the same name) is out to get you on their ride. The quintet’s first full-length album, Broken Uncle’s Inn, is a loud, lurid trip to 1986, back when hard guitar solos, screaming vocals and stringy hair-flips were the names of the game. Each track is chock-full of Poison-esque pump, twangy riffs and hefty hooks; despite all this, however, the album’s quality can’t quite live up to the legends that came before it.
Broken Uncle’s Inn’s first real track, “Till It Bleeds” – following a funky vintage intro, is a mostly hard blend of vocal shrieks, pulsating guitar riffs and seriously hard percussion. It’s fun, if overdone, a semi-clichéd metal music downpour. The sound is catchy but stale, a rip off of the old-school acts that came before.
The second full-length song and third track on the album, “The Fire Will Burn Away,” supplements the same metal sound with a more varied melody, nicely setting it apart from the preceding track. The lyrics are repetitive and unimaginative, but the track’s chorus, replete with howling vocals lamenting the title lyric again and again, takes on a more emotional tack.
“Window,” the album’s fifth track, is a particularly energetic, funky jaunt, featuring jam-packed instrumentals and a faster-paced rhythm. Still, as is the case with the rest of the album’s offerings, the song bleeds into the next, making it difficult to distinguish the track’s particular highlights from those of its comrades.
Some of Broken Uncle’s Inn’s tracks sink far below the others. “Gasoline Woman,” the album’s penultimate offering, is pure overkill, an unnecessarily loud, lumped up song that sounds like a lesser version of each track that comes before it. The lyrics and melody are barely indistinguishable from the others, which, this deep into the album, is an unwelcome monotone.
All in all, while Broken Uncle’s Inn has some interesting moments, it lacks ingenuity and overall intrigue. If Voodoo Highway really wants to satisfy, it’s time to get more creative.
Key Tracks – The Fire Will Burn Away, Window, Running Around
Rebecca Fishbein – MuzikReviews.com Contributer
August 6, 2011
