Monster Magnet is an American stoner rock band that has been around now since 1989. ‘4-Way Diablo’ is the bands seventh studio album and was released through SPV Records on November 5th 2007. The album features twelve original tracks as well as a cover of the Rolling Stones ‘2000 Light Years From Home’ also; it’s an incredibly trippy, psychedelic album and often the music is greatly powerful here. Not all the tracks on this ‘4-Way Diablo’ album are strong, there are a number that are more than a little disappointing here but on the whole this is a fairly decent album from the band.
Tracks such as ‘Slap in the Face’ and ‘Wall of Fire’ are particularly excellent from this album, both of these come complete with some truly hard hitting guitar work and the drumbeats also are supremely powerful here. The vocals are sung out in a lazy drawled fashion, this is something that suits the bands sound well however and the vocals do I feel compliment the instrumental sound nicely throughout this album. It’s a pretty competent offering of stoner rock, not the most original album you’ll ever hear but definitely there are a number of tracks present here that are really rather impressive.
Some of the tracks on this album definitely fail to ignite, opening track ‘4-Way Diablo’ for instance begins this release a little disappointingly and closing track ‘Little Bag of Gloom’ is also fairly unimpressive. Both tracks bore me a little truth be told, there’s not much going on within the sound and the music quickly becomes tiresome. These are not the only two tracks that disappoint; there are a couple more present on this album that progress in a similar sort of way and I’d say that roughly one third of this album fails to impress. When the music is good the sound really works well for Monster Magnet, it’s never exactly groundbreaking stuff but there are definite moments of brilliance riddled throughout this ‘4-Way Diablo’ album.
If you’re a fan of stoner rock then you may well like what you find here with Monster Magnet’s seventh studio album; don’t expect to hear anything you’ve not heard done before but still prepare to be impressed at times. ‘Slap in the Face’ and ‘Wall of Fire’ are definitely the two strongest tracks from this album, there are a few more that are pretty good too but these are the ones that appealed to me the most from this release. The music is raw and possesses quite a live atmosphere and energy about it; this is by no means a polished offering of music but then again that’s not really what stoner rock is all about. Definitely give this album a listen if you’re a fan of the genre, don’t expect the music to be particularly exceptional however and be prepared that a few of the tracks present here are more than a little disappointingly executed.
Label: SPV Records
Release Date: November 5th 2007
Rating:
UK based film graduate with a huge passion for music, sports and video games.
