The Blackening

Oakland's Machine Head have always been about creating the most honest and intense music possible, since with inception in 1982. Produced once again by singer/guitarist Robb Flynn, new album 'The Blackening' pushes the band's groundbreaking sound farther than it's ever gone before. Challenging themselves and each other to write a record that would demolish all of their boundaries, the band has delivered 60 minutes of the most structurally complex and technical material that Machine Head have ever recorded. Three part guitar and bass harmonies, duelling solos, and savage thrash intricacy, sit alongside soaring vocal harmonies, ultimately crashing head first into bludgeoning, Neanderthal riffage.

Fighting alongside the band's monstrous musical effort are Robb's gritty, streetwise lyrics which teeter effortlessly between brutal metal shouting and lush, melodic singing,. Going from what has recently been a more introspective focus, the words that grace 'The Blackening' return to the socially-conscious narrative so prevalent throughout their earlier albums, focusing heavily on issues that touch one and all. Songs such as the opener 'Clenching The Fists Of Dissent', the massive 'Halo' and epic album closer 'A Farewell To Arms' attest to that fact.