the James Dean Trio - "Getting Scary"
The Record Machine

Sure, there's been lots of music with what Buddyhead refers to as "Cookie Monster" vocals coming out ever since Coalesce hit the scene in '94. The James Dean Trio takes the by-now-familiar formula of grinding guitars and growled/screamed vocals and simply fucks it up.

There's stuff on Getting Scary I can't even begin to describe. The band goes from metal to hardcore to jazz guitars so effortlessly that it would an insult to even try and take what's on this album and reduce it to words. Unfortunately, I'm a reviewer, so I'm going to have to make something of an attempt.

The James Dean Trio doesn't even bother with formulas. It's as if they decided to take every musical style the band liked, throw it together, and make it work, come hell or high water. "I'm Blacknese" has a guitar lick that could have been lifted directly from the intro to Richard Hell & the Voidoid's "Love Comes In Spurts" together with hardcore breakdowns.

If this music were being made by any other group of individuals, it could come off as sloppy and roughshod. However, by dint of sheer mindblowing talent, what could have been a mish mash of crap turns into a breath of fresh air into the metal/hardcore genre.