The Bedlam In Goliath

by THE MARS VOLTA (Heavy Prog)

This was the first The Mars Volta album I ever bought, and frankly, I was unimpressed. Everything about this record is just . . . not good, um, to say the very very very least.

It starts off with a brilliant, oh-so-original BLAST of relentless noise that made me feel like I was going to go insane after only three seconds of listening to it. Some people say that death metal growls and such make them nervouse, but oh boy, nothing compares to this piece of garbage. Thankfully I was able to give The Mars Volta another chance and listened to their first album, which was fantastic. It really makes me wonder . . . where and when did these guys go so wrong? This is nothing but sensless noise that never lets up. Frankly, it's just too much. Nothing makes me a nervous wreck more than a high-pitched singer who sounds like he's got a pole stuck up his ass, complete with annoyingly loud and obnoxious horns, and a brand-spanking new drummer who seems to think he is playing on Fallout Boy's latest stinky pile. All of these wonderful elements combined make for a monstrosity that seems to actually think of itself as a solid studio effort. All of the tracks run together without aim or reason, and the deafening horror of this salsa- on-a-stick idiocy makes me feel like I am in the chili's from hell listening to the house band.

As said earlier, The Mars Volta apparantly recruited a new drummer, and he is horrible, just like everything else about this record. The drummer they had on their first studio album was amazing and rythmical complete with plenty originality and flare, and this guy simply bashes away emotionlessly on his no doubt 'totally kick-ass' drumkit. How could these guys think this man is any good at his instrument?! At all?! Not to mention there is absolutely no room to breath to speak of, and any attempt at an 'ambience' section of any sort is simply the band garbling up the end of the songs with a synthesizer, no real creativity here. Not a real big surprise, either. And Omar's guitar work? Practically non-existant. Anything that could have potentially been good has been drowned out by the crap that is this free-jazz monster that The Mars Volta has created with this album. It's almost as if Cedric in all his wisdom came up with a fool- proof way of avoiding any good notes or composition whatsoever; as if he was determined for his latest record to fail on all levels. But guess what? Tons of people are buying it, tons of people are hailing at as the best prog album in the history of God. What is even progressive about this? It's just a loud, sloppy jazz-rock album with some salsa on top and a few synthed-up voices, nothing about this even remotely makes me think Prog.

Yes, from the ugly alblum cover to the even uglier music that is held within, nothing is good about this record. As far as I am concerned, I am not going to buy another new TMV album. I mean, I'll still try out their earlier stuff, as I enjoyed DE-LOUSED so much, but as of right now, The Mars Volta is no longer any good whatsoever. I nearly missed out on the great record that was DE-LOUSED simply because this one was so horrible. If TMV are aiming to lose pottentially new fans this way, they are succeeding with flying colors. If they are trying to create progressive masterpieces, then they have failed miserably, and the way things are looking, they will never do anything worth listening to again. THE BEDLAM IN GOLIATH makes that promise, as it is by far the worst prog album I have heard to date. It is a horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible album, and I would never recommend it to anyone.