GWAR - Beyond Hell Review
Posted by Evocator Manes on 10.06.2006
Following the comeback album with a breakdown album?
GWAR Beyond Hell
2006
DRT
6.0
I know what the plan was and it was a well-conceived one. Sure, world domination and wenches and blood and puke and cum, etc. but also the idea was to ditch Metal Blade for DRT, who would focus on launching GWAR into the stratosphere somewhere. Instead, what happened was the band released War Party, easily their most energetic and ambitious album and arguably their best outright. That such a fantastic album, with death metal leanings, would be released by a more or less comic band took a lot of people by surprise and created a huge groundswell for the band. Seeking to capitalize on this, they wrote up with a concept album, which was to be produced by the architect of one of the hottest bands and sounds around, Devin Townsend. It was to be their breakthrough album...
...but like many great ideas, it wound up being more sizzle than steak. The problem is not in production. Devin Townsend is capable of fantastic arrangements and delivering great sonic results, such as in the case of Stuck Mojo, where the album he produced was easily their strongest. While GWAR has never been really about streamlined, straightforward songs, preferring instead to be as inane and insane as possible, when they did step in to that realm on War Party, people noticed, as GWAR demonstrated they were also capable of excellent musicianship. On this end, the band attempts to follow an incredibly convoluted storyline (I still can't read the fucking booklet without getting a headache), which stabs at humor (or stabs it to death, perhaps) along the lines of the band going to Hell to kick Satan's ass and thus prove they are the toughest, baddest motherfuckers on the planet, rinse, repeat. Hell is also alluded to as a vacation spot. In GWAR's own words, "[Beyond Hell] concerns GWAR’s epic journey into the tunnels and caverns that honeycomb your world, a journey not only to escape their earthly prison “from within”, but also to find and confront this so-called “Satan”, who seems to think that he is a bigger bad ass than Oderus. Along the way GWAR encounter’s [sic] a bevy
of demonic dickheads and hapless victims, all ready to die for your entertainment because they're all a bunch of assholes."
Yep, it's dumb and utterly nonsensical, but no one's expecting Nobel Laureate work from these guys. Dumb is their stock in trade, along with a twisted sense of something that skims the line between humor and perversion. The biggest issue here isn't any of that, but rather that the songs are not particularly that good this time around. Sure, they sound great. The instruments have never sounded tighter or crisper, but the riffs are moderately to not-at-all interesting and the subject matter is tired. Yes, war, fucking, killing, war and so on and so on. While on War Party, there were at least stabs of cleverness, here there are none. GWAR also decides to go for a cover, inexplicably winding up the album with an abortion of a cover of Alice Cooper's chestnut, School's Out.
Most of the foldout is devoted to the meandering and vapid storyline and song lyrics. The band members all get their own square as well, with Balsac also featured on the front cover, watermarked in the bloody band name letters. There are also various credits and blood spatters everywhere, but it's not very interesting, all in all.
The 411: This may be the band's tightest and best sounding disc to date, but it is far from their best and is completely eclipsed by the prior War Party album. Perhaps the band should either discard the idea of concept albums entirely or write simpler ones. Elements of War Party, such as the "Crosstika" concept, make their way here, but the most important element from that disc – having strong songs – did not. Not their best work, but if you're into the whole GWAR trip, this should have a stronger appeal.
