Not Today I'm Not
After years of forgetting about it and a week or so of deliberation, I recently ordered an old favorite album of mine. This time, I forewent the old standby of vinyl and acquired the compact disc version of Cable's tragically underrated "Gutter Queen".
Cable was and always will exist as a band that I like enough to continue supporting. But I sometimes think that they just barely make the cut. While each release of theirs is bound to have 1-2 really great tracks, it almost always seems that a few are fairly sub par as well. With "Variable Speed Drive", the album had some bright spots, but it definitely seemed also a bit of a lesser-than answer to Threadbare's outstanding and classic "Feeling Older Faster" album to me. With a later album such as "Never Trust A Gemini", Cable seemed to move so far to into stoner rock territory that they'd completely shed their former selves with somewhat mixed results. All except for "Gutter Queen".
For me, "Gutter Queen" was the perfect album for Cable and an exemplary album overall. "Gutter Queen" came out in what I'd consider to be the initial heyday for Hydra Head Records. Around the same time, Botch had unloaded "American Nervoso" and Cave In delivered one of the finest recordings of the late 1990's in "Until Your Heart Stops". Somewhere amidst those two colossal releases, one shouldn't forget Drowningman's "Busy Signal At The Suicide Hotline" either. Sandwiched in between those 3 monster albums, "Gutter Queen" did not seem to garner the same hype. Yet for me, it was every bit an equal to those aforementioned.
Looking back on Cable from the outset to present, "Gutter Queen" seems ever more the transition album. As they began to shift (though one wouldn't have exactly known at the time), Cable began to take a cue from Kiss It Goodbye, delving deeper into unbridled and unfiltered rage. "Gutter Queen" was every bit as pissed off as I could have hoped for when it came out, though it's unclear as to what were the reasons. Taking the best elements of their Fugazi-gone-metal era and bridging into the territory they embraced more heavily on "Northern Failures", Cable recorded what was then and still is their finest work.
Playlist 8-11-09
Isis - Wavering Radiant
Clutch - Strange Cousins From The West
Cable - Gutter Queen/Northern Failures
Gojira - From Mars To Sirius
Kylesa - Static Tensions
Cable was and always will exist as a band that I like enough to continue supporting. But I sometimes think that they just barely make the cut. While each release of theirs is bound to have 1-2 really great tracks, it almost always seems that a few are fairly sub par as well. With "Variable Speed Drive", the album had some bright spots, but it definitely seemed also a bit of a lesser-than answer to Threadbare's outstanding and classic "Feeling Older Faster" album to me. With a later album such as "Never Trust A Gemini", Cable seemed to move so far to into stoner rock territory that they'd completely shed their former selves with somewhat mixed results. All except for "Gutter Queen".For me, "Gutter Queen" was the perfect album for Cable and an exemplary album overall. "Gutter Queen" came out in what I'd consider to be the initial heyday for Hydra Head Records. Around the same time, Botch had unloaded "American Nervoso" and Cave In delivered one of the finest recordings of the late 1990's in "Until Your Heart Stops". Somewhere amidst those two colossal releases, one shouldn't forget Drowningman's "Busy Signal At The Suicide Hotline" either. Sandwiched in between those 3 monster albums, "Gutter Queen" did not seem to garner the same hype. Yet for me, it was every bit an equal to those aforementioned.
Looking back on Cable from the outset to present, "Gutter Queen" seems ever more the transition album. As they began to shift (though one wouldn't have exactly known at the time), Cable began to take a cue from Kiss It Goodbye, delving deeper into unbridled and unfiltered rage. "Gutter Queen" was every bit as pissed off as I could have hoped for when it came out, though it's unclear as to what were the reasons. Taking the best elements of their Fugazi-gone-metal era and bridging into the territory they embraced more heavily on "Northern Failures", Cable recorded what was then and still is their finest work.
Playlist 8-11-09
Isis - Wavering Radiant
Clutch - Strange Cousins From The West
Cable - Gutter Queen/Northern Failures
Gojira - From Mars To Sirius
Kylesa - Static Tensions
Comments
Post a Comment