Review HELMET ‘Left’

At the end of the 80s, guitarist and singer Page Hamilton started a band that created furore – Helmet. The timing could not have been better. Traditional metal in its various subgenres was on the decline, which opened up an opportunity for new types of hard music. Bands like Prong and Life Of Agony have been part of the rising scene in NYC and Helmet was a part of it too. Helmet was one of the bands of the hour with their noise rock/alternative metal blend and released with ‘Meantime’, ‘Betty’ and ‘Aftertaste’ excellent albums.

After the band ceased to exist between 1999 and 2003, Hamilton reactivated the group in 2004 and went back to work with new comrades-in-arms. Seven long years after the release of ‘Dead to the World’, a new record from Helmet, ‘Left’, is now on the way and of course, consciously and unconsciously the longplayer has to compete with the classics of the past.

To be honest, I initially had my problems with this record. Helmet delivers all the trademarks and especially the noise element in their sound is present throughout. However, the songs are sometimes bulky and it takes a while for tracks like the cracking ‘Make-Up’ to reveal their full potential. Hamilton and Helmet don’t mince words, either, as can be clearly heard in the above-mentioned ‘Make-Up’, which is about the ‘orange stain’ on America’s political scene.

Or listen to the lyrics on ‘Bombastic’; a reckoning with pious figures who want to dehumanize people because of their sexual orientation.

Besides the lyrics, however, it is the music that is most satisfying. It seems that the current circumstances have released a special energy in Hamilton and this anger comes to bear in the new songs. Otherwise, songs like the furious ‘Dislocated’ can not be explained.

Photo: earMUISC / Raz Azraai

With ‘Tell Me Again’ the record also includes an acoustic number, which fits well into the cotext and still makes you sit up and take notice. The same goes for ‘Reprise’, a nearly two-minute track that seems like an atmospheric interlude. Exciting here is how the song develops slowly and steadily. The intensity increases with every note and at the end creates a well-made transition to the following ‘Dislocated’.
The finale is special as well. Hamilton and Stevenson pay homage to the legendary John Coltrane and his ‘A Love Supreme’ with the jazzy tune which provides a great end to the record.

‘Left’ takes time. Helmet manage to present a smashing record that embodies the band’s sound and also translates it into the present era. At the same time, you have to take off layer after layer to get to the core of the songs, to see the totality. If you take this effort, then you can look forward to an album that you can enjoy for a long time.