JULY 2009 ONLINE EDITORIALS

Bronze - Bronze

By Nathan Harper

If Denver were a tougher town, Bronze could be the house band at some kick-ass dive bar where they could play Black Sabbath and Melvins covers interspersed with originals – and in doing so, both rock some socks off, and find their voice. As it is, they’re certainly not short on catchy riffs or thundering breakdowns, and the bright spots – the Hitchcock allusion in “Two Faced Man,” the cartoonish deviousness of “Next Victim,” and all of “Sex Drugs Rock ’N’ Roll” – are plentiful enough to drown out times where their sound is still unsure.

As this is their debut record, it’s fair to give them a pass on their still undecided guitar sound and lead singer Bailey Cecil’s continued search for a vocal delivery that’s best for him. On their demo Cecil’s vocals had the gritty husk of Houdini-era Melvins, but it wasn’t exactly right because Cecil’s voice lacks the deepness of someone like Clutch’s Neil Fallon. Because of this, the vocals are run through a variety of effects, and while it does help to add punch, his delivery still needs more fullness to be totally convincing. Not everyone growls – think Ozzy.

The record’s guitar sound is similarly searching, vacillating between fat tone and metal crunch. Guitars don’t have to be distorted to be heavy – a lot of the heaviness is the pacing of the riffs, with a little crunch doled out appropriately as an accent. And yet these are the kvetchings of man who’s happily banging his head, because Bronze is completely convincing at being a straight up, unpretentious, heavy rocker.