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Album Review

Brendon Small – “Brendon Small’s Galaktikon”

At this point in his professional career, Berklee graduate Brendon Small has already achieved a Cult-like status thanks to the critical and commercial acclaim of his TV hit series Metalocalypse, and for the music he writes and performs for the show’s “fictional” Death Metal band Deathlok. Now he is leaving aside his Extreme Metal influences and brings us “Galaktikon”, a Rock/Metal concept album about the troubled life of a superhero after divorcing his former “dream girl”. Is this the comic-oriented, crazy stuff that people expects from this guy? Yes! But… how does it translate musically?

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At this point in his professional career, Berklee graduate Brendon Small has already achieved a Cult-like status thanks to the critical and commercial acclaim of his TV hit series Metalocalypse, and for the music he writes and performs for the show’s “fictional” Death Metal band Deathlok. Now he is leaving aside his Extreme Metal influences and brings us “Galaktikon”, a Rock/Metal concept album about the troubled life of a superhero after divorcing his former “dream girl”. Is this the comic-oriented, crazy stuff that people expects from this guy? Yes! But… how does it translate musically?

Accompanied by Deathlok collaborators, master drummer Gene Hoglan and bassist Bryan Beller, Small recruits many of its non-Death Metal musical influences to assemble a nine song journey that, although isn’t totally cohesive, is capable of conjuring up many exciting moments. Everything starts very promising with “Triton”, a bombastic mix of Prog Rock, Power Metal drama and striking guitar/vocal work reminiscent of Queen, a band whose influence is all over the place on this album. Things get more exciting with “Prophecy of the Lazer Witch”, a catchy track that showcases a subtle variety of vocal styles (from Chris Cornell to Dave Grohl to Devin Townsend) and spot-on guitar theatricals. Sadly, after the sludgy “Beastblade”, things start to lose some stamina and the record never fully recovers its initial momentum (despite the good efforts of “Arena war of the Immortal Masters” and the excellent a-la-Vai/Malmsteen instrumental “Dangertits”).

The big issue with Galaktikon as a concept album, is that it doesn’t include at least one big piece capable of holding everything together. Sadly, the Power Metal-inspired finale “On my Way”, although it showcases a rhythmic extravaganza in its middle session, is not that very needed track. Hopefully this album is just the beginning of more ambitious and brilliant things to come from this accomplished musician. He just needs to allow his internal, musical superhero to take complete control!

Track Listing:

01. Triton (4:02)
02. Prophecy of the Lazer Witch (4:34)
03. Beastblade (4:47)
04. Deathwaltz (3:33)
05. Truth Orb and the Kill Pool (4:28)
06. You Can’t Run Away (5:05)
07. Arena War of the Immortal Masters (4:47)
08. Dangertits (Instrumental) (4:33)
09. On My Way (5:28)

Run Time: 42:15
Release Date: April 29, 2012

Check out the song: “On My Way”

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