Metal Bed

For the Alice Cooper fans who feel his output was spotty before and after the 1989 classic Trash on Epic, Brutal Planet is a cause to rejoice. It is a solid hard rock offering. Cooper is in great voice, and he sounds mean and spirited. The title track would be a blessing on radio today. It has great bottom, sizzling guitars, and wonderful backing vocalists. The most impressive thing about this album is Cooper's lyrics. "Sanctuary" could be Lou Reed meets Deep Purple in their heyday. Back in 1987 Cooper performed with an unruly band all over the map. It was very uncomfortable and a far cry from his heyday of "I'm 18" and "Under My Wheels": guitars too loud, and an artist obviously struggling with his personal demons.

Most Aborym albums play like testimonies of sudden unpredictable turbulent mood swings. Bursts of rage and coldness give way to creeping anxiety, startling roughness give way to scenarios of loneliness and anguish. Harmonic noise predominate. Melodic motifs recur like the whole thing’s being hammered out as the tape rolls. With Hostile Aborym can be considered part of a select group of acts who have the unwanted distinction of being a band whereupon every note of music made after a certain point in time can be deemed something of a triumph. Where Aborym do succeed in bringing themselves full circle, it’s by mixing the acoustic elements, the search for the melody, the coldness of the machines and the industrial influences that surfaced on their Shifting.negative album. Hostile often acts like a cudgel, pounding sludgy guitars and the hip-swiveling grind of the rhythm section directly into the listener’s temporal lobe. Hostile is a cryptic puzzle of darkness, brightness, discomfort, equilibrium and loathing…

The road to Ordinary Man was anything but ordinary. Osbourne started working on the LP after a serious fall forced him to postpone touring plans. During the tedious process of recovery, the Prince of Darkness found comfort by working on new material. “If it wasn’t for making this record, I would still be on traction, thinking, ‘I’m going to be lying here forever,'" the 71-year-old rocker previously confessed. "I’ve missed music so badly. My fans are so loyal and so good. Up until making the album, I thought I was dying. But that got me off my arse. … It’s the greatest album I’ve done.” Ordinary Man notably includes some high-profile collaborations, including Elton John, Guns N’ Roses’ Slash and Duff McKagan and Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith.