Beast You Are

Personnel: Coady Willis (vocals, keyboards, drums, percussion); Jared Warren (vocals, synthesizer, percussion).
Audio Mixers: Phil Becker; Big Business.
Recording information: El Studio, San Francisco, CA, USA.
What would you get if Jon Lord had replaced Jimmy Page in Led Zeppelin? It wouldn't be Big Business, that's for sure. But the splashy thunder of Coady Willis' drumming bears some resemblance to John Bonham's epic stomp, Jared Warren's bass is as solid and dependable as John Paul Jones', and the keyboards that Willis and Warren spread over it all in the absence of guitars loosely follows the template Lord set down with his B-3 in Deep Purple, so it's not hard to imagine these guys at least pondered the notion. Neither Warren nor Willis have a bluesy tone to their vocals; instead, they're going for a grander and more epochal approach, and there's an operatic sense of compact majesty in The Beast You Are, like a local production of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen that uses volume and brio to overcome inexpensive production design. That's not to say The Beast You Are sounds cheap or small -- this is an impressively grand production, full of echo and substantial bottom end, and if the spectrum of sounds used to create it is limited, they sure lay them on thick. Warren and Willis have both worked with the Melvins, and like that band, their commitment to heaviness is complete, but it's sometimes hard to tell how seriously listeners are expected to take The Beast You Are. While the Melvins' cynical wit isn't hard to suss out, there are times when Big Business sound like some sort of elaborate and over-the-top parody in their glorious overkill, but if these guys are kidding, they do so with an entirely straight face. Either way, this music is still monstrous in its unrelenting pound, and for stamina and impact, this is as satisfying as anything to come down the alternative metal highway in recent years. ~ Mark Deming