Ten Commandos (2016)

Ten Commandos (2016)

By: Ghost Writer

The first contact I had with Seattle's grunge was just at the start of the 90s,I had the chance of holding in my hands the first copies of Soundgarden's Louder Than Love in Mexico, it was an awesome record, at the time 1989, I was totally into Jane's Addiction, so making the jump to Soundgarden, Skin Yard and Nirvana was no big deal, I was ready for the down and dirty sounds of the North, it was a definite fresh sound, a world apart from LA's glam metal monopoly of the 80s, and early 90s,but grunge predominance was still years ahead, before it, we had great music from Seattle still in the underground, like The Melvins, Mudhoney, Mother Love Bone and The Screaming Trees, no one would ever thought that grunge would get so big, no one could have prevented that Nevermind by Nirvana would be as successful as it turned out to be.

1991 was the year Nirvana issued Nevermind, and the rest is history, Alice In Chains, Pearl Jam and even The Stone Temple Pilots, nice and easily, grunge became the new glam, and the new musical monopoly, prompting punk to finally achieve commercial notoriety and becoming as domesticated as many genres before it, I was immediately against Nevermind, I was there when MTV started playing heavily Smells Like Teen Spirit, call it a triumph over glam, yes, but it was also the coming of age of the American Underground, and its subsequent decline, over exposure always play a definite role when it comes to fashion, and when music becomes a matter of fashion, you know it is going to come down heavy.

Ten Commandos 2016 self-titled debut is a sign of two things, one is that grunge, the way it was in the beginning, is not exactly dead, the other thing is that being nostalgic is playing a major role in what seems to be the return of grunge, TC is led by two musicians who I appreciated so much in the 90s, the extraordinary drummer Matt Cameron, a grunge veteran who played with Skin Yard, Soundgarden and Pearl Jam, and Ben Shepherd, an awesome musician who contributed greatly to classic Soundgarden albums like Badmotorfinger, along with them come two other notorious troublemakers, guitarists Alain Johannes (who also prominently sings here) and Dimitri Coats from QOTSA and OFF! Respectively, and on first track, Staring down the Dust, they even enjoy the collaboration of the great Mark Lanegan, ex singer of the also great Screaming Trees, so yes, the song is basically a return to the great days of grunge, in the days prior to Nevermind.

With a band featuring such rhythm section, it’s obvious that what you are getting are really heavy, hypnotic and dirty beats, the guitars quickly follow the lead and go heavy and mesmerizing, recalling the impressively twisted guitars Kim Thayill laid down for the mighty Soundgarden, in a sense this record goes back to the days of the increased musicianship a band like Soundgarden was showing on Badmotorfinger, before falling in the more commercial trap of Superunknown, it's ironic that Cameron and Shepherd are recapturing here the Soundgarden muse they weren't able to capture with the band itself on 2012's King Animal.

Great guitars are put on display in conjunction with addictive beats on War on the Peace, where Johannes amazing vocals take the spotlight, in a powerful melody exploited to the max, easily another song that could become another powerful single, along with the neo psychedelic Outermost Sky, another challenging song perfectly crafted by this undeniably talented band.

But it seems that TC aren't simply another one trick pony, as they are quick to recruit legendary singer Nikka Costa for the psychedelia soul of Come, which definitely gives this album an amazing new dimension, demonstrating that the band is more than merely nostalgia, and that they are not only into making Badmotorfinger 2, but into making great music and great art, just check out the devastating drums and strident guitars on Sketch 9, featuring the peculiar guitars of none other than 70s live albums legend Peter Frampton.

This incredible record closes with another pair of outstanding songs in the form of the heavy Four on the Floor and the intense guitars of Invisibility, leaving us with an incredible record that proves that the original promise of grunge was a great breath to heavy rock, that it could have meant something else besides Pearl Jam or Stone Temple Pilots, this is the original Seattle sound going heavy, down and dirty, just like in the good old days, what came after it, well, whatever, nevermind...