Nostalgia can be great, but you only need a passing glance at the latest swathe of sub-par Led Zeppelin worshippers to know that it can also be dreadful. New Orleans’ Cane Hill pay tribute to the nu metal era without sounding like they’re straight out of ’99, with baggy trousers, backwards caps and all that might entail. This isn’t ‘Chocolate Starfish’.
‘Smile’, the group’s debut LP, builds on the foundations of last year’s self-titled EP. But it’s beefier. Broader. Better. MGGDA is a statement of intent, incorporating Korn guitar effects – especially in the quasi-industrial intro and outro – and bashing the listener like Amen jacked up on blue Smarties. Vocalist Elijah Witts screams his way through it and delivers a few hokey laughs for good measure. But that’s just nu metal, innit?
The bangers keep coming. The New Jesus is huge, with its ad-lib nuances reminiscent of Snot without being stale, while Screwtape and True Love’s downtuned, gritty ditties stink of ‘Untouchables’-era Korn. St. Veronica even benefits from a trippy electronic beat that wouldn’t exist without Falling Away From Me.
Stepping away from all things nu for a moment, White Zombie’s hulking, arse-shaking presence is felt throughout Cream Pie – the naughty noises throughout are unnecessary, though - with You’re So Wonderful, and the aforementioned Screwtape, both channelling Five Finger Death Punch through their powerhouse choruses. They could get on US radio and scare the piss out of everyone.
Album closer Strange Candy summons visions of Alice In Chains and mid ‘90s-era Metallica, with Witts’ vocals twanging like James Hetfield before everything goes black, a wah pedal emerges and the drums reel you back in as though Kirk Hammett and Lars Ulrich were hiding in the studio.
‘Smile’ has its fingers in many pies, and that’s where the slight criticisms arise: it’s a bit too derivative. The whispered/crooned pre-chorus leading into the massive, anthemic final hook is a great tool, but Cane Hill utilise it in basically every single song, rendering things a tad predictable. Largely, that’s fine as this is a great record, but little more compositional experimentation wouldn’t have gone amiss.
The majority of Cane Hill came straight out of college to record this. While most of us sat and numbed our brains watching Breaking Bad, Cane Hill numbed their brains bashing out top drawer nu metal. And it is nu metal, just done extremely well in 2016. It lays waste to the likes of Spineshank and Powerman 5000, but its copy and paste nature stops it from reaching the heights of Slipknot or Korn. Just imagine what they’ll sound like when they stray from the beaten path on record two.
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