Genre defying
Sometimes a digi-pak cd arrives with beautiful fold out loveliness and a glossy cover. An insert made from the finest velvet textured paper printed with artwork so clever and intricate that you spend 10 minutes just looking at it. Then you put the cd on and it's crap.
My Mind's Weapon (MWW) on the other hand have sent a CDR with felt tip writing on it in a plain transparent plastic sleeve, I spent a whole 30 seconds looking at it shaking my head in disbelief before slotting it into the CD player. Guess what, it's great!
In just the same way that you can't dress up bad music you also cannot stop good quality music from shining through. So what am I talking about? MWW have produced a four track ep here with more ideas on it than some bands get on an entire album.
The first song called 'A Sense of Wonder' charges through about four different genres in its five minute playing time, starting off with an opening riff straight from Dream Theater's '6:02' before dropping into hardcore for a verse, then flying off into metal territory and onto thrash, back to hardcore, go a bit progressive and layer it over with some catchy vocal hooks in an American style even though they're from Scotland.
Phew! listening leaves you a bit breathless like jumping around in a mosh pit. Considering that the recording is not commercial quality it's a testament to the band that they manage to get across so much life and feeling.
Their Dream Theater influences come over a few times but don't think that this is anything like that prog rock band, it's not. MWW are much heavier and harder than DT they even sound death metal for a second or two. That's the point really, I could fly off a list of bands they remind me of but I'd be skipping genres like nobody's business and couldn't honestly say they have stolen anything from anyone.
The other three tracks on this ep follow the same course in that they are complicated, genre jumping, inventive and totally listenable. They are listed on their MySpace page as metal/hardcore/progressive; I could add a couple more to that list but you get the idea, give them a listen if you like your music well played and intelligent.
I see they have a record deal and a new album in the pipeline, if they can keep this level of inventiveness going for a full length CD then I wouldn't be surprised to see them literally explode onto the scene, I'm looking forward to hearing it.