Customer Reviews

Darkhorse

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

The first time you hear this you think poop. Then you listen to it another time and you begin to like it. You know how it goes. Eventually you love it. It's not as raw as the last album and the tracks are quite short so if you listen to it in one go it sort of sounds like one long song - but most of the tracks are good! If you like Limp Bizkit or The Lost Prophets you'll like this. It is a good album and deserves a place alongside your other albums so buy it.

Just when I thought Crazy Town had recovered from the "Butterfly" incident they broke up but left an amazing album behind. "Darkhorse" is the crazytown that should have made it big but critics decided to kill this band. Don't listen to the bad wrap, buy this album you wont be disappointed. It's not as much rapping and suprisingly more rock in certain songs. It's a wide range of music and an awsome CD that shoulda been more than what it was let to be.

I never really understood why "Darkhorse" wasn't as popular as "The Gift of Game" - perhaps, at the time, nu-metal and derivatives were getting "overrated" slowly.

This album marks a shift from a heavily hip-hop influenced sound to a slightly more pessimistic, more nu-metal (read "power chord" driven), while not taking either side all the way. Mostly, the sound has grown more aggressive, lyrics more pessimistic and a little bit less "fun-lovin-weed-smokin-youngster" attitude. CrazyTown has grown up a little bit, and isn't afraid to look vulnerable beneath their "B-Boy/Playa" exterior.

The songs... what to say? It's been YEARS from when I first listened to this, and I am still in love with it. "Decorated" ('Nothing come from nowhere') starts off to an unusual (for CrazyTown) sound, but it's incredible. It's followed by "Hurt You So Bad", a classical rock/love song. Followed closely by "Drowning", the single, it hits hard. The album keeps the pessimism and introspection with "Change" and digs even deeper with "Candy Coated". It lights up a little with the cliched but still funny and quite good "Waste of My Time". The mood grows a bit somber with "Sorry", the song of apologies. Continued on with the amped-up "Battle Cry", the band sticks it to everyone, even the listeners in "Take it to the Bridge" ('Would you jump off the bridge if I told you to?'). "Skulls and Stars" is a reggae-inspired little ballad, kind of upbeat for a change in this "Darkhorse". Still, as if this was for us to catch a breath, the album launches into it's final track, "Beautiful"... and it is beautiful.

On the album, there are actually two bonus tracks: "You're the One" which is a classical Shifty Shellshock song, and "Them Days", which is an incredible chiller-outer and dancer.

All-in-all, I wouldn't suggest this album to everyone, but those with an open mind to the more simplistic and poppier side of nu-metal (wonder if there is any other side by the way). Be aware that this is essentially a spawn of pop music, and you'll be okay. Otherwise, stay away.

It took me a long time to figure out just what to say about this album, mainly because it didn't grab me the same way The Gift of Game did, but also because I didn't know what to make of the incredible (and incredibly bizarre) criticism I've seen on this site about this band. Seriously, what can you say about Butterfly that you can't say about a hundred other grossly misrepresentative breakout hits? (Paging the Baha Men!)

They did a complete break from the freewheeling, genre-hopping styling of their debut album, apparently wanting to stick to their roots. The result is a fairly powerful, slightly not-work-safe outing from start to finish that...well, it sounds very similar to P.O.D.'s Satellite, in style if not in theology. Nothing earth-shaking or overly controversial, but then, that's never what they were going for.

This is an sophomore album that's a lot different from the first, which is good, but shoots more toward the mainstream which...well, it's not bad, but you expect a *little* more from a band that really had nothing to lose.

This cd is actually very good. This album proved that after the gift of game, they were going to do more rock and singing. Great singing on their parts, and very, very catchy songs. A must buy for rock/rapcore lovers.

...Just another LP clone, eh? Bah. Gift of Game was released almost a year prior to the release of Hybrid Theory. Granted those two albums sounded slightly similar but no one was "copying" the other one. Fast forward to now. Darkhorse is out and further broadens the gap between the bands. Gift of Game relied on "Up yours!" attitudes and spikey hairdos and Darkhorse seems to delve deeper into the over-gelled skulls of the co-frontmen.

Track one- Decorated- 9.5/10- Where would we be without the mosh pit anthem opening the album? Stupid lyrics and loud guitars somehow make this song into a masterpeice.

Track two- Hurt You So Bad- 9/10 Check out the guitar solo towards the end. Sound out of place? That's because Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo has decided to contribute. Surprisingly melodic song for CXT and very well done.

Track three- Drowning- 7/10- Brilliant song first time you hear it. Unfortunately the radios have killed a large amount of this song's appeal.

Track four- Change- 8/10- Good lyrics. The sensitive side of CXT is more fully explored. "It's time for me to bloom out of this childish phase."

Track five- Candy Coated- 8/10- Smooth rapping, harder chorus, catchy lyrics. Need I say more?

Track six- Waste of my Time- 9/10- Very amusing song. Nice lyrics. Very good song for people going through a breakup.

Track seven- Sorry- 8.5/10- Slow song. In fact you may begin to think your CD player has gone into shuffle. A sad, reminiscent style makes you see the heartbreak that these self-proclaimed players have suffered.

Track eight- Battle Cry- 6/10- Low point of the CD. Pointlessly hard and very awkward mixing of guitar riffs and rapping/singing/screaming. A wound in the side of the smooth style that has been established thus far.

Track nine- Take It To The Bridge- 10/10- Wow. Chorus leaves a bit to be desired but the verses more than make up for it. An in your face anthem to unoriginality.

Track ten- Skulls and Stars- 10/10- Very smooth rapping with an equally smooth chorus. Best lyrics on the whole album.

Track eleven- Beautiful- 8/10- Haunting song with a very pessimistic view towards life in general. Brilliantly done. Very good closing song... or is it?

Bonus Tracks- 9/10- Surprise! The fun is not yet over. Two bonus tracks "You're The One" and "Them Days" close the album. You're the One is an anthem to sex it seems. Them Days is reflection on how far the "B-Boyz" of CXT have come in their life. Both very good songs.

This Cd is cool man, its relaxed kick it type music...... ... it is rap but it gives us white boys a chance to be happy to say i listen to hip-hop anyways the CD is tight.... I suggest ya pick it up one day!!!

Let me preface this by saying that I don't plan on writing things like "Crazy Town puts out another great album" because I've heard Gift of Game and frankly I thought it wasn't that good. There were some okay songs and I enjoyed Butterfly, but the album as a whole was mostly just garbage lyrics and no clear musical direction.

Enter Darkhorse. I heard Drowning on the radio and thought it was decent but generally subpar and didn't give the matter much thought until I found myself in a mall with a few hours to kill and listened to this album. It didn't hurt that the first track on the album, Decorated, is outstanding, but as I stood there and listened to most of the album, I realized that the whole thing was awfully impressive. Is it perfect? Certainly not, and that's why I only gave it four stars (very few albums should get a five star rating, in my opinion). The lyrics are at times pretty cliche and the quality of the tracks does vary some, going too far in the direction of just screaming and trashing about on occasion. That being said though, it's one of the strongest rock albums I've run into in a long time, perhaps even the best I've heard since Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory.

In terms of the tracks, the first four are great: they're hard-rocking while still managing to be musical. Drowning is definitely growing on me, although I still think Decorated should have been the first single, wow, what a song. Tracks five and six are decent; Sorry is somewhat softer, sort of trite, but also sort of poignant: I'm still not sure whether I like it. Eight and nine I think go too much toward the meaningless screaming side of things although I'm sure some people would say "dude they totally rock, what are you talking about?" Skulls and stars is pretty laid-back and melodic -- I really don't care for it, but it's not awful, just kind of boring. Beautiful I want so badly to be a good song, but it just isn't. If they had put some more effort into it, it probably could have made the album, but as it stands, it's just sort of there. Fortunately both the bonus tracks are also good, so that redeems the end of the album somewhat.

As for the question of whether Crazy Town has sold out, heck, I don't know, they probably have. All I know is that they put out a great album.

P.S. If you're looking for another Butterfly, keep lookin because it certainly ain't here.

P.P.S. After a couple years with this album... I don't really listen to it anymore. The songs are still good, but I keep finding more to dislike, rather than more to like. Listen to some of the song previews though, and if you like the sound, you'll probably still get some play time out of this CD which is overall pretty good.

Just about a year and a half after becoming one-hit wonders with the instant hit "Butterfly," Crazy Town's second album Darkhorse was released. The album is a lot more grown-up than their first (not to mention more diverse), but this quality goes unnoticed since the album's only single, as of October 2003, was "Drowning." Not that it's a lousy song or anything -- it just wasn't radio-friendly and poppy enough to generate album sales.

The heavy-hitting tracks "Decorated" and "Take It to the Bridge" are the loudest songs on the album, and can be fairly classified in the rap metal department. "Battle Cry" is also pretty intense, but it's more of a hard rock song than a rap metal song. "Hurt You So Bad," "Drowning," "Change," and "Candy Coated" are smooth, serious, and melodic, instead of being completely, senselessly heavy. "Sorry" and "Beautiful" are the record's softest, slowest, and most toned-down cuts. Therefore, they would have been tremendous radio hits had they been released as singles.

As for the other two songs, they stand alone on the record. "Waste of My Time," a somewhat heavy hip-hop track, is the only really upbeat thing on Darkhorse. And the catchy "Skulls and Stars" is the only song on the album that is truly hip-hop.

But don't forget about the hidden tracks! Track 23 (!) is a happy little electronic-metal number (it reminds me of "Lollipop Porn" from their first album) called "Love Is in the Air," and track 32 is a humorous three-minute ditty called "I Remember the Days." God only knows why these two songs weren't included in the album's lineup along with the rest of the songs, but both songs show off Shifty and Epic's incredible songwriting skills.

I remember when i first heard Crazy Town. I never heard the single "Butterfly" but I saw the commercial and thats when i decided to take a risk and give The Gift Of The Game a listen. I loved it purely because of its laid back style and funny lyrics. Anybody who thinks that Gift Of The Game is metal is [not right] and when i heard about Darkhorse about 2 months ago i immediately downloaded the whole album because it takes a while for such albums to come to India and what i found was an album completely the opposite of The Gift Of The Game which is not exactly a bad thing either. They have a new drummer and new guitarist which i think is great. They have matured a great deal and gone are the songs about drinking, partying, and girls. Darkhorse is a much more whole hearted and serious attempt to make music by a band which has a great deal of potential. The lead singers Shifty & Epic have the vocal talent and with their new guitarist they have also accquired the much needed musical talent now we just have to see whats next because this is definitely a step in the right direction for these California rap rockers.