Heavy As a Really Heavy Thing [Import]

Strapping Young Lad | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 20, 2006)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: PID
• ASIN: B000FMH9UC
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #528,906 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Why can't this happen more often?, May 20, 2006

By 

Barry Dejasu "the_otherness" (Rehoboth, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heavy As a Really Heavy Thing (Audio CD)

For over ten years now, Strapping Young Lad's debut was as stripped as can be. "Eh" production quality, only 9 songs that stretched only seconds shy of 40 minutes long, and a photo-heavy booklet that included NO lyrics whatsoever (something that annoys me more than anything else with CDs). Granted, it was a GOOD album, but these things left much to be desired.

And now, this has emerged.

This is exactly what this album needed. The production has been remastered, giving the album a lot more punch to its heaviness - and with a band like Strapping Young Lad, heaviness is a MUST. There are four bonus tracks, making the album over 56 minutes long now! And best of all, THERE ARE LYRICS NOW! And not just lyrics to all the songs, but even to the bonus tracks (a rare thing in and of itself with special editions of albums)! There's also a enhanced video clip for "S.Y.L.," which is a nice bonus. What a deal! There's also a really nice introduction from Devin Townsend in the booklet, telling the story of SYL's inception and the coming-about of this album in a manner that is as funny as it is informative.

About the bonus tracks: the first of them is the hilariously goofy and heavy "Satan's Ice Cream Truck," with a silly vocal performance, tasty crunch-riffs in the choruses, and a bizarre guitar solo that would sound better in a polka group. "Japan" is epic-feeling, with choruses composed of soaring vocals and waves of riffs, feeling more like something off of CITY or SYL. "Monday" is previously unreleased (well, officially anyway), and is a nice industrial-tinged piece, with Devin making a great singing-turning-into-screaming performance over a building storm of melodic riffs, very reminiscent of his Ocean Machine work. "Exciter" is recorded to sound like it was recorded live (or maybe it really *was* live?), a refreshing cover of the famous Judas Priest song (I never really cared for it until now).

I've found a whole new appreciation for this album. SYL have always been a great and unusual metal band, even way back in "the day." Any shortcomings you might have once thought HEAVY... had are gone: buy this, and listen to the album as it should have been!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It begins..., September 13, 2003

By 

Wheelchair Assassin (The Great Concavity) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Heavy As a Really Heavy Thing (Audio CD)

Before the utter masterpieces "City" and "SYL," there was this rampaging slab of industrial-metal madness from the great Devin Townsend. It was here that Devin began to establish himself as metal's answer to Mike Patton, in terms of both vocal prowess and musical diversity. This may be a metal album, but it also shows the early signs of Devin's genre-bending tendencies. Like most great albums, it not only exemplifies its genre but also busts conventions to create something truly unique.

The sound of "HAARHT" can best be described as a sort of barely controlled insanity, with equal parts aggression and catchiness combined to form one of the most potent sounds in recent history. The opening one-two punch of "S.Y.L." and "In The Rainy Season" is a perfect summation of Strapping Young Lad's musical mission. Both songs reach a grindcore-esque level of speed and intensity, but if you listen closely enough you can hear melodies emerging from the sonic carnage, making things go down just a bit easier.

From there, the album branches out in some surprising directions, but it manages to remain firmly rooted in metal at the same time. Devin's voice is all over the map here, ranging from ear-piercing shrieks to fearsome death howls to something that actually bears some resemblance to singing. And in the grand tradition of Fear Factory and Ministry, samples and industrial beats are used often enough to make the album interesting, but not so much that they become tiresome or distracting.

Perhaps most importantly, "HAARHT" provides convincing evidence of the demented songwriting genius that would only become more apparent on SYL's subsequent albums. "Goat" slows things way down from the first two songs, but doesn't soften the album up one bit; the slower tempo merely serves to drive the steamrolling heaviness into you even harder. The Ministry-style "Cod Metal King" actually shows an admirable grasp of dynamics, moving from mid-tempo and subdued (by Devin's standards, anyway) to all-out headbanging fury without warning. "The Filler-Sweet City Jesus" has one of the most addictive guitar riffs in history, hands down. "Happy Camper (Carpe B.U.M.)" and "Drizzlehell" are quite possibly the most manical compositions in Devin's catalog, propelled by harsh vocals and vicious grooves that make the mirrors in my car vibrate (or maybe I just need new tires).

Metal lovers everywhere definitely owe a debt to Devin Townsend. Along with Meshuggah, the Dillinger Escape Plan, Soilent Green, and a few other bands, Strapping Young Lad are ensuring that the genre stays intriguing as it moves into the new millenium. If you consider yourself any kind of metal fan, you need this album. And if you don't like it, you're lame.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The beginnings of greatness, March 20, 2005

By 

spiral_mind (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Heavy As a Really Heavy Thing (Audio CD)

Before Ocean Machine, before City or Terria or Alien, there was this - Devin Townsend's first small twisted masterpiece. The seeds of all those other works can be heard here, although this album is much more.. I guess 'crude' would be a good word. Heavy... is the sound of a brilliant headbanger's mind being let completely loose for the first time to produce what it will with no restraints or straitjackets. (Scared? Good.) It's not just extreme metal or industrial or hardcore or thrash. The genre's cliches are gleefully undermined, twisted, embraced and lampooned all at once to make a refreshingly wacky pile of heavy-metal slop.

We go all over the map, from slow-and-heavy to hyper-and-REALLY-heavy, from pure straightforward guitar squawk to synths and techno-beat loops, from shrieking to singing to goofy growling and back to shrieking again, from the savage fury of "Critic" to the almost childish silliness of "Satan's Ice Cream Truck." No metal stone is unturned. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll wince in pain, your eardrums will bleed. Sure it's less cohesive and refined than anything else under the SYL name, but I wouldn't hold that against this disc. Its head-spinning disjointedness is what makes Heavy unique among the catalog, and it's got a wild abandon that the others (for all their psychotic lethalness) inevitably lose.

This is essential for fans of metal in any or all forms. Nutty, crazy, ferocious, bizarre, silly, punishing, brutal - you may not like all of it, but this is one album that leaves a mark (or perhaps a second-degree burn scar) like no other.