Customer Reviews

Them Crooked Vultures

5 star:		(79)
4 star:		(42)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(15)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Yes, I am a fan of QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE, FOO FIGHTERS and LED ZEP. I even saw THEM CROOKED VULTURES in a terrific show in DC, prior to this release. That said, I still dropped this disc in the tray, hit play, and was prepared to skip tracks if they did not grab me in the first minute; it's a lame habit, but I do eventually listen to all discs in their entirety. This album had me mesmerized for 1 hour and 6 minutes. No skipping! It is extremely well crafted from start to finish. With Homme's haunting vocals, it does sound more like a QOTSA release than anything else, but many of the catchy songs are designed to highlight the considerable talents of his bandmates. Instant classic. Buy it now. Let's hope this is not just a side project for the performers. These vultures should "carrion". sorry...

Seeing as I'm a fan of Zeppelin, Queens of The Stone Age, and Foo Fighters, the idea of buying this cd was a no brainer to me.
Upon inital listen the impression I was left with was it sounds like another QOTSA album.... And only found a few songs that stood out. However upon inital listens to the album it is anything but another QOTSA album. I think its funny how people can judge an album so quickly and most reviewers do that. I like to give an album a few listens (roughly 20-40) before I can determine if it is eligable to become a regular in the cd player. And this album quickly has turned into just that for me.
Before I purchased this cd I did however look at the reviews and some of them included that there was a Zeppelin like presence on the album. At first like I said it sounded like another QOSTA album and I could'nt figure out where the Zeppelin was. THIS IS AN ALBUM YOU CANNOT LISTEN TO A FEW SONGS AT A TIME. LISTEN TO IT IN BULK THE WHOLE WAY THROUGH. And you certainly cannot judge it on a couple listens. There is so many different elements in each song on this album. Songs that I initially did'nt like at first now have become some of my favs. "Elephants" and "Warsaw Or The First Breath You Take After You Give Up"
Right then onto the breakdown of the album ...........

1. NO ONE LOVES ME & NEITHER DO I .......... good opener def. better material on the album than this although midway through the song their is a great tempo change which makes it a great song.
2. MIND EARSER, NO CHASER .......... Def sounds like its a radio song but in a good way. This was a fav of mine right off the bat, very catchy chorus.
3. NEW FANG .............. choppy fast rythm and good vocals grea,t closing solo to the song
4. DEAD END FRIENDS........ love this distorted sound, it has a spooky erie sound to it, the vocals are great again, this is a great song to just drive and blast in the car and the midway through the song is great " doo do do do do do do do do do dooo" love the solo to close out the song
5. ELEPHANTS ............. upon intial listen I did not care for this song, now it is one of my fav. It starts with a repetitive riff that just keeps getting faster and faster then breaks off and the distortion makes it sound like an actual elephant, its just very clever and a great song structure.
6. SCUMBAG BLUES .......... love the guitar work in this song the riffs are very catchy and sometimes are stuck in my head.
7. BANDOLIERS........... talking about getting riffs stuck in my head this song has a very repetitive riff but it has a great sound to it and the vocals go very well with the guitar work.
8. REPTILES....... well if theres any song on the album that you can easily see some Zeppelin in its this song. The vocals are def different in this song and the riffs are just flat out insane, the chorus guitar work is almost "dream like" This is def. a stand out song on the album In My Opinion.
9. INTERLUDE WITH LUDES....... this sounds like something you would get off the begining of "Lullabies to Paralayize" its an intresting song but kind of bland, I usually skip this one, and its the only one that I skip. But its still a good song just more of an extended interlude to the next song.
10. WARSAW OR THE FIRST BREATH YOU TAKE AFTER YOU GIVE UP............ yes the title is that long. The song is very slow paced but a lot happens in this song. Towards the middle of the song you get a very nice solo. Then the vocals become echoing and distorted which makes an almost psychedelic sound which is to die for, all along this little riff playing which makes this song truley a masterpiece yes I said that. Not too many people can tolerate this song or see the great variations it has.
11. CALIGULOVE......... one of my fav. songs And a real stand out IMO John Paul Jones keyboards come into play in this song and they sound amazing. I just love the chorus to this song to its truley a stand out song. Towards the end of the song you get an almost "desert psychedelic sound"
12. GUNMAN .......... I regretably admit to likeing this song, why regretably because it sounds almost like a club-esc-disco song. Its got a very groovy up beat tempo to it almost disco-techno ish then the chorus gets some keyboard work and erie sound that makes it great for me.
13. SPINNING IN DAFFODILS .......... the vocals on this song are amazing another one of my favs. The song ends with a unique twist.

STAND-OUT SONGS
CALIGULOVE
DEAD END FRIENDS
REPTILES
WARSAW.......

DUDS
NONE !!!

If you want a cd that doesnt sound like anything else and a truley original album get this now.

Cheers !!!

I'm not much for writing reviews, however I felt compelled to tell everyone who reads this that you must buy this album. It is some of the best music produced in the past few years. I went to see them without ever hearing a song and loved everyone they played at the concert. I pre-ordered the album and couldn't wait until I was able to download it. I just may go and pick up the CD as well.

I don't know why more reviewers haven't made what seems to me an obvious connection between TCV and Cream.

Besides the fact that both bands are power-trios, this seems to me totally a Cream album for today. Like Cream of yore, it's imperfect and sometimes anti-melodic except, in Cream's case, when the band followed traditional blues patterns that allowed for a bit of groove (Strange Brew, Sunshine of Your Love, Tales of Brave Ulysses). Cream often challenged listeners by using time shifts and cryptic lyrics, and TCV certainly does the same. I can't call TCV's debut a perfect or great album, but its real interesting and, damn! these guys can play.

My tastes run more to music that swings, and if TCV ever did a version of Politician or SWALBR I think the world's energy crisis would be solved. But till then, this album offers technical mastery, interesting and intricate power arrangements, and just a really agreeable roar than I'm thoroughly digging.

On a whim, I decided to buy this album recently.

I didn't expect much, honestly.

I have a lot of respect for each of these musicians, but honestly each of them seemed to be well past their peak.

I was very surprised to see how much I ended up liking (or loving, actually) this album.

Here is what I will call The 6 Reasons Why This Album Is Awesome:

1) Take everything you like about KYUSS and/or QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE, magnify it several times, and this is the end product. If you enjoy the work of either of those bands (particularly Welcome to Sky Valley and/or Songs for the Deaf), be prepared to be blown away by this album, as it should be everything you've ever wanted in a Kyuss/QOTSA album. Somehow Homme has done great stuff in the past and yet managed to save his best for when he got into his mid-30's and decided to be part of a supergroup.

2) Speaking of Homme being great, the next thing is HOMME'S SINGING. What the hell happened that made him suddenly an incredible singer? Listen to the way he sings on this album, the notes he hits, the subtleties. It's not like he was bad before, but it's almost like he's a different (and much better) singer on this album than he's been in the past.

3) Not to go on and on about Homme or anything, but the next reason is HOMME'S GUITAR PLAYING. There are some great riffs in here, and just overall his playing is very innovative and interesting. It's all over the place, in a very good way.

4) Dave Grohl's drumming is frickin' AMAZING. Now, I respect Grohl. He did some good drum work in Nirvana. However, I don't think he's a very good songwriter and aside from a few tracks, Foo Fighters music (in my humble opinion) ranges from decent to bland crap. However, (just like with Homme's singing) I don't know what happened exactly, but on this album he's suddenly a virtuoso, pounding out all kinds of crazy drum "riffs" (I'm not a drummer, I don't really know how to talk about drums from a technical standpoint, but this is the kind of stuff that makes me want to be a drummer).

5) John Paul Jones is, well, JOHN PAUL JONES! And he's ON THIS ALBUM! He's in his mid-60's! Anyone who knows anything about rock music knows that he was in Led Zeppelin, one of the greatest bands of all time, and while he was overshadowed by all 3 of the other members in Zep, he certainly is no musical slouch. He's a great bassist, but his musical history is far deeper than that, and I'm sure he brings a lot to this band beyond bass playing. Bass often kinda gets lost in the shuffle within the mix of an album, and this album is no different. To be quite honest, nothing about the bass on this album stands out to me as particularly great, but I'm not the best at picking up on good bass playing, and I bet a bass player listening to this album would have a lot of good stuff to say about Jones's contribution. I actually have a theory about why this album is so high-quality. I'm fairly certain that Homme and Grohl were trying to impress JPJ, and came up with all of this crazy-good material to do that. If that's the case, they probably succeeded.

6) Finally, one of the greatest things about this album is the PROGRESSIVE SONG STRUCTURE. Some songs are long, some are short, but in either case they rarely follow a simple verse-chorus-verse type of structure, and often have changing/unconventional tempos. This sort of thing is common in progressive rock, but relatively uncommon in music in general. It helps to make the album much more interesting than it otherwise would be.

BOTTOM LINE: Get this album. You will not be disappointed. Unless you have terrible musical taste, in which case you will be disappointed.

Not a letdown like other `supergroups' (I am looking at you Velvet Revolver and to some extent Audioslave). The entire album is brilliant and pretty much dips in and out of QOTSA and led zeppelin sounds. The rhythm section in particular sounds very much like John Paul Jones' ship. I remember reading an interview with Dave Grohl way back where he was gushing about how much he loves Led Zeppelin. Can you imagine the awesomeness of this scenario? Listening to a JPJ with led zep on the radio as a kid and today actually playing on stage with him! That's like me playing onstage with Dave Grohl and Josh Homme! Grohl channels his inner Bonham and actually holds back a little of his usual grunge flourish. Josh Homme can do no wrong as usual - singing with a boozy swagger and the snaky fuzz-fueled riffing.
The most zeppelinesque song and my favorite on this album - Reptile
Gunman - chorus sounds like Bowie - the song has a *gulp* disco feel to it - theres a break in the middle that sounds like the break in `another one bites the dust'.
No one loves me, neither do I - brilliant, and has QOTSA written all over it, with the tongue in cheek lyrics.
All in all, this rocks!

As background... I'm 55 and was (and am) a huge fan of rock in the Led Zep era. These days I like jazz, classical and rock, and it's been hard to find a modern rock album that I find interesting. But this album is incredible. I can't stop playing it. It's filled with creativity, nuance, humor, insouciance, and just plain great hard-driving music. I can't recommend it enough. It's rare to hear rock music these days that has so much going on in it.

I like every single song (in it's own way), which is unprecedented in any album these days, IMO.

Josh Homme (QOTSA), David Grohl (Foo Fighters), and John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin) team up and in turn create a so-it-right-now rock "supergroup" with their debut self-titled album Them Crooked Vultures. (Homme on vocals/guitar, Grohl on drums, John Paul on bass). Them Crooked Vultures sounds a lot like QOTSA only with better material. In fact, I will go out on a limb and say this debut is better than the last few albums these people have made with their own respective bands.

Seriously, this is head-pecking rock at its best.

Now, first, let's talk about that album cover: that's one moody flagitious looking vulture - plus, it looks totally crooked! The red white and black very much remind me of the album cover for the QOTSA album "Songs For The Deaf" - simple yet effective. Intentional or not, the look and quality are pretty much on par with said album, which really is a great thing. However there is a picture of the band standing around - sorry, looming - and one of them is holding an umbrella. What does that even mean! That confused me more than that vulture in that one Hostess commercial... but I digress.

The first two songs on the album are truly mind molestingly great, especially Mind Eraser, No Chaser which features table pounding riffs and both Homme and Grohl harmonizing. Amusingly, the album ends with some soft syrupy trumpets - totally unexpected and unintentionally funny. Another stand-out is "Elephants" which is pretty much the "jam" of the record, and the lyrics "Pachyderms full of germs" totally kill me (so vulture-esque!). If anything solidifies John Paul Jones' statement that Them Crooked Vultures are the best band in the world it's those lyrics (/sarc, just kidding, but their catchy supersonic riffs do put them up there). Scumbag Blues sparkles greatly with Homme's trademark falsetto ear candy and some really hook-y bass playing. Though there is one song that I have tried to fight myself into liking: "Vandoliers." The song features a certain (insert drums) triteness which kind of sucks goat dong. However, the riffs kind of have a magnetic grab to them what with the whole Spanish flavor. Los Crooked Buitres?

One song that is kind of middling-at-best is Interlude With Ludes (great title, though). The cringe-worthy vocals, banal whispers, and "garbage can drums" really do nothing for me, and the only thing that really saves it is the semi-morose ending lyrics: "I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I am." A redeemer of sorts would have to be Caligulove (nice wordplay). The intro will probably turn you into a dancing foot twisting imbecile like Elaine from Seinfeld, and there's a lot to (Caligu)love about the face buffeting tribal drum thrash. The song ends with soft piano music, another throw you for a loop kind of thing like they did on Mind Eraser. The gem of the album has got to be Gunman which has some interesting "swooshing" doped up riffs and solos as well as a highly clappable bridge. The last song on the album is Spinning With Daffodils which starts off with very somber and sweet piano playing that you would expect to hear playing during a Hallmark commercial while a pregnant woman is looking outside a rainy window. It's not that great of a song, though, the vocals are kind of hard to make out and I would put this together with Reptile as the only songs that would make you do that left and right hand tilting motion and basically say "it's just okaaay." But hey, it has some tambourines and stuff. Does that count?

In summation: The fact that people laud this band as a "supergroup" and cite the members won't exactly hurt album sales, but I find it kind of annoying as it then makes that part of the selling point and takes away a bit from the music itself doing that (good for business, bad for me - I find the term "supergroup" incredibly irritating). In "short," Them Crooked Vultures have officially succeeded in doing what they sought out to do, and that is sweeping me off my feet (both literally and figuratively).I like most people hope this isn't just a one time thing, because these guys are extremely talented. I guess you could even call them...vultureosos.

This collaboration is both retro and cutting-edge all at the same time. It's a fresh, gritty sound from greats from past and present! Dave Grohl has had direct hand in producing/recording some of today's best music, how does he continually top himself?! I think Queens of the Stone Age are so incredibly underrated, so it's awesome to hear more of Josh's vocal. Having John Paul Jones' influence and collaboration is just a gift! YOU MUST BUY THIS!!!

There's no reason for me to reiterate how great the band members all are. They are great though! This record is not a straight ahead hard rocking piece of work that I thought it would be. It took me a couple of listenings to get it. Its very different. I immediately thought of Nine Inch Nails on the first listen. On the second time through, you start to hear things familiar to your ear, a little Led Zeppelin among other things. It's an excellent record.