TRIXTER: "New Audio Machine"

Rating: 3/10

Label: Frontiers 2012

Review by: Urban "Wally" Wallstrom

People always pick on me for loving the first two albums with the U.S. hair-metal band, Firehouse. Guilty at charge though. I can't get enough of the somewhat cheesy, but extremely catchy, "All She Wrote", and what not really off their early work. Yeah, well, at least I'm not raving about Trixter. One of the lamest hair-metal acts of the era? "One In A Million", need I say more? Probably not since it's extra cheesy with hardly any substance nor purpose whatsoever. Thank God that Grunge aka Kurt Cobain came along to snuff out bands like these...

Ehem, fast forward to twenty twelve and here's the comeback album. Damn, where's Kurt? six feet under ground? and these schmucks are still doing the hair-metal? No, of course not, they've been jumping on every bandwagon since and now it's finally time to return to their roots (read: cheese). Overall, the songs are slightly better?, more rootsy, not quite as corny (huh?), and Steve Brown does rip and shred like a proper guitarhero throughout the album. "We take pride in the fact that we are one of the few bands of our genre that have all original members," says Brown. That's pretty funny, considering it's the only thing "original" about the band.

The opening track (Drag Me Down) feature the annoying 'na-na-na' choir of the past (Shotgun Messiah did it in style though) and the following one (Get On It) goes through the mandatory 'woah-oh's'. Sigh, We're off to a dodgy start indeed. "Dirty Love", slightly better, poor man's Def Leppard. But we'll have to wait until track five (Live For The Day) for the first sign of decent songwriting. "Ride", yet another track in the poor man's Def Lep style. The lead single "Tattoo's & Misery" is however a feel good tune and sadly one of few good moments. "The Coolest Thing" with its more contemporary sound - easily the best track...

The riffing and a couple of cool sing-a-long moments (special guests collaborated with the band in the songwriting department: Glen Burtnik of Styx and solo fame and Snake Sabo and Rachel Bolan of SKID ROW) are simply not enough to save this from being below average. There's nothing wrong about the musicians nor hair-metal. In fact, we take pride in the fact that we are writing about the genre as well as everything else that either rocks or pops. These songs are however not up to standard...

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