Antemasque – Antemasque CD (Nadie Sound)
At The Drive In created something special, but the inception of The Mars Volta rinsed dry all that excitement with it’s totally commercially spoilt edge. Thankfully Antemasque re-ignite all interests and see a developing sound of progressive punk rock recreating drive in the correct direction from Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala once again. To mention bass duties are carried out by RHCP loon Flea is neither here nor there, as it’s the tunes these wired Americans ingest that fire up the furnaces of pure exhilaration and once again give us a relevant echo of alternative sounds, a tasty selection of idiosyncratic chops and changes, a dynamic of systematic carnage. The high pitched wails of anxiety, the garage guitar sounds, and the eclectic elements that combine during this eponymous self titled debut, give off a combustion that hasn’t been heard since the first earshot of ‘Nothings Shocking’ (Jane’s Addiction)… when that album came crashing onto the rock and metal scene. Antemasque blend a unique sound of interesting rhythms and the intense feeling of the music being here and there, never focusing in a direct line, may seem off kilter to the untrained ear, but there’s something about the enticing vocals and fretwork that makes it an attention grabber – an album of top tunes. It’s like the experience of teenage drug experimentation all over again, exciting and a little uncertain. Having said that, there is a enough commercial accessibility to see the band appeal to mainstream, but what is the real gem here is that messers Lopez and Zavala are developing what they formerly invented. Mark Freebase