While Nickelback will never be known specifically for virtuoso musicianship, there’s no denying their penchant for writing catchy and memorable songs, and with beastly guitar riffs and pounding drums aplenty, there’s an abundance of quality material here. For the most part, they’re usually a fine old slab of cheese, but anyone willing to dig a little deeper can see that occasionally the band can have something meaningful or poignant to say. Sex, women and parties are usually at the top of the bill, but there are themes of unity, suicide and dependence too. The lyrics, as always, range from the usual rock debauchery to more introspective and reflective themes. The production is top-notch, giving the band a full sound which really makes the rockier songs heavy as hell and gives the soft pop songs a warm, vibrant feel. As is usually the case by now, the band can be hard and heavy enough for rock fans, yet some softer ballads allow the band to garner radio airplay. Those willing to give the band a chance, that is. Radio-friendly enough for the casual listener yet rocking enough for metal fans. They have a winning formula and they’ve stuck with it. But is that such a bad thing? The band have sold millions of albums and toured the world over, so they must be doing something right. Watch Chad talk about his house here! Could be better than the real thing.2011’s ‘Here and Now’ is the seventh studio album by Canadian rockers Nickelback, and yep, you guessed it, it’s similar to their previous few releases. I’m not sure Chad Kroeger can even spell shover chauver chauvinism. Since with some help Nickelback can now present consistently decent tunes, maybe next time they’ll get someone clever in to help write the lyrics. Mutt Lange’s work is the best thing about this record. Hmmm, a song about partying and drinking, on an album full of crass songs about girls? I sense a midlife crisis. ![]() Sure, as expected, the lyrics are plain dumb, but at least this time Kroeger’s not thinking with his nob. The ‘hey’ vocal here is surely a sample (1000 Joe Elliotts?) overall, the end result is a winner. ‘Burn It To The Ground’ matches a hard driving riff with a huge chorus. During several other songs, Kroeger makes other lewd sexual references which spoil otherwise decent tunes. During ‘Next Go Round’ Chad Kroeger sings (seemingly without irony) about doing it ‘until good and sweaty until can’t stand up’ and how he wants to be ridden ‘up and down the lawn’ (presumably like a tractor, since he name checks John Deere). With regard to the tunes which follow,‘Dark Horse’ there’s some enjoyable tunes, but excrutiating lyrics throughout spoil any chance of it ever being a decent record. I’m not gonna go into details, but let’s just say Kroeger sings about strippers – and not in a fun way. This opening song is called ‘Something In Your Mouth’. From the crunch of the opener it’s a good attempt at an attention grabber with a meaty riff in tow, but sadly, Chad Kroeger is an appalling lyricist and here he peddles out a bunch of smut that would make even Mötley Crüe cringe. The album utilises all of Mutt Lange’s best tricks, and thanks to his partial presence, the band’s music has moved from tired sounding post-grunge, to more classic sounding hard rock. He takes them and puts them into his special machine (the Mutt-o-tron™), shouts “Red light, yellow light, green light, GO!” and presto – everything comes out bigger, shinier and with extra Def Leppardy backing vocals.Īnd so it is with Nickelback’s ‘Dark Horse’. Bands knock on the door of his lab with their master tapes. I have a friend who has a theory: Mutt is a mad scientist. He has a trademark approach where he’ll beef up the sound and add lots of backing vocals (look no further than classic Def Leppard for the best examples) he’s even used that approach to some extent on Shania (ex-Mrs Mutt) Twain albums. He’s worked with Def Leppard (‘Pyromania’, ‘Hysteria’), Bryan Adams (‘Waking Up The Neighbours’) and AC/DC (‘Highway To Hell’, ‘Back In Black’) and a whole bunch more. For the three of you who don’t know, Mutt Lange is a production legend. ‘Dark Horse’, their sixth album, has something instantly in its favour: it is the first Nickelback album to be part-produced by Mutt Lange.
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