Madside’s self-titled debut CD is a classic case of a good band playing mediocre music for the sake of radio airlplay. My thoughts are that if all bands would simply stop doing this, we could change the monotonous drone of mainstream radio. If all bands are working on interesting, original music, then Clear Channel and other radio conglomerates will have no choice but to play it. Musicians need to drive the direction of what is pushed to the public, not the evil, soul sucking corporations.
Throughout the disk, I couldn’t find one stint of an original sound. The track “Deny” had riffs that reminded me of Def Leppard. The track “Never Enough” was the one decent sounding song, with an upbeat interesting feel that didn’t immediately make you think of another band. Unfortunately, the lyrics were saturated with the word “you” which is a personal pet peeve of mine. Please for the love of God whine about something other than your woman problems. I almost fell down laughing at the sixth track on the disk, “Blame.” One of the main lines is “I feel rage” but it’s sung in a wussy voice that just ruins the effect. If you’re going to sing about rage, put some damn anger behind your voice.
One thing that this band gets props for is the amazing voice of Mike Mathis. His singing is consistently powerful through the entire disk, presenting a great range and a good sense of following the dynamics of the music. His sound is relatively unique, and I feel that if he were to shy away from radio rock and write some inspiring original lyrics, he would be unstoppable in his career.
Madside is signed to a small record label by the name of Evo, out of Raleigh, North Carolina. It seems like this label is hoping that Madside will help put them on the map. Their press release states that “Major commercial airplay is a long term goal of the band” and you can certainly tell. The single “Enemy” has been sought out by program directors of smaller radio stations and is doing really well spreading through word of mouth. “Enemy” is the most generic songs of the disk, so I’m sure they will do well with the radio play. By the way, isn’t there some other band with a song called “Enemy” that’s getting major radio play right now? Hmm.
