ENTER THE CHICKEN! What thoughts run through your head upon hearing that? While ENTER THE DRAGON may fill our heads with the martial arts virtuosity of Bruce Lee, Enter the Chicken fills our heads with the Marshall Arts virtuosity of Buckethead and his friends.

Enter the Chicken recently rereleased by Serjical Strike Records is Buckethead and his friends offering up an eclectic mix of music.

The intro is an opera aria which quickly segues into We Are One a fast paced System of a Down sounding song. Of course the song sounds like System of a Down, because their singer Serj Tankian is Buckethead's friend for this song. If you like them (think Chop Suey) you will like this song.

Botnus features an insane crunching power riff reminiscent of old school hard core music. Ah, those were the days. Three Fingers again changes pace with spoken word lyrics over a funky beat. The song features Saul Williams, an American poet known for his blend of spoken word and hip hop beats* (thanks Wikipedia!)

Running from the Light again gives a completely different change of pace with a gospel / folk like sung introduction by Gigi and Maura Davis. Buckethead's guitar gives a jazz like undercurrent to their melodic voices. The singers quickly ramp up the song into solid rock territory.

Coma brings us back to the System of a Down sound with Serj Tankian, but with Azam Ali on vocals. She has a haunting sounding voice.Waiting Hare [sic] features another amazing female singer, Shana Halligan in a duet with Serj Tankian.

A Tiny Tim sounding banjo solo is presented as Interlude by Donald Conviser which segues into another hard core song with thrashing riffs and hoarse vocals FunBus featuring Dirk Rogers and Keith Aazami.

The Hand features a beautiful operatic voice of Ani Maldijan and the hoarse awful voice of Maximum Bob, from Bucketheads old band The Deli Creeps. Nottingham Lace continues the mayhem started in the previous song with some pure instrumental jamming hard core style.

The album ends with an instrumental that Gracenote labels Game of Death Theme but is noted on the album as Shen Chi.

My Thoughts

This is quite an interesting hodge podge of songs, and it introduced me to some singers that I had not heard of before. Like Bucketheads teaming up with Les Claypool of Primus, Buckethead's teaming up with Serj Tankian of System of a Down works great. Serj also produced this album. While the theme isn't as cohesive as some of Buckethead's albums, it is certainly a fun ride. It is more like a buffet with all sorts of different items rather than a single meal. You may not like everything on this Buckethead buffet, but I guarantee that if you are a fan of Bucketheads more avante garde/hardcore/metal/alternative music, you will find plenty here to please you.

Summary

Fans of Buckethead will certainly enjoy this album, and may even find some other artists to listen to and enjoy. I know I did.



Recommend this product?