Come What(ever) May -Stone Sour

Sun 13th Aug, 2006 in Music Reviews

Sometimes it’s a good thing for frontmen to get out of their current projects for some breathing space. And in the case of Iowan band Stone Sour, it’s true in more ways than one. Their singer is Corey Taylor, legendary among angry teens for being Slipknot’s poster boy, but with this sophomore from his ‘other band,’ Come What(ever) May has a lot of impressive differences in check. Like, for example, he takes off his mask.

Whether or not this could be a metaphor for the album is also a good thing to take into account when listening to it. It’s healthier for Taylor’s voice when he’s just wearing sunglasses and looking mean, as shown by the mostly above average and several excellent numbers here. They’re still angsty and angry and guitary, but so much more sensible in their rage. Plus producer Nick Raskulinecz rounds it up to a sharp edge.

‘Through Glass,’ an almost entirely acoustic single for the band, is like the pick-up to where their 2002 hit ‘Bother’ (from the Spider-Man soundtrack) left off, reminding its audience that Corey Taylor can sing after the feedback from ‘Duality’ in 2004. ’Zzyxz Rd.’ also attempts to add a new brand of sensitivity to the plate for the frontman: it’s a piano song about being tired of life. The rest all follow a formula to some degree, but there’s no way to deny how catchy and surprisingly good lyrically ‘30-30/150’ and ‘Your God’ are, even while they turn up the loud factor.

It’s an album that would feel out of place on Headbanger’s Ball, plus it looks from a distance like the equal of damn Godsmack, but you have to hear Come What(ever) May for yourself to really see how strong it is. So, like in Slipknot days, Taylor does let loose a few screams of ‘motherfucker’ and ‘I just wanna be God!’ in a bunch of tunes, but otherwise its their vertical opposite.