Helmet
Wilma's Rainbow EP

THE REVIEW

A slight fever upon waking, probably due to the vaccine from the day before yesterday. No mountains today or tomorrow, I need to rest.

Page Hamilton and Helmet help make this cold morning less oppressive; my ladies are still asleep. I can lose myself in the dissonant notes of this short but extremely intense EP.

Mengede has left the group. In his place, Rob Echeverria on second guitar. Little or nothing changes in the wall of sound that the four build.

Two studio tracks plus five live songs.

Compared to the first two albums, there's more control, a dynamic balance in the distortion created by the instruments.

But we are still talking about a band that's angry, disciplined, direct, exhausting.

Floral cover, bucolic...but the sound is "Helmetian" in its entirety.

Wilma's Rainbow kicks off the bombardment. Shamanic voice, guitars muted just right; a "bituminous" rhythm section. A climactic ending that paves over everything (indeed).

Decidedly disorienting Sam Hell: Country-Noise in a little over two minutes. Like the Gun Club on a spree playing in a sordid, dark cellar in New Orleans.

Live, they have no rivals: an infernal machine, pounding, thick. Stanier's drums dictate syncopated rhythms...and the other three follow him with unheard-of executive ferocity.

In the Meantime has the task of closing the dance...and the blows under the stage...

Ad Maiora.