Legion

I'm really happy about Legion. They're one of two Birmingham bands right now (the other is Now I Have a Machine Gun) that I feel are representing the best of what Birmingham has to offer as far as the musicians in the band, and are making the effort to tour and prove that Birmingham has a lot more to it than rednecks or Christian hardcore kids. I finally got to see this band for the first time a little over a week ago when I visited Birmingham for the first time in a while. They played a house show and the crowd was pretty nuts considering the close quarters and Alabama heat. Their show a few months ago in Chicago (with tourmates Die Young, Ceremony, Life Long Tragedy, the Muzzler, and Sabertooth Zombie) was top-notch. Their van had just broken down and were behind to the tune of a grand on tour, but they went out played just as loud and fast and you could hope for.

I got their new 7" on Wake Up and Live Records the morning of the show (that's a fucking epic story I'll save for later). Matt Whitson, who does a great job recording a lot of local bands, recorded the 7" at their practice space instead of his basement studio, which adds a great raw element to the production, which definitely benefits the sound. The band switches between slow, sludgy metal parts to break-neck speed power-violence-style seamlessly and the vocals are an indistinguishable mess of anger and resentment.

All the tracks are tight as hell, which isn't surprising to me considering how awesome some of the previous bands these guys were in have been (JAWZ!). A good comparison for this would be His Hero Is Gone, but they don't sound like a band who would point to them as influence because I'd hate to pigeonhole them like that. I hear some more metal elements and some of the slow parts remind me of Iron Monkey or even Anodyne. A lot of the fast parts, especially with all the starts and stops, seem to pull a lot from Japanese bands from the `90s.

This is a fucking sick record.