Kingdom Come: In Your Face
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| Posted on October 25, 2014 at 16:20:18 | ||
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Posts: 7338
Location: Bay Area Joined: December 11, 2000 |
 In the late-80s' glut of heavy metal, I loved that many bands patterned themselves (rightfully so) after Led Zeppelin, who, in my book, were superior to the Beatles and Rolling Stones. Perhaps the band which took the most flak for copying Led Zep was Kingdom Come. In fact, some critics derisively called them "Kingdom Clone." Well, today's performers (and I use that term lightly) don't even bother to mimic older artists. Rather, today's performers bypass the mimicry all together, and simply sample old recordings. So it turns out that critics shouldn't have been so hard on Kingdom Come, who wrote and played their own material. I've actually seen Kingdom Come. In summer '89, they opened for Warrant at San Francisco's Fillmore. My friends and I were actually at the front of the stage. I got to grab the late Jani Lane's snake-patterned boot. Anyway, back to Kingdom Come, who were excellent. Sonically, their In Your Face album sounded like a reasonable, though ersatz, facsimile of their live performance. Setting aside the Led Zep lemon squeezing, In Your Face is very good. While playing softball, my friends and I would get started with "Do You Like It." We loved one girl singing "Overrated," while pointing at some bitchy ho's passing by, LOL! There was nothing like listening to this album, while going between S.F. and UCSC, via the picturesque Highway 1. Since I traveled at night, I loved hearing "Stargazer," while the moon's light peered through the clouds, and made the Pacific Ocean shimmer in dark shades of obsidian. For a quarter century now, I've used In Your Face as an audiophile reference. James Kottak's Pearl drums POP, a textbook example of what PRAT truly is. I originally had In Your Face on cassette. Engaging Dolby noise reduction sucked out too much air, space, and cymbals. I then got In Your Face on Polydor's CD. This sounded better. In the mid-to-late 90s, when Totem Acoustic came out with the floorstanding Forest loudspeaker, they wisely tried to liken its woofer to the album cover of Kingdom Come's In Your Face. Yep, you know I couldn't resist taking the bait. But was I suckered? Nope. In a medium-sized room, if you had halfway-decent electronics and cables, the Forest rocked! With sound this good, you can't say, "Suckered." In addition, In Your Face includes "The Wind." And wouldn't you know it? Totem Acoustic named their Jawa-shaped model, "Wind." Well, well, well. Universal Music's Japan division recently re-issued In Your Face on SHM-CD. Alas, instead of a proper jewel case, it comes in a crummy cardboard sleeve. Cardboard sleeves are easily damaged, and do not last. But ah, as expected from SHM-CD, the sonics are cleaner, more open, and less hazy. There is better separation between the images. Instrumental textures are more varied. With more soundstage depth and volume, you can peer into that soundstage, and hear the Paiste cymbals down in the mix. Though too low in level relative to the other instruments, these cymbals now have better ring and timbre. Overall, this album sounds fresher. Or rather, it comes closer to capturing the vibe, spirit, weight, and impact of Kingdom Come's summer '89 show at the Fillmore. When listening to the intro [in concert, Kingdom Come used electric, not acoustic guitars] of "Highway 6," my wife KJ marvels that this is 25 years old. Then she mutters about us being old. The Audiophiles' DJ,
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| RE: Kingdom Come: In Your Face, posted on October 26, 2014 at 11:54:11 | |
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Posts: 15524
Location: Alabama Joined: September 11, 2010 |
Nice review! Are you still using 'the one' speakers?
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