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Ashes Divide: Keep telling myself it's alright
Ashes Divide - Keep telling myself it's alright - [Island Records]

2008-06-25

Following the career moves of Billy Howerdel, the man behind the new group Ashes Divide, creates the feeling of watching a mastermind in action. While we can assume that the heads of NATO can still rest easy in their beds and Howerdel is not planning on something bigger such as taking over the world, we can just say that the man knows that achieving things in life is all about planning and being patient.
Here is a quick review of where we stand so far: the beginning belongs actually to working behind the scenes as Howerdel worked as a guitar technician in Fishbone’s road crew. Along with writing songs and rubbing his skin against the asphalt of life on the road, a musical partnership was made with James Maynard Keenan, Tool's front man.

At its own slow pace this friendship evolved after almost 7 years into one of the most original bands in the alternative metal scene – A Perfect Circle. The story continues as Howerdel stayed under the huge shadow cast by Keenan’s scorching voice and took the roles of being the guitar player, main writer of material and producer. 3 albums later he pills off himself any unnecessary layers and steps to the front of the stage with the first album of Ashes Divide.
In order to save any false assumptions with regards to whom does the new project belongs to, Howerdel simply decides to do everything and if this was a low budget album he would probably have done the cleaning around the studio as well. He writes, plays most of the instruments and takes the roll of engineer and producer. A one man show.

The result is definitely not bad and more. Like a good dictator, Howerdel proves that when you have no one to argue with, things tend to work smoothly and sometimes even better (we can put Stalin aside for now). His proven ability as a songwriter continues to stick throughout the album. The style of music shifts from good songs that never entered a Tool album to a typical Emo sort of whining. What happens in between supplies a powerful album which is well produced and eventually pulls you back for further listenings. One problem, for anyone who considers this as a problem, is the fact that Ashes Divide sounds like a mixture of styles rather than a unique statement. Above all stands the singing which is obviously influenced by Keenan’s voice, a fact that makes you think: why not do a new A Perfect Circle instead?
But even with these minor setbacks Ashes Divide still remains a very fulfilling project, from a musician that maybe won't take over the world but will definitely continue to rule over a few millimeters on my CD's shelf.

Ofir Shalev



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