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The Dark Lord

I've had a bag of Kettle Brand Pepperoncini chips cooling in the salty cellar for a minute. I honestly haven't been in that much of a rush due to the whole Kettle Brand usually being a disappointment thing [even though I find the pepperoncini flavour beyond intriguing]. Finally tonight I figure I'd step into this lime green bag of (hopefully) goodness. When I opened the bag and took a whiff I was met with a smell similar to salt and vinegar. The chips have green flakes on them and don't look dissimilar to sour cream and onion. I popped one in my mouth and hot dang, the initial crunch released a faint salt and vinegar flavour..followed by a heat that is similar to black pepper, however, with a bit more of a kick. The chips have a nice crunch and (for being Kettle Brand) aren't overly greasy [compared to almost any other kettle cooked chip they're still pretty greasy]. The grease however doesn't overpower the "pepperoncini" flavour which is a *thumbs up while foolishly grinning*. Not a bad chip, I wanted them to be good and they didn't disappoint [here's to hoping that I can get my hands on pepperoncini from other brands {that is if they exist ((they must, right?))}].

Black Tower has been on my radar for a minute (I think originally via Razorcake..then this past October Dave Williams was on the Anxious and Angry podcast). After hearing that Black Tower features members of The Creeps/Crusades/The Visitors (because those bands are rad [that also means that they're Canadian..from Ottawa to be exact]) I was sold. With the Canadian dollar being absolute garbage for a while now my record collection has slowed down, and with that, purchasing Black Tower's The Secret Fire was put on the back-burner. For some reason I wanted to wait until I had their record in hand before getting my listen on. A couple days into January I thought, "Hey, treat yo' self" and ordered my first few records of 2016. Last week, when the record order came in, I was finally in a position to treat my ears to the unyielding sounds of Black Tower with their debut LP, The Secret Fire (based on the song titles and the little bit that I had read about/heard, I had an idea what they would sound like..but I still wasn't positive as to where exactly Black Tower fell on the metal spectrum). [Now keep in mind that I'm not super educated in the subtle differences when it comes to metal] When the needle met vinyl I was greeted with a pleasant NWOBHMish sound, dark heavy guitars and Erin's (almost) operatic female vocals trading off with Skottie's uniquely monotonous voice (I want to say that it's monotonous..but he's hitting notes..I don't know, it's just like..weird..cool, infectious). Harmonies all over the place. There's traces of black metal and I want to say there's a spectre of pop punk peeking in through the 2nd story window of this band (there's probably nods to other metal genres but what do I know). Heavy metal man. I wanted Black Tower's The Secret Fire to be great..and it is. Shit yeah.

Stay hydrated,
Marc

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