Album Review – DEALER

Billionaire Boys Club

Wicked World Records – February 17th, 2017

Vinyl / CD / Cassette / DD

Described as a cocktail of metal/punk/grunge/rock-n-roll, Dealer is a trio out of Oakland that is certainly not lacking in discordant rock solos steeped in crazed post-a-punk-a-lyptica with grunge sprinkled on for “color”… well then. Not my usual taste, but somebody said they really liked these guys so, I better check it out, right??

Opener ‘AM Gold’ is pummeling and thick from the first chord, showing this unit is a machine as opposed to some three chord wankfest, complete with vocals as snarling as the leads. ‘Slur’ comes out of the gate even faster and spares no one from the flying fingers ripping up the guitar in your face, taking me back to the days of bands like Quicksand, full of multi-tone harmonics screaming like so many insects swarming. ‘Total Horse’ / ‘Stone Freak’ / ‘Fester’ / ‘Solar Dominion’ and ‘Cake Walk’ all demonstrate the confidence to shift tempo on a split second and not drop a step marching through nonstop.

Two tracks stood out to me in particular, the first being ‘In The Flesh’ which starts out slower than the rest with a loopy guitar intro, shifts into a faster jaunt before settling in on a lurching pace that pulls you forward without resistance. Longest song on this release, the frantic staccato soloing will not let you get bored but keeps you moving. This is the second best vocal delivery on this record in my opinion. The second standout is the rather lucid cover of ‘She’s As Beautiful As A Foot’ originally done by legends Blue Öyster Cult. Not straying very far from the original, they still manage to put their own signature and feel throughout while still paying homage to the song itself, definitely the clearest vocal performance on here.  Hailz for the effort gentlemen!!  Great band to watch in 2017………

Words by Ric “Sui-Syko” Dorr