Rebel with a cause
Unless you happen to be one of the fortunate few that have access to cable television, metal promotional video clips are somewhat of a rarity on most music shows these days. Thankfully, this is something that Century Media Records are all too aware of, and it's with their ongoing Visual Rebellion series that they hope to in some way of bringing the video clip efforts of their vast roster out to the masses.
Much like their previous couple of efforts (Both released at opposite ends of 2004), Visual Rebellion III is a mixture of the conceptual, the high budget, live performance and low budget, with Napalm Death kicking off proceedings in brutal fashion with the cleverly filmed Silence Is Deafening, which incorporates some political overtones (The Presidential stance of Barney Greenway on Napalm Death Television) alongside the constant sign language deciphering at the bottom right hand side of the screen. Following on in conceptual manner, there's Nevermore with their very Metallica influenced Final Product (The use of an aging old man brings to mind The Unforgiven), Shadows Fall's Inspiration On Demand, Strapping Young Lad with the very Evil Dead influenced Love?, Orphaned Land with Norra El Norra, Impaled and their tribute to the silent/black and white horror films of the '50's in Preservation Of Death and Extol and their strangely innovative Pearl. But as far as conceptual efforts go, the definite winner is Sentenced and their stunning Ever-Frost, which graphically reinforces their belief to finish on a high (While their young), rather than continue for the sake of doing so into old age.
Elsewhere, Visual Rebellion III features performance video clips on stage from God Forbid (A live version of Gone Forever) and Mercenary (Firesoul), and other studio performances from Manntis (Axe Of Redemption), Naglfar (The darkened The Perpetual Horrors), Dark Tranquillity (The darker still/special effects infused Lost To Apathy), Brand New Sin (Black And Blue), Firewind (The rather cheap looking Tyranny) and The Haunted (Who are by far a stand out with their simple, yet impressively shot No Compromise). Of course, there are a couple of acts that do inject a sense of humour into their clip efforts, as evident within Nocturnal Rites' Avalon, and Diecast's rather disappointing Beastie Boys/hip hop pisstake Rise And Oppose.
There's little to fault visually throughout the seventy-minute running time of this D.V.D., and given the small asking price (The cost of a single C.D.), this should please metal clip starved fans to no end.
(Century Media Records/Shock Records Distribution)
