Notre Dame
Demi Monde Bizarros
5.5
And now for something totally different, let’s take a look at the new album from Notre Dame. No, this record isn’t renditions of the American college’s fight songs in metallic form, but rather, Demi Monde Bizarros is a brand new release by French shock-rockers, Notre Dame. Now this is certainly metal, but it’s metal with an angle, like a soundtrack to a B-grade horror movie. But these guys (and girl) are not total unknowns. Former Mercyful Fate/King Diamond drummer Snowy Shaw is the main force behind the band, playing the six-string, as well as contributing vocals that range from an understandable growl, to hauntingly low clean vocals like the guy from Rammstein, to nearly sounding like Marilyn Manson.
With an album subtitle like “Songs about Sex, Satan, and Sado-masochism”, you can be assured that you’re in for something outside the norm. Notre Dame is like Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie for the new generation, with partially tounge-in-cheek subject matter and a spooky disposition. But how does the album play out, you ask? Well, there are some good tracks, and some that aren’t so hot, and some that really aren’t songs at all, but interludes. The better tracks ride a death ‘n roll vibe, coming out like a more playful, latter-day Entombed. This is the case with “TheThing../ Munsters!” and “Demi Monde Bizarros”. “The Stripper” is awesome, with slow-paced, chuggy death riffs, and creepy female vox. On the other hand, “The Master, The Servant, and the Slave” is a painfully slow doom track that just flops.
Pretty much every song on Demi Monde Bizarros is unlike the others, which is a hit-or-miss strategy. There’s a little something for everyone, but I can imagine each listener having a different set of tracks that they skip over. Snowy set out to make Vaudeville-style metal, and I think he succeeded in that respect, but overall, the final product is shaky. If you’re craving a dose of “Electric Shock Metal”, check out Notre Dame’s new offering.
