Must

Must

One of the best bands you've never heard. 

(photo: Michelle DiPoala, April 26 2002)

Uploaded to Youtube by grant7055 on Sep 3, 2009

Dave Ireland and Must performing 
'Bubblegum Sleaze' at the Kashmir Klub in London

 
Live Review  
Paradise Front Room, Boston MA  
5/11/02 

The Peasants, still brushing off the road dust from yet another successful European tour, hunker down on the small Paradise stage and rip into their gritty no-holds-barred brand of good old fashioned rock 'n' roll. Astonishingly, almost nobody in this room cares, proving that not only are the drinks at The Paradise grossly overpriced, but also the place attracts some seriously lame ass patrons. Cassani is one of those veteran guitar players whose every lick and strum is rippingly good; the dude plays the shit out of everything. The band powers through the Stonesy "Forty Lines," rages on the Cheap Trick-like "Girlfriend," and stomps all over the anthemic "Goddamn Job." The sorority queen next to me won't stop yapping and snapping her gum, and I feel like knocking the five dollar Smirnoff Ice out of her manicured hand and snarling "Listen Barbie, these guys are HUGE in Holland." Well they are!  

Must shares a record label with Creed and Seether, shares a manager with Godsmack, and this adroit group of transplanted Londoners is unquestionably carving out a niche for themselves in the heavy rock arena. The band has worked out a way to play prog metal in a Queensryche kind of way, with a freshness that pairs electronic flourish with a certain elegant debauchery in style and lyrics. The best advice for the skeptics who haven't yet seem them play live: grab hold of something, because these guys are serious. Compelling guitar riffs fly out of the only American in the band, Charlie O'Neil. Das bass player Kaiser is a severe rock soldier, laying down chunky rhythms and haunting back-up vocals. Drummer Reuben Alexander nails his propulsive beats with spectacular finesse. But the show is all about the carnal prowl of lead singer Dave Ireland, whose gorgeous voice croons and wails with equal intensity. The increasingly popular ballad "Freechild" doesn't go over as well with this crowd as the U2-like "Rust." The highpoint is the full-on assault of "Bubblegum Sleaze." I am fairly certain that, under the piercing stare of Dave Ireland, Barbie swallowed her Trident. Must rocks, dudes.  
(Review originally appeared in The Noise, 2002)