Living Colour - 'The Chair in the Doorway'

When a pioneering band like Living Colour releases its first album of new material in six years, it should be a cause for rejoicing among rock fans. Unfortunately, it seems “The Chair in the Doorway” (Megaforce Records) flew under much of the music world’s radar. A pity, though, this new release from guitarist/Black Rock Coalition founder Vernon Reid, bassist Doug Wimbush, drummer Will Calhoun and singer Corey Glover finds the quartet firing on all cylinders.

Over the course of 11 new tunes recorded in Austria, the Czech Republic and the United States, the band slams its patented punk-heavy-metal-rock-fusion-soul sound. Reid shines as he showcases his Jeff Beck-styled buzzing, distorted guitar riffs and rhythms as he shoots the arrangements with a machine gun delivery somewhere between Metallica heaviness and jazz-fusion atmospherics. Glover alternates between rock shrieks and heart-wrenching soul, all the while Wimbush and Calhoun again prove there’s not a better, or more galvanizing, rhythm section to be found in rock.

 – Eric Feber, The Pilot

Tracks to download  “Young Man,” “Bless Those”

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