The Blood Brothers

The Blood Brothers combine abrasive, discordant music with unnerving lyrical content and a healthy dose of avant-garde experimentation. They’re unlikely candidates for "next big thing" status. Oddly enough, this is what has set them ahead of the pack -- and landed them in a place so many bands are self-consciously striving for. They have both a rabid underground following in the hardcore scene which spawned them, and the support of producer Ross Robinson, known for his production work on bands such as Slipknot, At the Drive-In, and Korn.

Formed in 1997, The Blood Brothers (comprised of Blilie (vocals), Johnny Whitney (vocals), Cody Votolato (guitar) Mark Gajadhar (drums) - and later augmented by Morgan Henderson (bass)) wasted little time harnessing their youthful exuberance into a slew of seven inches and a full-length, This Adultery is Ripe, released in 2000 on Second Nature. The recordings were frenetic bursts of manic art-damaged hardcore.

A year of intensive song-writing resulted in March on Electric Children, on Three One G. Given The Blood Brothers' current position, the album, a concept record of sorts, resonates with a certain irony. "We wanted to put together a short story that had themes and characters and plot lines," explains Jordan. "We really wanted to write about the differences between the world where you make connections with people, the bullshit world of fame and fortune, about what happens to someone in the process of becoming fake, giving up on honest connections." It's a potential irony not lost on the members of the band, but given their track record of following their own path it seems the sort of contradiction on which the band thrives.

The intersection of those differences is where The Blood Brothers truly stake their territory - March On… is a bold tribute to pure, eviscerating frenzy or a at times - a punchy post-modernist take on primalist frenzy. Jordan & Johnny's ballistic pass-the-mic dual vocals, booming low-end, feverish spikes of guitar damage tempered by driving beats. Ominous boom splayed by stinging, vacillating dynamics multiplied by undistilled, youthful fury that rings like an indictment of the modern musical landscape.