Probot provides prodigious rock

Dave Grohl is a busy man these days, with filling various roles in Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age, Killing Joke, Tenacious D and now Probot. \nHe admits in the liner notes of this, his much anticipated side project, that without the massive influence that loud, hard and fast heavy metal music had on him in the 1980's, the only liner notes he'd be penning would be on fast food drive-thru receipts.\nMake no mistake, Probot is pure, unadulterated metal, and not for the faint of heart or sensitive of eardrum. With almost no exceptions, frenetic drumming and hyperdriven bass are the order of the day. Guitars crunch, voices howl and momentum surges forward, all adding up to an album that is infinitely stronger as a whole than if analyzed one track at a time. However, don't miss the wondrous hidden track at the end of the album, "I Am the Warlock," with an uncredited Jack Black spouting his best vocals to date.\nHeavy metal heavyweights including Lemmy Kilmister of Motörhead, King Diamond of Mercyful Fate, Conrad Lant of Venom, Mike Dean of Corrosion of Conformity, Scott Weinrich of the Obsessed, Kurt Brecht of Dirty Rotten Imbeciles, Tom Warrior of Celtic Frost, Denis Belanger of Voivod, Eric Wagner of Trouble, Max Cavalera of Sepultra and Lee Dorrian of Napalm Death lend their voices and cryptic lyrics to music written and played almost completely by Grohl. These combined efforts produce a fully-realized labor of love, the likes of which is rarely seen in today's commercial music landscape ruled by soulless record executives and filled with empty hits and no-talent acts. It is a major credit to Grohl and the esteemed company he keeps that Probot so effortlessly makes listeners long to be smack in the middle of a beer and blood soaked mosh pit in some anonymous underground thrash club.\nOne could argue, if one were so inclined, Grohl's musical talents have now eclipsed that of his former bandmate Kurt Cobain, if only because Grohl's ability to generate such solid material so consistently and in varying genres. If the next Foo Fighters record oozes as much emotion and rocks even half as hard as Probot, prepare for seriously blown minds.