Ginger Wildheart announces Birthday bash 2018

Mutation (Ginger Wildheart) - I - The Frankenstien Effect (Re-mastered) (2017)

Genre - Hard Rock / Noise / Alternative

Label - Round Records

Track listing:

01 - Powderland
02 - Rats
03 - Friday Night Drugs
04 - Schadenfreuden
05 - Compass Point
06 - Lively Boy
07 - Gruntwhore
08 - On Poking Dogs
09 - Wham City
10 - Carion Blue

Following hot on the heels of III - Dark Black is the re-mastered release of the first album to emerge under the Mutation banner, The Frankenstein Effect.
Once again re-mastered by the man with the magic ear, Dave Draper, this album now sounds even more impressive. the Frankenstein Effect was always the most acessable of the three Mutation albums, but now everything sounds that much clearer and sharper. In fact this album sounds absolutely awesome!
The Mutation project is about as far removed musically from the 555% and Hey! Hello! projects as you could possibly get!
Imagine the more extreme, heavier, off the wall tracks that the Wildhearts have ever put out, then multiply that by a thousand and you may get an idea of what we are dealing with here.
That's not to say that its all intensity, there are some great melodies interwoven with the immense riffs. If you like your music on the heavy side then you really should check this out, very much in the vein of Pulled Apart By Horses and Exit International (who feature, along with Random Jon Poole and Chris Catalyst to name a few), The Frankenstien Effect is an album that shows Ginger is just as cutting edge and relevent today as he has ever been.

A great album!

Unfortunately it looks like this re-master will only be available digitally with no physical cd available at the moment.

Rating - 10/10

Mutation (Ginger Wildheart) - III - Dark Black (2017)

Genre - Hard Rock / Noise / Alternative

Label - Round Records

Track  Listing:

01 - "."

02 - Authenticity

03 - Toxins

04 - Devolution

05 - Irritant

06 - Skint

07 - Hate

08 - Victim

09 - Dogs

10 - Deterioration

III - Dark Black is the third instalment of Ginger Wildhearts Mutation project. This time around all of the tracks were written by Ginger Wildheart and Scott Lee Andrews, with Devin Townsend adding to the mix on Devolution. Ginger himself says that Mutation will not be for everyone, and its certainly not for anyone who has a weak disposition. Its loud, its noisy, its brash, its bloody brilliant. A great noisy mess!
The album begins with a very short intro in the form of "." before launching all guns blazing into 'Authenticity', which really lets you know exactly what you are in for with the rest of the album! 'Toxins' blasts past, before we have the Devin Townsend collaboration, the rather excellent 'Devolution', which is exactly what you would expect from a collaboration between such noise loving merchants! 'Irritant' has quite possibly one of the best chorus's ever written in, "fuck off you cunt, you are an irritant", just pure class! 'Skint' hurtles along leading us into the brutal 'Hate'.  'Victim' is pure unadulterated chaos, as is the albums penultimate track, 'Dogs'.
the album closes out with 'Deterioration', yet another blast of intensity. In fact the intensity levels never drop below maximum from the albums start to its finish. Clocking in at twenty six minutes this album is short, but not all that sweet.

For this album, Ginger has not only attracted the talents of Scott Lee Andrews and Devin Townsend, but has also roped in the likes of Phil Campbell (Motorhead), Givvi Flynn, Toshi, Paul Catten, Jamie Oliver and Dom Lawson to help out.
Recorded by Jase Edwards and mixed by the magic ear of Dave Draper, III - Dark Black really is the crowning glory of the Mutation project.

If you like it loud, noisy and chaotic, check it out, if you don't, well I really wouldn't, this album could give you nightmares

Rating: 10/10

Ginger Wildheart - Clout EP (2015)

Genre - Experimental / Hard Rock

Label - Pledge Music / Self Released

 

Track listing:

 

01- Nelson

02 - Benn

03 - Darwin

04 - You

Hmmm now this is a strange one. Clout is a free download Ep, one of the exclusive incentives to Ginger Wildhearts latest Pledge Music campaign, Songs & Words. Clout was recorded by Ginger and Jase Edwards at Jase's studio.
 I say this is a strange one because once again Ginger throws us a real curve ball with Clout. Four songs inspired by great heroes, but not in the usual hard rockin style that we have come to know Ginger for. Opening track, Nelson comes across as the bastard off spring of Clam Abuse and Mutation. Lots of loops and samples creating an interesting and rather unique soundscape. No real lyrics or vocal line here, just some crazy twists and turns. Interesting track.
Benn follows and is similar in style and feel to a rare Ginger track entitled Patience and Gratitude from a few years back. Opening with a monologue speech from Tony Benn. This melodic track has a great feel to, the speech working great as a spoken word kind of track. I'm loving this track!
Darwin is definitely the most unique track that I have ever heard. It just evolves through so many twists and turns its ridiculous and almost impossible to keep up with. The lyrics come in the form of Ginger quoting various quotes from Charles Darwin. A weird song that if I am honest I have difficulty wrapping my head around.
The Ep's closing track, You is inspired by, well inspired by You, and the incredible journey that you make in life. Its the most melodic track that the Ep offers, with Ginger providing a spoken word commentary on the miracle of life!
A brilliant song!

Clout is a really different EP, with Ginger once again keeping his fans on their toes. Unfortunatley I don't think that it is going to be for everyone. Personally I bloody well love it!

Well worth checking out

Rating - 9/10

Ginger Wildheart - G.A.S.S. Month 1 EP (2014)

Genre - Hard Rock / Pop / Punk

Label - Self released

Track listing:

01 - Everything

02 - That's A Nasty Habit You've Got There

03 - Bloody Knees

Bonus Demos

04 - Ice (Demo)

05 - The Jackson Whites (Original Demo)

OK so Ginger Wildheart has had tremendous success as of late with his various Pledge Music projects, most notably the awesome 555% triple CD release and the Mutation / Hey!Hello! releases, but this time he has opted to go down a far riskier path with his G.A.S.S. project, So what is G.A.S.S? and just why is it so damned risky?
G.A.S.S. (Ginger Appreciation Secret Society) is a totally fan interactive project, the ultimate fan club so to speak, with membership spread overt three different levels, with the most basic offering full access to the exclusive website, and access to 36 brand new tracks, (yes I said 36!) spread over a twelve month period, as well as access to various demos etc, podcasts, competitions etc, and the ultimate top tier offering a membership card that allows the holder to gain access to meet and greets throughout the year. Pretty awesome hey?
So this is a review of the first batch of the 36 songs, (the plan is to release 3 a month over a twelve month period, a little like the aborted Singles club that Ginger tried a few years ago, which got aborted due to an inept record label!)
So what do we have here then?
Track one, Everything, featuring Givvi Flynn on backing vocals and recorded (and mixed) by Jase Edwards, is a mid paced melodic rocker that would have fit comfortably along side any of the tracks on the now legendary 555% project or for that matter even on the aforementioned aborted singles club! A great song!
Track two,  That's A Nasty Habit You've Got There, recorded by Jase Edwards, mixed by Jason Sanderson and also features Jason Sanderson on backing vocals, is a slightly darker track with a quicker tempo. Again this song would have fitted well on the 555% project or even Market Harbour, another great song!
Track three, Bloody Knees, again recorded by Jase Edwards, mixed by Kevin Vanbergen and featuring Givvi Flynn on vocals and Jon Poole on keyboards, is a real monster of a song. Givvi and Ginger sharing lead vocal duties in much the same way as Ginger did with Victoria in Hey! Hello!, but this time around the song feels much darker, more Market Harbour than anything else, with a real Wildhearts feel in places (check out its awesome mid section!), just less heavy. Bloody Knees is one of the best songs Ginger has produced ever, and this guy has created some corking tracks over the years. A definite classic!
Its important to note that Ginger plays all instruments, unless otherwise stated, on all three tracks in much the same way as he did with the Hey! Hell! project, and again does a grand job!
So that's three great new tracks, membership also allows you access to various rare demos / outtakes that again will be uploaded and made available over the twelve month period. This month we have two, Ice and an original demo of the Wildhearts classic The Jackson Whites.

I'll allow Ginger to explain,
"ICE - I'd been given a brief to write some pop/rock songs for a Japanese artist, something that sounds like Ginger. I penned a few songs (I'm sure we'll be sending you the others in due course) and the artist didn't like them because they were too melodic and sounded too much like The Wildhearts. This has happened a few times, once for a proposed movie soundtrack where the director insisted I write something as he was a huge fan (No Way Out But Through), then complained that it sounded too much like me writing a song for a film. This is why I don't write for people very often. This song was recorded with Jase Edwards."
"THE JACKSON WHITES - This is a home demo that I made of The Jackson Whites, the first track written for Chutzpah!, in New York City, 2008. This was before bringing it to the band, where we made a further demo of it in Finland, recorded by our manager at the time, Virpi, which also featured standard tuning. The decision to drop the tuning was made in Denmark as we were actually recording the album. So much for demos, eh?"

Ice is a great little poppy rock track, that if I am honest, I am surprised has been made available as a bonus demo, when the quality of its recording and hell the quality of the song could have easily made it possible to put it out as one of the new 36 tracks! Ice = a great three minute pop rock experience!
The Jackson Whites demo is a surprisingly good quality demo of an early version of the song, You can hear what it sounded like before they tweaked a couple of the riffs and down tuned the guitars!

If this first instalment of G.A.S.S. experience is anything to go by then we are in for a real treat with Ginger pushing himself to deliver the quality product that he has become symnominous with!

Rating 10/10


NB - G.A.S.S. membership is available at any point over the next twelve months, with all releases being made available in due course, so there is plenty of time to save those penny's if you cant subscribe straight away.

Ginger Wildheart (Band) - Albion (Pledge Edition) 2014

Genre - Hard Rock / Classic Rock / Pop / Punk / Metal
Label - Pledge Music

Track listing:

01 - Drive
02 - Cambria
03 - The Road To Apple Cross
04 - The Order Of The Dog
05 - Chill, Motherfucker, Chill
06 - Burn This Town Down
07 - Body Parts
08 - The Beat Goes On
09 - After All You Said About Cowboy's
10 - Grow A Pair
11 - I Need You
12 - Capital Anxiety
13 - Into This
14 - Creepers
15 - Albion

Albion is Ginger Wildhearts latest venture with the fan funded Pledge Music system, building upon the huge success of the 555%, Mutation and Hey! Hello! projects, and what a monster of an album it is. Albion has been recorded primarily by the lineup that Ginger put together for the live shows to support the 555% albums, hence the Ginger Wildheart Band monica and what a line up it is featuring the talents of Ginger Wildheart (The Wildhearts / Mutation / Solo / Hey! Hello! / Michael Monroe Band / Courtney Love Band / SilverGinger5 / Clam Abuse / Supershit666 and more), Chris Catalyst (Eureka Machines / Sisters Of Mercy), Denzel (Ginger Wildheart Band / Barbarossa / Young Legionnaire / Horsefight) , Rich Jones (Ginger Wildheart Band / The Loyalties / Bassknives / Michael Monroe Band), Victoria Liedtke (Ginger Wildheart Band / Hey! Hello!), Random Jon Poole (The Wildhearts / Goddamn Whores / Cardiacs), and Bryan Scary (Evil Arrows) with Kevin Vanbergen handling production duties.
Firstly I have to say that despite its familiarity (hey this is the sixth albums worth of material Ginger has released in less than two years!) Albion is not an instant album, its very much a grower, giving up more and more layers with each listen, and having lived with it since just prior to Christmas here goes for a track by track review.

Drive -  a typically schizophrenic power-pop/rock song, that although a great song, takes a spin or two before it really grabs you, but boy when it does its a blinder!

Cambria - a song that comes across as a cross between a Mutation track (it would have fitted easily onto The Frankenstein Effect) and one of The Wildhearts more edgy tracks, say Chutzpah! or an Endless Nameless track with its blast beats and in your face lead vocal, (which are offset at times by Victoria's vocals to amazing effect

The Road To Apple Cross - A belter of a track that seems to blend all of Ginger previously released styles into one song) and could have easily have made it on the Chutzpah! album by The Wildhearts, with Gingers alternating vocal styles and its monster riffs. Truly a great song and one of the albums many highlights.

The Order Of The Dog - begins with a lovely mellow introduction almost fooling you into thinking that this is going to be an instrumental track. Again the song has many twists and turns and takes us, the listener on a great journey. Would have easily fitted onto 555%. A great song and another album highlight.

Chill Motherfucker, Chill - A light and relatively mellow rocker that would not have been out of place on 555%. One of my favourite songs on offer with the great lyric, "Sometimes you are the shit, sometimes you are the pan, this you must understand". Just simply awesome!

Burn This City Down - Co-written with Chris Catalyst, (something that is evident throughout this album is that although its clearly gingers baby, the other band members have been heavily involved at all stages), a great song with a real energetic feel to it.  This song really does bode well for any future Ginger / Catalyst collaborations. Definitely an album highlight!

Body Parts - A real up beat pop rocker, and obvious choice for a lead single / promotional track. 

The Beat Goes On - A real gem of a track, with a more upbeat version of the feel found on some of Ginger's earlier solo work, say on Valor.... A real good song with a nice commercial feel to it.

After All You Said About Cowboy's - This song was originally recorded as part of the 555% sessions but Ginger wasn't happy with the way it turned out, too far removed from the feel vision of the original demo, so he decided top shelve the song in order to re-record it at a latter date. Nows that date, and the song is beautiful. It really does have a Market Harbour era kind of feel to it, a really great song with some great pop elements. Another album highlight.

Grow A Pair - A fairly uptempo pop / rock n roll track similar in feel to Begin From Within with some great vocal exchanges between Ginger and Victoria. this song could have made a great Hey! Hello! or even Silverginger5 track. Love it!

I Need You - Gingers ode to the fans (I think lol). An uptempo pop / rock track with a great sing along chorus, going to be amazing in a live setting!

Capital Anxiety - Fast aggressive punky track. Could be fun live but feels a little out of place here, and one of the tracks that I imagine will be dropped from the eventual ten track commercial release of the album. (I'll come to that later!)

Into This - A mellow laid back poppy rocker. Another song that wouldn't have been out of place on the 555% triple album, but also one of the weakest tracks on offer here and one I'll probably be skipping a lot in future, that despite having some great lyrics, yet a weak chorus by Gingers standards.

Creepers - An uptempo melodic rocker that goes through many twists and turn (and tempo changes), a fun song. Victoria probably provides her longest lead vocal here, not the albums strongest track, and a little prog rock in places but still a bloody strong song that inbeds itself further into your brain with each and every listen.

Albion - The albums epic title track, what can I say. Ten and half minutes long, with so many twists and turns that it could give the mighty Sky Babies a run for its money. A really nice touch having the Drive riff re-enter things hear during the song as it gives a sense of the album coming full circle. Awesome, simply awesome.


So what can I say? Well Albion is very much a companion album to the 555% triple album set, and I say companion and not successor as the two releases sit so comfortably side by side. This Pledge Edition of the album also contains fifteen songs, something that will change for the commercial release which will only be featuring ten of the fifteen, (and I would hate to be the person charged with choosing which five tracks have to be cut!) Therefore if you want to get a hold of all of the songs here you will need to pledge quickly (the entire album is available for immediate download for just £8).

This album (as with the bulk of Gingers back catalogue) is very, very highly recommended!

Rating - 10/10

Mutation (Ginger Wildheart) - II - Error 500

Genre - Hard Rock / Metal / Experimental / Extreme / Alternative
Label - Pledge Music (exclusive at moment)

Track listing:

01 - Bracken
02 - Utopia Syndrome
03 - White Leg
04 - Protein
05 - Mutations
06 - Computer, This Is Not What I...
07 - Sun Of White Leg
08 - Relentless Confliction
09 - Innocents In Morte
10 - Benzo Fury

What can I say? Pure unadulterated intensity, I think that that is the only way to truly describe this album, which is the sixth albums worth of material released by Ginger in the matter of nine months, unbelievable!
Where as Mutation I, The Frankenstien Effect was pretty much Gingers baby, with him going into the studio with the song structures melodies and ideas firmly in mind, Error 500 is much more of a coroberative effort, with the multitude of musicians involved lending their input and the resulting album has to be heard to be believed. Intense does not really describe this album, there's riffs, lots of them, great vocals, intense to say the least, and some great songs that really do make this one hell of an album. Gingers original plan was to release both The Frankenstien Effect and Error 500 to those that had pledged, and then get them to vote on which tracks should make it onto the commercially released album, but this has proved a little tricky with many, Ginger included, saying that they believed that Error 500 should be released as it is and not broken up or diluted in any way. This is one hell of an album, and probably as extreme has Ginger can get, definetly its a million miles away from his previous solo or even Wildheart releases. Error 500 even makes The Frankenstien Effect sound like a Bon Jovi record!
I really can not find the right words to describe this album, but can honestly reconmend it as possibly the most frontier challenging album since The Wiuldhearts released Endless Nameless back in 1997.

A great album well worth checking out if you are brave enough, and just check out the credits below to see just who appears on this monster of an album!

Rating 10/10





Ginger Wildheart - Mutation (II) - Error 500

Song Credits:

Produced, Engineered And Mixed By Kevin Vanbergen (Except Track 10)
Track 10 Produced by Tom Bellamy & Paul Mullen.
Executive Producer Kevin Vanbergen
Mixed By Kevin Vanbergen

Recorded @ The Chairworks Studio & FX Yourspace
Mixed @ The Attic
Mastered By Dick Beetham @ 360 Mastering
Chairworks Studios Credits:
Assistant Engineers: James Mottershead, Bob Cooper
Pro Tools Engineer: James Mottershead
Runners: Harry & Andy

1: Bracken:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Paul Astick
LV: Ginger
BV: Ginger
Rich Jones
Kevin Vanbergen
Tom Bellamy
Denzil
Craig Temple
Simon Wright
Givvi Flynn
Jake Adams
Daisy Vanbergen

2: Utopia Syndrome:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Paul Astick
LV: Ginger, Craig Temple,
Dave “Catfish” Corbett (Hick vocal)
BV: Ginger
Rich Jones
Craig Temple
Harriet Bevan
Dave Kerr
Givvi Flynn
Paul Astick

3: White Leg:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger
KEYS: Jon Poole
LV: Ginger, Paul Astick, Jon Poole
BV: Ginger
Rich Jones
Harriet Bevan
Dave Kerr
Givvi Flynn
Paul Astick
Luke Dunnell
Tom Bellamy
The Boys From Black Moth!

4: Protein:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Kevin Vanbergen
LV: Ginger
BV: Paul Astick
Harriet Bevan
Ginger
Rich Jones
Givvi Flynn
Jon Poole

5: Mutation:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Jon Poole, Tom Bellamy
PROGRAMMING & KEYS: Tom Bellamy & Paul Mullen
NOISECALL: Merzbow
LV: Mark E Smith
BV: Tom Bellamy
Paul Mullen
Luke Dunnell
Ginger
Givvi Flynn

6: Computer, This is not what i …
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Shane, Jon Poole
LV: Ginger
BV: Ginger
Givvi Flynn
Paul Astick
Rich Jones
Harriet Bevan

7: Sun of White Leg:
DRUMS: Denzil
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Jon Poole
Keys: Jon Poole
LV: Ginger, Paul Astick, John Mackenzie, Jon Poole
BV: Ginger
John Poole

8: Relentless Confliction:
DRUMS: Denzil, Ginger & Paul Astick
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Paul Astick
LV: Mark E Smith
BV: Ginger
John Poole
Chris Catalyst
Simon Wright

9: Innocentes in Mortes
DRUMS: Denzil,
BASS: Jon Poole & Shane Embury
GTR: Ginger, Rob Stephens, Paul Astick
LV: Luke Dunnell
BV: Ginger
Paul Astick
Paul Mullen
Givvi Flynn
Rich Jones
John Mackenzie
Luke Dunnell

10: Benzo Fury
Programmed and Performed By: Tom Bellamy, Paul Mullen & Denzil
PROGRAMMING & KEYS: Tom Bellamy
GTR & BASS: Paul Mullen
LV: Paul Mullen
BV: Denzil
Paul Mullen

Mutation (Ginger Wildheart) - 1 - The Frankenstien Effect

Genre - Hard Rock / Metal / Experimental / Extreme / Alternative
Label - Pledge Music (exclusive at the moment!)

Track Listing -

01 - Powderland
02 - Rats
03 - Friday Night Drugs
04 - Schadenfreuden
05 - Compass Point
06 - Lively Boy
07 - Gruntwhore
08 - On Poking Dogs
09 - Wham City
10 - Carion Blue

The Frankenstien Project, the first of two Mutation albums, and the fifth albums worth of material released in an eight month period!. The Mutation project is about as far removed musically from the 555% and Hey! Hello! projects as you could possibly get, and this the first of the two, The Frankenstien Effect, is the mellowest of the two and the more accessable of the pair.
Imagine the more extreme, heavier, off the wall tracks that the Wildhearts have ever put out, then multiply that by a thousand and you may get an idea of what we are dealing with here.
Thats not to say that its all intensity, there are some great melodies interwoven with the imense riffs. If you like your music on the heavy side then you really should check this out, very much in the vein of Pulled Apart By Horses and Exit International (who feature, along with Random Jon Poole and Chris Catalyst to name a few), The Frankenstien Effect is an album that shows Ginger is just as cutting edge and relevent today as he has ever been.
A great album, with ten stunningly heavy tracks, and possibly only ever to be made available through this Pledge campaign as it now looks like the second album, Error 500, will be made available commercially in its entirity.

Rating - 10/10