DigHayZoose - "Ascension 7: Rocketship to Heaven"

DigHayZoose - Ascension 7: Rocketship to Heaven
1995, Brainstorm

1. Intro/Dancing In Concert With the Infinite
2. Strugglefish
3. Slow Serious
4. Whoo Woo
5. Slatherage
6. Magentamantalovetree
7. Self
8. Beware of Strangers Bearing Gifts
9. Later (L.A. 1994)
10. Circle of Pain
11. Secret
12. Intro to Regret
13. Regret

I count DigHayZoose's MagentaMantaLoveTree as one of my favorite albums of all time. No lie. So you'd think I'd be super excited about this live album. It's okay. It's not one of the greatest but there's nothing that I can point out as being super horrible either. Allan Aguirre from Scaterd Few joins the band on stage for a couple Sin Disease tunes and that's pretty cool. I also thought the band would be a bit funnier on stage. I guess somewhere I got the impression that they might be goofballs, but they play it pretty straight here. One last thing - great bass playing here. You can hear it really well in the mix so it stands out whereas the guitars sound mushy and sloppy to my ears. It's too bad this band broke up because I always wanted to hear more from them. (Sorry about the cover picture - Blogspot changed all the controls and I'm having a hard time adjusting!)

Useless Fact: The band did record some demos for a new album but it was never finished. I think they posted some of those demos on their Facebook page.

DigHayZoose - "Strugglefish"

DigHayZoose - Strugglefish

1991, Brainstorm

1. Think About It

2. Psychadelic Mommy

3. Water's Way (Intro)

4. Water's Way

5. Slow Serious

6. D.H.Z.

7. Ozeptune

8. Strugglefish

9. Dad Song

10. Love Song

11. Express

12. Brighter Daze

I don't even really know why I'm putting this up here. I own the CD but I don't have it on my Ipod. I got this after hearing MagentaMantaLoveTree thinking that it would be another brilliant fusion of sounds. What I got was a frenetic, sloppy Red Hot Chili Peppers clone. The opening track, "Think About It" is okay, but I just can NOT get into the rest of it.

Useless Fact: Dion, the bassist from Hot Pink Turtle, once said on a message board that the guys from HPT told DHZ that they needed to sound more like HPT. If that's true they must have taken their advice.

DigHayZoose - "MagentaMantaLoveTree"

DigHayZoose - MagentaMantaLoveTree

1993, BAI

1. Beginning

2. Dancing In Concert With the Infinite

3. Whoompfinashun #7

4. Slatherage

5. Brave Strong Song

6. Lift

7. MagentaMantaLoveTree

8. No One Told You?

9. Secret

10. Detention 3:00 AM

11. Penalty Box

12. Circle of Pain

13. Doubt

14. Diggin' Away

15. Vanillanator

16. H8 Machine

17. Untitled

18. Black-Eyed Pea

19. 99 Cent Smile

20. B.D.O.C.

21. Regret

22. Twenty-Second Track

DHZ's first album was sort of a Red Hot Chilli Peppers funk/rock record that I never really cared for. This one sees their sound shift into the sort of eclectic "everything but the kitchen sink" sound similar to their friends Hot Pink Turtle. Though DHZ is a lot less spastic than HPT. They don't switch it up as much during songs, but they do have a lot of different types of songs. Some are sort of grunge ("Slatherage"), some are alt rock ("Dancing..."), and some are plain ol' metal ("H8 Machine"). Even with all the different songs the album sounds focused and doesn't feel like you're on a roller coaster getting jerked around between tracks. There's some good emotion here too - take the melancholy "Doubt" for example. The vocalist is pretty good too. This is another CD of mine that is "Christmas music" despite having nothing to do with Christmas. If you haven't guessed by now... yes... I'm weird.

Useless Fact: Terry Taylor from Daniel Amos does a teeny, tiny guest spot on "Secret."