From House of Restitution Records, and hailing from Los Angeles, CA, I give you Mardo. Mardo consists of brothers Aron on bass guitar, keyboards, and lead vocals, and Robert on all guitars, drums, and backing vocals. While on stage, Mardo includes additional guitarist Rob Small.
Upon first glance, the Mardo brothers appear to be very multi talented musically. They certainly are. According to their public relations document that accompanied their CD to SoT, they will be sharing concert billing with the likes of Green Day, REM, Velvet Revolver, Marilyn Manson, and Garbage. So it certainly seems like they are on their way, by sharing the stage with established acts that I previously mentioned.
So what is the problem? I am noticing a few. For one thing, their choice of musical style seems to be quite outdated from an era that I hope to forget. While listening to their self titled debut, I am noticing a lot of similarities to the hairbands of the 80's, such as Ratt, Cinderella, Poison, etc. My question is, why? In addition, when giving this CD its very first spin, Mardo oozes with attitude. This is especially evident right from the first tune, "Anyone but me", where they say the word "Yeah" about a couple of dozen times. At times their songs are a bit too lovey dovey, while there are countless bands being reviewed on SoT that manage to come up with much more sophisticated topics to sing and play about. And what is with their cover version of the Huey Lewis song "I Want A New Drug"? It seems pointless to me to cover a song that I thought was cheesy 20+ years ago to begin with, and kill it even further with distorted vocals and strange sounding electric violins.
While it was ok for a band like Van Halen to come across with attitude the way they did in 1979, and actually have it add to their charm, to me it does not seem to work for a band such as Mardo in 2005. For one thing, it was a fresh idea for Van Halen in 1979, when very talented bands were still being recognized by the major record labels in the US. However, in this day and age when you have very musically talented prog metal bands that are having difficulty attaining the fame and fortune that they deserve in the US media, I find it very difficult to give a CD such as Mardo's a good grade. Other than the decent production and instrumental play, I really cannot give Mardo's self titled debut anything higher than 2 ½ stars. I would strongly suggest that they rethink their musical style and direction for their next release.
Track Listing
1. Anyone But Me
2. Here She Comes
3. Poor Paul
4. Big Mouth Shotgun
5. I Want A New Drug
6. Cold Creepin'
7. Son
8. Broken Bones
9. Catch A Thief
10. Told You So
11. Last Call
12. Hey Girl!
13. I'm The One
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