As Joey Jordison once again indulges his 80s horror sleaze rock fantasy, his Slipknot colleagues Corey Taylor and Jim Root are advancing a rather more mature — though arguably much less fun — musical argument with their third Stone Sour album.
Stone Sour has consistenty transcended the post-grunge genre. Always heavily populated by horrible bands that in effect destroyed everything grunge actually stood for, that really wouldn’t take much, but the lush melodies and diversity of the performance — particularly from Taylor — lifts it well above the usual mire of that ilk. It isn’t perfect, and tends to see-saw too dangerously and too often between radio fodder and metallic rock, but Audio Secrecy is another solid effort from the band. “Mission Statement” and “Digital (Did You Tell)” open the album in a big rocking if unspectacular way ahead of the darker, brooding “Say You’ll Haunt Me”, the first demonstration of Stone Sour’s more layered, melodic approach this time around. “Dying” veers close to the type of insidious dreck the likes of Nickleback have foisted upon us in recent years before “Let’s Be Honest” gets everything somewhat back on track.
1. Audio Secrecy
2. Mission Statement
3. Digital (Did You Tell)
4. Say You’ll Haunt Me
5. Dying
6. Let’s Be Honest
7. Unfinished
8. Hesitate
9. Nylon 6/6
10. Miracles
11. Pieces
12. Bitter End
13. Imperfect
14. Threadbare