Hell or Highwater Gives Its All

Hell or Highwater's "I Want It All" is metal music guaranteed to put hair on your chest. I feel more masculine already. The whole song rumbles like a Texas thunderstorm. Each note rattles your rib cage profoundly. To add to that vocalist Brandon Sallers wails from the top of his macho range, a strategy that only gets the glow in the dark cell phones going as if you were at one of Hell or Highwater's live shows. If these guys keep pumping out bangers like "Hell or High Water" there will likely many shows full of ruthless, grateful, metal mavens. This outing clicks in all the ways a metal song should. Joey Bradford and Jon Hoover dual guitar assault shall leave you shaking down to your pinkie toes. They are truly marvelous things to behold. Drummer Kyle Rosa hits the right degree of menace, which means he's bashing at a Goldilocks perfectly flavored porridge level. Nobody in Hell or Highwater is going out of his way to be a big showoff, and that helps up the power ante tremendously. Each member gets his chance to either explode or put forth a brutally effective simmer. For instance Nick Maldonado's bass makes "I Want It All" growl ferociously. This is one back alley you don't want to face without a few buds handy. Nick's insanely wicked here. So what are the words behind the explosive instruments? Well. let's just say Brandon doesn't exactly consider gluttony to be a mortal sin. He wants it all, and there's nothing you can do to change his mind. If you can make it on your own it's his time. Imagine you hail from a big city, New York or Los Angeles for instance. Any and all earthly delights are hanging on your doorstep. Letting Brandon loose in such a temptation soaked atmosphere would do wonders for either city's tourism industry. So many women, so much hooch, so little time. Anyway, Brandon's voice clearly underscores his lust for taking a bite out of the pecan pie that is life. I'm not so sure what the treasure the mystery person left behind draws reference to but Brandon's beyond done with that confining lifestyle. He's out strictly to conquer, not even remotely divide. The guitar work at the bridge gives the metal community what it wants and then some. One of my favorite musical magic tricks yes, you guessed it, the chord shift set to stun, makes "I Want It All" an absolute no dietary rules need apply treat. The video makes it hard to ignore the hedonism on display. Then again, why would you want to. This genre's demise won't be on the horizon so long as Hell or Highwater's around to carry the torch. "I Want It All" gives metal fans and plain old fans of well constructed rock everything they want and more.