BAYLESS "Ready.Aim."

(c) 2019 Independent Release

1. Ready.Aim.
2. My Declaration
3. Save The World
4. Game Over (featuring Justin Forshaw)
5. No More Suffering
6. Intermission

Jared Bayless--Lead Vocals, Lead Guitar

Vanessa Bayless--Lead Vocals, Keys, Programming

Additional Musicians

Justin Forshaw--Guitar Solo on 4

Wow.  Just...wow.

Rarely am I blown away by a band from the get-go, but Bayless accomplishes this rarity with their 2019 effort, Ready.Aim.  The husband and wife duo from Cheyenne, WY perfectly marries heavy guitars, symphonic string sections, and electronic elements, and both clean and harsh male vocals and soaring female lead vocals to create a musical tapestry the likes of which I cannot say I have ever truly heard before.  Whether Jared is utilizing his powerful baritone vocals in a rich singing tone, or snarling through harsh accompanying lines to support his wife's equally powerful, at times operatic voice, the vocal combinations here change from song to song...sometimes utilizing all three vocal styles within one track...to vocally match the intricate musical creations Bayless brings to bear on this effort.

The album kicks off with the title track, and it is immediately evident that Bayless is not just another symphonic metal band.  Vanessa handles the majority of the lead vocals on this particular track, showcasing a powerful range throughout the verses, with Jared adding his clean tones to the chorus, only adding in a bit of edge when he challenges "I'm coming for you darkness" referring to humanity's sinful nature, threatening to "take back what you stole".  Heavy guitars open the track, supported by what sound to be programmed drums and some electronic elements support the sweeping vocals, and hints of Evanescence creep forward, especially when the strings join the musical fray following the second chorus.  There's a musical buildup leading to a vocal bridge from Jared who snarls, "I'm running to the monster!  Ready, aim!"

"My Declaration" is the lead single from the record, and went straight to number one on several Christian rock and hard music charts.  Vanessa takes a lead vocal break from this track, with Jared contributing both clean and harsh vocals on this huge rocker.  Electronic elements are dropped all over this song, but as supporting pieces and not to the point that this becomes full-blown electronica.  The guitars are heavy and edgy, and Jared's voice simply owns the track.  In fact, it was this song, and specifically the vocals that drew me to hunt down this band and this EP, and I am glad that they did.  This is truly powerful stuff here.  Lyrically, it doesn't get much bolder than "My Declaration", with Jared proclaiming "I'll put my faith in who created me" before the chorus declares:  "I want to lead courageously, Leave a legacy/I wanna surrender myself./Faith awakening, Live for eternity/I'll stand with no ovation.  This is my declaration!"  I particularly like when Jared cuts loose on his vocals as he screams "Gonna face my demons, For I know that they will come/They'll here me screaming, 'The end of you has come!'"  The anger and coviction he delivers the chorus with is especially powerful, especially as Vanessa's offset the growl to add a depth and richness that simply isn't matched by a lot of bands today, as so many bands have taken on similar vocal styles now, at least in the modern rock genre.

"Save The World" is a more mid-tempo rocker with some obvious programmed lines running alongside the heavy buzzsaw rhythm guitars and some delicate keyboards.  While not quite industrial, there are some obvious influences from the genre here, and it works to great effect.  Jared and Vanessa share the lead vocals on this one, with Jared handling the majority of the chorus and Vanessa soaring through the verses.  There is a nice piano and strings interlude in the track, with just Vanessa singing for a couple of phrases before the guitars and drums return, bringing back Jared's rich singing style.  One interesting thing here is the unusual way Jared pronounces the way "proclaim", which comes out sounding more like pro-CLAY-eem the name.  At first, I was like...what the heck?  But after several listens, I have to be honest and admit that I sing along in the same way now.

"Game Over" is again largely a song with Vanessa handling the verse sections and Jared tackling the chorus portions.  Vanessa shows remarkable vocal control here, utilizing an almost operatic approach to the phrasing of the verses, and to say she is impressive would be an understatement.  There is an odd synth solo where one would usually expect the guitar solo to come slamming in, but fear not, for the guitar solo does drop, but as a final run-out at the end of the song.  Justin Forshaw, who handled the production on the record, tears his way through a complex guitar run that flashes more than he typically shows when he is ripping up the strings for his band, As We Ascend.

"No More Suffering" is another powerful hard rocker with a potent message, proclaiming "One day there'll be no more suffering/One day there'll be rest for me/But not today!", and the layered vocals on this chorus line, with Jared and Vanessa's voices paired together so perfectly, really adds an emotional depth.  This is the second single from the album, with it already cracking the top 25 of a few charts I've looked at.  Fighting for the title of favorite song on the album ("My Declaration" might win by a nose...), the song breaks down into a beautiful string section, with the two vocalists almost singing in a chorale style as they echo each other as the song concludes.  Again, the guitars are plenty heavy here, and the drums, while programmed, provide a solid rhythm line for the duo to perform their vocal acrobatics across.

"Intermission" is basically an all instrumental piece that concludes the album, so the name is rather odd.  There is some Gregorian-styled chanting at the beginning, but it is placed low enough in the mix that I can't make out what is being said, and other than Jared adding his voice as an instrument near the end (he's not singing actual words), this is song of pretty much all strings, piano, drums, and guitar, with some programmed elements shaking things up just a tad in places.

Forshaw handles the production on this album, and he deserves a good deal of credit for resisting the temptation to take things too far...in any direction.  While some may have considered burying the programmed elements further in the mix, I feel they provide an important support structure throughout this record.  And while many people would have been inclined to push the strings even further out front, the dynamics of the record would have been changed dramtically and much of the heaviness lost.  There is a near perfect mix of heavy, edgy guitars and smoother, more polished keyboards and strings, which mirror the different vocal styles incoporated throughout the five main tracks here.  My one hope for the band would be to add a drummer to the mix for the next album, as I feel that big drum sound would only serve to enhance an already remarkable sound!

Make no mistake, this is heavy stuff, both musically and lyrically, but the faint of heart need not fear Bayless, as there is also a melodic beauty and accessibility that can be enjoyed by most any fan of hard music.  This mini-album is an essential listen for 2019 and is one that people seeking something new and fresh should hunt down immediately.  I plan to track down the project's first two releases, as well, as Bayless has made that great of an impact upon me.

Rating:  9/10

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MANAFEST "This Is Not The End"

(c) 2019 Manafest Productions

1. This Is Not The End
2. All Time High
3. Kamikaze
4. Wake Me Up
5. Plan For Me (featuring Melanie Greenwood)
6. Born For This (featuring Max Manon)
7. Come Back Home (featuring Trevon Mcnevan)
8. Grenades
9. Insomnia
10. I Made It

Chris Greenwood (Manafest)--Vocals

Christian rap/rock artist Manafest returns with his first album of new material since 2017's surprisingly good Stoneshttps://positiverockreview.blogspot.com/2017/08/manafest-stones.html record.  The former skateboarder from Ontario, Canada is quite a dynamic force in both the Christian rock and rap scenes, with ten studio albums, a remix album, and a live record to his credit, multiple Dove Award nominations, Juno and GMA Canada Covenant Awards and nominations, as well as several charting singles both on the Christian rock and Christian rap charts.  In 2015, Manafest decided to leave his label, BEC Recordings, and enter the independent music scene, where he has found possibly his greatest success as an artist.      

For the life of me, I cannot find any credit for who played what instruments on this record, and that is a shame because there is some really good guitar work in several spots here.  I have to wonder if Adam Messinger is not responsible for at least some of the music here, as he has performed a lot of the instrumentation for Manafest in the past, although on Stones a lot of guest musicians were brought in.  What I can tell you is that Manafest again turns to his friends for assistance on some of the better tracks on the record, with Thousand Foot Krutch's Trevor Mcnevan, a frequent contributor to the Manafest catalog, again lending a hand, as does the album's producer, Doug Weier.  Mcnevan's vocals are easy to pick out on the soulful chorus section of the quasi-ballad, "Come Back Home".  Programmed drums and speedy, rhythmic raps are in full force here over a bed of electric piano, but as a package, the track works well.  

Speaking of Mcnevan, he also lends his pen to the writing of the three hardest rockers on the album, the excellent "Grenades", the gritty "Born For This", and the punchy "Kamikaze".  All three tracks feature some solid guitar work, with "Grenades" really hitting hard on the rhythm guitars and what sound like live (rather than programmed) drums.  A song about letting go of grudges, "Grenades" combines some atmospheric elements under the verse sections, with the pre-chorus and chorus portions both supported by those edgy guitars I mentioned.  "Born For This" is another rocking tune that gets a solid boost from the cool vocal contributions of Max Manon.  I have no idea who the guy is, but his voice really adds to the chorus sections of this song with a vocal style that is both gritty and soulful at the same time.  And "Kamikaze" is another solid modern rock song that finds Manafest using a bit more of a singing vocal style for parts of the verses and then on the pre-chorus sections, with a more aggressive style utilized on the verses.  There is still some snappy, rapid fire rapping going on in parts of the verses, so Greenwood really showcases the full range of his vocal styles all in one track.

Mcnevan also co-wrote the very emotional and poignant anti-abortion song, "Plan For Me".  The first verse of the song finds the father of an aborted child addressing his son or daughter, explaining the pain and regret that he has been living with since he and the child's mother decided to terminate their pregnancy.  The second verse is a response from the child trying to console her father (we learn the child would have been a "baby girl...[with] brown eyes and golden curls"), telling him that she forgives him, still loves him, and that he needs to let go of his grief and pain.  Then, in a spoken interlude before the final run through the gut-wrenching chorus (more on that in a minute), the child tells her father that he can't "let the past shape your future" and that "God's already forgiven you, if you can just find the strength [to] forgive yourself", concluding "I love ya and I'll see you up here soon".  The chorus features the hauntingly beautiful voice of "Mrs. Manafest", as Greenwood's wife, Melanie, is heard on an album for the first time.  The quality of her voice only adds to the powerful message of the chorus, which echoes: 

"I was never unplanned (unplanned, unplanned)/It was not your plan for me/I was never unplanned (unplanned, unplanned)/I'm right where I'm supposed to be./I was never unplanned (unplanned, unplanned)/I never left Your hands/Never left Your plan."

While I'm sure there are a lot of pro-choice people who will dismiss the song's message as being meaningless and just anti-women's-rights rubbish, there will also likely be a segment of the pro-life crowd who crow that the song's message is too forgiving of the father (and likely mother) and their decision to abort their child.  Both camps miss the point, in my estimation, as this is a song about pain, grief, heartache, loss, forgiveness, and hope for redemption at some point, along with a reconciliation in Heaven for the shattered family.  Don't quickly look past the point in the chorus that finds the child stating she was never unplanned, at least by God.  I am not ashamed to admit that this song has brought me to tears on more than one occasion and moves me every time I hear it.  Tuly a powerful message here, but sadly one that I think people on both sides of the abortion debate will dismiss.  Oh...and the child singing, "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine..." at the end is a nice gut-punch ending.  I have to wonder if this was performed by Greenwood's daughter, London, although I have no idea how old she is and there is no written indication that this is her.  

The other stand-out tracks for me are the album's opener and title track (also co-written by Mcnevan) and the closing track, "I Made It", which are both positive, uplifting rock tracks with catchy, sing-along choruses that both of my kids picked up on almost immediately.  

Not everything here really resonates with me.  "All Time High" feels like a Drake-styled track, musically, with Greenwood providing the vocals.  The music is all programmed and electronic, and the song is just too...synthetic...for me.  "Wake Me Up", while featuring some melodic guitar lines, is just too poppy and saccharine with it's electronically enhanced "Whoa-oh-oh's" and programmed handclaps.  And "Insomnia" sounds like the darker musical echo of "Wake Me Up", again featuing some electronically embelished "whoa-oh-ohs" and electronic drums, but with a much more down-tempo pace and darker tone...not to mention the desire to go to sleep rather than the call to be awakend.  Intentional?  No idea, but it is an interesting point/counterpoint, even if the music isn't really my style.

Ryan Clark of Demon Hunter is credited in the liner notes for "the sick artwork", which I assume refers to the cover art and the artwork on the 2-sided, 9 panel insert.  The digipack artwork features  red and black enhanced photo of Greenwood, along with a stylized "M" on the interior.

As with Stones, I am not going to say I absolutely love every aspect of this record, because the electronic hip hop that is employed on tracks like "All Time High" and "Insomnia" is just not my thing.  But I would be lying if I said I don't really like a lot of this record, accepting it for the style of modern rap/rock hybrid that it is.  I realize not everyone will be able to musically tune into what Manafest is doing here, and that's okay.  But for those that are open to various styles of modern rock, especially younger audiences that are accustomed to genre-blurring artists, Manafest is likely to strike a musical chord.  My 12 year old LOVES Manafest, and my 7 year old regularly sings along to this album already, and both of them are also fans of MUCH harder/heavier music than is supplied here, so obviously Greenwood is doing something right.

Rating:  7/10

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