Billy Talent III

Hey everyone. Scott’s away saving the free world and whatnot, so he asked me to stand in and do a post or two in his absence. Unfortunately, I had one hell of a time settling on something to talk about, as I’ve recently discovered that liking music doesn’t mean you can write about it. However, I settled on Billy Talent’s newest album, creatively called Billy Talent III.

If you’re into punk, and live in the Northern Hemisphere, you’ve probably heard of Billy Talent. While you may not like them, you can’t argue with success, and they’ve certainly had their share of that, with their first two self-titled albums Billy Talent I & II going triple and double platinum in Canada, respectively. Their third, and latest album, Billy Talent III, was released in 2009 and features the singles ‘Turn Your Back’, ‘Devil on My Shoulder’ and ‘Saint Veronika’.

Despite being a long time Billy Talent fan, I was a little apprehensive approaching this album. I’d heard the singles on the radio, but they didn’t seem to pull me in the way the old Billy Talent stuff does. After I gave it just one play through, however, I rediscovered that the real genius in Billy Talent’s style is the way they tell stories in their songs that are self-contained, but wound together in the album to produce a vision of the world through their eyes. And man, I gotta tell you, they’ve done one hell of a job this time.

Themes that we’ve heard in the previous albums make a reappearance here, such as the darker sides of religion, laments over lost love and loneliness, and the band’s views on government and world politics. Also present is the band’s love for metaphors and allegories, which take simple messages and transform them into elegant prose.
Since I doubt I could do the songs justice by trying to describe them, I’ll simply recommend very strongly that you give the album a listen, if you haven’t already.

G

Billy Talent: I

“Milk carton mug-shot baby missing since 1983… 20 years of dirty needles, rain drops running through my veins!” – “Standing in the Rain”

Billy Talent is a post-hardcore, punk-rockish band from Mississauga, Ontario Canada. They started in the early 90′s as the group Pezz but got into legal trouble and changed their name to Billy Talent in 2001.. when they had their breakthrough mainstream success (in Canada at least). Their second album and first with the new band name is self-titled (or sometimes considered ’1 or ‘I’ as they have a trilogy of self-titled albums). I’ve seen these guys live in concert twice and they sound awesome in concert. I saw them in a smaller club venue for their first Billy Talent tour and I saw them at the Air Canada Center in Toronto for their third album’s (Billy Talent ‘II’) tour. Both times were amazing!

The second time I saw them live they started with a white sheet over the stage and the silhouettes of them playing this album’s first track, “This Is How it Goes”. The play the intro chords and then the sheet dropped when the song gets heavy.. it was pretty sweet. This song was actually written about the band’s drummer, Aaron Solowoniuk, who suffers from Multiple Sclerosis.