1. Greed Machine
2. Lyna Red
3. Under 16
4. District Of Swine
5. Hometown
6. Hoodoo Queen
7. Gone
8. Tales Of Underground
9. Mary Green
10. Rattlesnake Preacher
11. Daydream

The French Hard Rock band Aesthesia is one of the best Guns N' Roses cover bands I’ve ever heard. No sarcasm at all, I mean it!

There’s no real interesting history to tell about these Frenchies, only to mention this is their second full-length album. Shattered Idols definitely rocks hard, but there are some flaws.

The disc contains 11 tracks, some are killer and others are questionable to say the least.

We start off with "Greed Machine", which is a great opener and shows us immediately their GNR-influenced style. A pretty solid song and a real treat for the ear.

In the second track, "Lyna Red", vocalist Nico Marlyn uses the more moody and lower 'Axl Rose' voice, which can be heard in "It’s So Easy" and "Mr. Brownstone". It’s a significantly slower track compared to "Greed Machine", but as promising for sure.

After this song, all hell breaks loose. "Under 16" has a typical 80’s Hard Rock sound, and with the guitar parts of Hardcore Superstar’s Thomas Silver, this sleazy picture is complete.

The final track of the ‘killer four’ pounces away like no other. "District Swine" is heavy and spits the word ‘dirt’ in your face, ‘nuff said.

Now, we continue with the second part of the disc: the part which isn’t that exciting.

For example, "Home Town" is a ballad combined with a lot of drag. A real bummer compared to the previous songs. However, the sound is recognizable for some original 80’s ballads, so the nostalgic feeling I get, saves its credibility in many ways.

From this point on, it’s goes downhill in my estimation. "Hoodoo Queen" is some kind of RHCP song and has got nothing to do with sleaze.

"Gone" is never-ending...

"Tales Of The Underground" has a more punky sound and is quite enjoyable. For a moment, I thought: Shattered Idols is gonna end with a bang!.

Unfortunately, we get "Mary Green", nothing special and boring at some parts.

Aesthesia closes with the up-tempo "Rattlesnake Preacher" and the whiny, Guns-like ballad "Daydream".

Overall, as I mentioned before, the first four tracks are great. Too bad the rest of the tracks just don’t cut it. The G ‘n R influenced can be heard everywhere. That’s not a bad thing, but it’s so obvious Aesthesia wants to sound like Guns ‘n Roses that I rather give it the stamp ‘Rip-off’. If all the track where kick-ass, I wouldn’t complain about it...but in this case; I do! I associate Aesthesia’s music more with GNR than with Aesthesia itself...and that’s not a good thing.

Closing words; Aesthesia delivers the goods in some ways. Shattered Idols is an album which has more GNR vibe than the ridiculous Chinese Democracy. Mr. Rose should be very excited with this effort! And that’s a good thing.

I won’t recommend Shattered Idols, but I also won’t keep you from purchasing it!

Out on Shotgun Generation Records
www.aesthesia-rocks.com

Written by Jesse Gorvette