Appice Perdomo Project Release “Drum City”  

True rock music doesn’t have to be loud, glamorous, nor feature an elaborate instrumental arrangement to be endearing – but, truth be told, it really ought to be as boisterous as it gets. Honestly, I’ve always found the laid-back, simplistic side of hard rock to be its least exciting, and the Appice Perdomo Project appear to agree in their new single “Drum City” this summer. Striking a balance between a retro metal groove and the rich melodicism of traditional hard rock, Appice Perdomo Project channels some of the most spellbinding aesthetical attributes of both genres beautifully, though I think “Drum City” will serve more as a boon to the indie puritans among us than anyone else.

I love the guitar parts in this song, and I particularly like how cleanly they’re presented to us in the mix. There’s never a moment in which the string melodies are clouded by a bassline or partly concealed behind a prominent showing of strength from a nonexistent vocal – they’re always at the forefront of our attention, guiding us into the guts of the music as well as the soul of this band. I wouldn’t normally want them as heavily featured beside such a forward drum element, but this is an instance in which they coexist brilliantly.  

The leads are quite the stunning instrumental counterpart to the foundation in “Drum City,” and to some degree, they’re the bedrock for every cathartic moment in the song. The collaborative spirit behind Appice Perdomo Project is engaging for both the audience and the material at hand for one significant reason above all others – these two guys know how to read each other in the studio. There are moments where it’s difficult to tell where one end of the melodic charm is starting and another is trailing off into the backdrop, not because of negligent performing, but because of the kinship between the players.   Carmine Appice doesn’t hesitate as the star in “Drum City,” and he layers the beats atop the humble riff in this single beautifully. He’s tethered the emotionality of his play to the harmony between the guitar strings so tightly that we await his every strike as a means of better appreciating the power he’s putting out for us in this song.

These guys aren’t the only kindred spirits in the studio; the melodies, the percussion, and even the mixing board seem to have a connection to the players themselves here.   I can’t believe it took me so long to find out about this new project, and if it’s just a sneak preview of what’s still to come, they’re going to make a lot of the hard rock faithful very pleased this season. Instrumental rock has become increasingly loyal to the traditionalist standards of what was once a sect in the genre forgotten by the label elites, but with performances like this one from the Appice Perdomo Project, the underground is only going to become harder for even the snobbiest in the hard rock establishment to ignore.

Mindy McCall