The Bled

Brendan Joel Kelley September 23, 2004 4:00AM

[
          {
            "name": "Related Stories / Support Us Combo",
            "component": "12017627",
            "insertPoint": "4",
            "requiredCountToDisplay": "6"
          },
          {
            "name": "Air - Billboard - Inline Content",
            "component": "12017623",
            "insertPoint": "2/3",
            "requiredCountToDisplay": "7"
          },
          
          {
            "name": "Air - MediumRectangle - Inline Content - Mobile Display Size 2",
            "component": "12017624",
            "insertPoint": "12",
            "requiredCountToDisplay": "12"
          },{
            "name": "Air - MediumRectangle - Inline Content - Mobile Display Size 2",
            "component": "12017624",
            "insertPoint": "4th",
            "startingPoint": "16",
            "requiredCountToDisplay": "12"
          }
          
            ,{
              "name": "RevContent - In Article",
              "component": "13027957",
              "insertPoint": "3/5",
              "requiredCountToDisplay": "5"
            }
          
        ]

On the Bled's 2001 EP, His First Crush, the album cover bears the line "Can you still feel the butcher knives?" While it's a clever play on Jimmy Eat World's chorus to "For Me This Is Heaven," from Clarity -- "Can you still feel the butterflies?" -- it's also an apt description of the Tucson-based act's music, a blend of hardcore, metal, screamo and melodica that inflicts itself on you like death by a thousand cuts. Not long before the Bled's latest disc, Pass the Flask, was recorded, a crucial lineup change propelled it into territory beyond what a typical hardcore/metal band is capable of. The members replaced original vocalist Adam Goss with longtime friend James Muñoz, just a month before they entered the studio. The bulk of Flask has Muñoz screaming, but the melodic, pretty moments are what really sets the record apart. On stage, the five-piece -- vocalist Muñoz, bassist Mike Celi, guitarists Jeremy Talley and Ross Ott, and drummer Mike Pedicone -- is a tempest of aggression and angst. To call the Bled merely a hardcore or metal band would be an unfortunate marginalization.

The Bled

This Week's Issue