Trouble - Manic Frustration (1992)

As one the pioneers of the doom metal genre (along with - Black Sabbath, Pentagram, The Obsessed, Witchfinder General and Saint Vitus), Chicago, Illinois', Trouble became legends through their first four records, 'Psalm 9,' 'The Skull,' 'Run to the Light' and 'Trouble.' 1992, however marked a change within their sound and lyrics as well metal in general was changing quite a bit in terms of what was popular and happening around the early 90's.

'Manic Frustration' the bands fifth album is different because it really isn't doom metal, its hardly heavy and most of the songs have a semi-fast tempo with tons of rockin' riffs, cool solos and lyrical themes of hallucinations and psychedelia, whereas the previous efforts mostly centered on Christianity. I'd have to imagine at the time fans were a bit baffled, perhaps even pissed, but this isn't a bad album at all, its just different.

Both 'Come Touch the Sky' & 'Scuse Me' are superb hard rocking songs, as well, 'The Sleeper' has a tremendous amount of drive behind it that just makes the album a delight of fun so far. By the time, 'Fear' passes by you'll probably have noticed a bit of a stoner and groove metal influence on this record, while, 'Rain' is a ballad of sorts, but just not a very good one, in fact, terrible.

Moving all the way down to the 10th song we come to, 'Mr White.' An interesting personal story about this song is that I actually began listening to Trouble back in '05 as a result of Antimatter's really unique melancholy acoustic cover of this song which also had female vocals. When I finally heard the original version a few years after that I was really blown away and I knew I had to own this album someday, which I only just recently made happen. In any case, its an interesting slower but still rocking song with elusive lyrics which could be about drugs. A few other standouts among the album are also, 'Memory's Garden' & 'Manic Frustration.'

'Manic Frustration' isn't a must own album because its by no means a great album, but its certainly not bad as I'm sure a lot of people have made it sound over the years since its release. Basically though if you dig hard rocking stoner/groove semi-traditional-doom-ish stuff with catchy riffs, colossal solos and the always great lead vocal work of Eric Wagner, then you really can't go wrong with this album if you should happen to stumble upon it someday.