From the Chicago Tribune, April 14th, 1994
Course of Empire
Initiation (Zoo)
[two stars]
Course of Empire, a five-man Dallas outfit, is like a lot of booming rock
bands that issue a clarion call for the revolution of misfits. The band's
second album serves a good measure of tight ensemble performances but
wallows on a few tracks with the usual destruction-is-around-the-corner
lyrical cliches. The hard-driving, enmeshed guitar and bass licks of Mike
Graff and Paul Semrad, respectively, and two-drum double-whammy from
Michael Jerome and Chad Lovell beat along with the persistence of termites.
"Invertebrate" is suitably reptilian from the lobster-rock school-and with
Vaughn Stevenson's overdub yammering it has all the levity of a Black
Sabbath tune. "Infested" brings an illusory conversation with Charles
Darwin as Stevenson chants "The weak fall out," an observation of his
survival of the fittest.
[Brad Webber]
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