Album Review:
Horseshoes And Hand Grenades
by Disciple

By Paul Anthony | August 28th, 2010 | Posted In Album Review

September 14, 2010

{INO Records}

Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

That’s the saying, anyway, and it’s the reference for Disciple’s new album, Horseshoes and Handgrenades.

It’s also an apt description for this life, in which perfection is the only way to gain an eternity with God, and in which our best, no matter how close to perfection it is, well … it just isn’t good enough, and close doesn’t count.

Disciple hammers this theme home in its latest disc, which doesn’t just get close to the musical mark but easily clanks around the pole. This is a ringer, about as close to perfect as any band is likely to get.

Following up on Disciple’s disappointing – though aptly titled – Southern Hospitality, the band has returned to the formula that made its self-titled CD and Scars Remain so effective: the mix of melody and metal that has rarely been put to such effective use in hard music. Disciple clearly has figured out how best to mix its dual influences – the 1980s stylings and lyrical sensibilities of Christian bands such as Petra with the uncompromising fierceness of metal giants such as Metallica.

While Disciple was weighted toward the melody and Scars Remain focused on the heavy, Horseshoes and Handgrenades marries the two flawlessly, while the lyrics are Disciple’s strongest yet, each entry focused on a different aspect of the album’s theme of brokenness subsumed by grace.

Kicking off with the radio hit “Dear X, You Don’t Own Me,” and ending with the moving “Worth the Pain,” Horseshoes rocks like the explosion from a hand grenade (or beats the listener over the head like a poorly thrown horseshoe? Maybe not.)

The album’s theme is stated unequivocally in the opening track, which addresses pain, shame and anger specifically, but applies to any struggle or addiction a Christian faces: “I was yours. I’m not yours anymore. You don’t own me.”

From “Watch It Burn” to “Invisible” to the incredible “The Ballad of St. Augustine,” that message is repeated.

It is discussed tenderly in “Worth the Pain,” which repeats, “It’s not too late to start again. It’s worth the pain, so hold on tonight.”

It is shouted defiantly in “Shot Heard ‘Round the World:” “Where is the sting? Where are the things that haunted me? Where is the stain?”

Often this record dabbles in the spiritual warfare aspects of these struggles, as in “Shot” and “Battle Lines,” which addresses Satan directly, warning him, “We won’t just lay our weapons down so easily so you get in. We won’t be swayed so easily, not by your words.”

Perhaps no track so encapsulates both ends of this message – the personal tragedy of falling away from God and the militant urgency of fighting against the lies and attacks of the devil – than “The Ballad of St. Augustine,” which also has the benefit of being the album’s heaviest track (is that a little Avenged Sevenfold-like guitar work toward the end of the track? I think so.)

“A good man was living here,” Young sings. “Virtue was evident, to all but disappear. … I’m falling very fast, a bread that never lasts. Well, I’m starving. … My death is imminent.”

But at the end, he rejoices: “Memories burning away. Ashes celebrate. They’re washing me … branding me with grace. Innocence reborn. Welcome back, my innocence. How I have longed to see your face again.”

The song is all double bass and crunchy guitars, and the verses are classic Disciple, the rap-screaming Young has long since perfected. Similarly, “Burn it Down,” “Shot Heard ‘Round the World” and “Battle Lines” match their war-influenced lyrics with driving music that will move the crowd during concerts.

In between are mid-tempo rockers such as “Collision,” “Revolution: Now” and “Deafening,” this last echoing “St. Augustine” with its reminder that “you’re never too far away, and it’s never too late.”

If there is anything to detract from this masterpiece of an album, it’s the disappearance of guitar solos from all but “Watch It Burn,” a likely consequence of former guitarist Brad Noah’s ongoing efforts to step back from the band. That’s a small matter, however, and certainly not worth more than this small mention.

Disciple has always shown flashes on its previous albums that it had the potential for a record like this, a sonic, thoughtful tour de force that demands not just to be bought and enjoyed, but to be owned and absorbed.

Well, here it is. The best Disciple album yet, and it’s not even close.
~Paul Anthony

Favorite Tracks:
The Ballad of St. Augustine
Shot Heard ‘Round the World
Battle Lines
Dear X, You Don’t Own Me

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