The Prize Fighter Inferno 'My Brother's Blood Machine'- Music Review

As an avid fan of the band Coheed & Cambria, I was interested to hear Claudio Sanchez go ahead and do his own thing. The Prize Fighter Inferno still has the science fiction elements that got Coheed noticed, but there are a lot of changes.

For those who hate tinny, electronic drums or Sanchez's high-pitched voice, this album is not for you. At first the use of electronic instruments seems to envelop the whole album, but there are a few stand-out tracks that remind the listener of good ol' Coheed.

The first track The Going Price for Home is the first taste of awkward electronica that Coheed fans aren't used to. Of course, the reference to "the wheels that round the ground across the Never" is comforting, but this is still unfamiliar territory.

The album picks up quickly, though with The Fight of Moses Early & Sir Arthur McCloud, Our Darling Daughter You Are, Little Cecelia Marie, and Run, Gunner Recall, Run! with guitar riffs that would have meshed well with Good Apollo: Volume 1.

Thankfully, Sanchez does not forget his roots throughout the album and pays homage to Second Stage Turbine Blade with The Missing McCloud Boys. Sanchez's extreme use of falsetta brings me back to a time when Coheed's sound was still rough around the edges. Sanchez harps, "They were only boys," a similar sentiment found in the Second Stage song Junesong Provision where cries, "I'm just a boy."

78 is a nice end to the album, encompassing Sanchez's tongue-in-cheek humor and the type of electronic that would not be lost on a Nine Inch Nails record.


Overall, my inital disappointment turned to love and I find myself eager for the next installment of The Prize Fighter Inferno. If not for the music, at least for the story. Sanchez will always allow us that. The record gets an A- from me, though this may be biased coming from a girl who interviewed the man and has been worshiping his music for 6 years.

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