Album Reviews for May 11, 2012

Various artists
AVENGERS ASSEMBLE

The soundtrack album for the record-breaking superhero hit movie, The Avengers, rocks dependably hard throughout its 13 tracks. Listener-friendly pop-song structure appears to be a prerequisite for inclusion as well as high-energy, heavy riffing and musical drama.

Songs from a mix of veteran and younger acts, including Shinedown, Bush, Papa Roach, Buckcherry, Five Finger Death Punch and, a singer who influenced some of the collection’s younger acts, Stone Temple Pilot’s Scott Weiland, flow with cohesive synergy.

Nor is the soundtrack strictly a boys club. With Black Widow, played by Scarlett Johansson, joining Iron Man, the Incredible Hulk and the rest of the guys on screen, the female-led Evanescence and a quartet of Los Angeles rockers who are, in fact, girls in their teens, Cherri Bomb, fit easily into the album’s testosterone-fueled mix with the Led Zeppelin-like “Shake the Ground.”

But the jewel in the Avengers Assemble crown is “Live to Rise,” a new song by Soundgarden. Reunited in 2010, the group has been touring and playing festivals, including Voodoo Experience in New Orleans. If Chris Cornell’s effortlessly effective songwriting and Kim Thayil’s wicked guitar riffing are indications of what other new music may come from Soundgarden, the reconstituted Seattleites have much more worth hearing.

John Wirt