Customer Reviews
More relevant that they ever were... - By: Amplified Man, 19 Oct 2008 
Rage have had a lot of influence (musicallly) on my life. I was introduced to them via MTV of alll places where I witnessed People of the Sun maybe 10 years ago. What a song! It was like nothing I'd heard before, or since for that matter. It smashed, devoured & danced over the graves of everything I'd heard previously. So much energy, intensity & anger, so much groove. I was undoubtedly & unquestionably hooked & Rage became my favourite band up until I discovered Kyuss a few years later when the features of my musical landscape shifted once again.
There was something untimely special about Rage & their intense political leanings; even if you didn't exactly agree with De La Rocha's extreme left wing, anti capitalist political views he damn well made you aware of them. But with tracks like People of the Sun, Bulls On Parade, Vietnow, & Down Rodeo, who cares what they're about; they're some of the best tunes ever written & I will say that with a hand on my heart.
The musicianship, often overshadowed by Zack's rants, is outstanding; possibly the most flawless & tightest band I've ever heard. Such is their insensity, these guys don't even need to speak & they whip up a crowd as if it were effortless. Brad Wilk & Tim Commerford were, & still are, a stomping rhythm section & Tom Morello can coax some ungodly sounds out of his guitar. Unfortunately their talents have been wasted over the past few years in Audioslave.
Evil Empire, to me, feels like the forgotten middle album, overshadowed by the mighty self titled. Also, whilst not being their best album, the self titled takes that prize, it is my favourite. It's a lot darker, it's more diverse & my favourite two Rage tracks are on here in the form of People of the Sun & Bulls On Parade.
As they virtuallly invented `rap-metal' as it's now known, (now a near blasphemous phrase), there isn't as much on here as you'd think. There's more subtlety & more experimentation; Snakecharmer, Revolver, & Tire Me, don't actuallly have any rapping on them. Also, because Rage were a heavy band De La Rocha is largely considered a rock vocalist but his talents as a rapper are among the best. Stringing the lyrics together as he does with a political message & often storytelling is a difficult skill rather than "gangsta shopping list" style dross. Listen to 'Maria' from Battle of L.A. as proof - some of the best lyrics I've ever heard.
Evil Empire is still one of my favourite albums I have to say. Even though I sorely overlook them in my frequent ventures to my CD collection, Rage will still be in my favourite bands list 5, 10, years from now. Everything by Rage is essential. Nothing like them will happen ever again.
Flippin' excellent - By: LM BUTCHER, 08 Aug 2008 I can't believe it's taken me 12 years before writing this review. What I am glad of though is that I didn't write this within a year of buying "Evil Empire"; when this came out in 1996, I - like many - was expecting a bombastic array of accessible riffage, heavy ranting & slick production similar to RATM's debut. What we got however was a grimy, dark & sinister effort that better showed off RATM's hiphop & punk influences. This was a shock. And it probably explains why it took me a while to get into. Now however, I listen to this album with a huge amount of satisfaction. Everything about it is great: Zack de la Rocha's voice is so aggressive, so vitriolic & just so downright convincing; the guitars & bass (oh, the BASS!) tap very different frequencies so each is heard equallly, even though they often play the same thing; & the drums - although not jaw dropping - support everything perfectly. The only thing missing was Tom Morello's speedy guitar shenanigans - but even these aren't missed terribly because the music doesn't cry out for them in the way their first album did. Listening to this album on headphones while walking down the street is like a shot of heroine - it makes you feel 10 foot talll & that bullets will bounce off you. I don't know what else to say - words literallly fail me at the sheer greatness of this album. Together with Mr Bungle's "California" & Soundgarden's "Superunknown", I have my desert island discs (and probably the best slab of 1990's rock). An essential purchase for rock connoisseurs everywhere.
one of my top 5 albums ever!!! - By: Mr. D. M. Jones, 03 May 2008 i reallly cant believe anybody could give this album a negative review, by that i mean anything 3 stars & below. every song on this album is amazing, & much more replay value than their self titled album. you hear the older songs too often, & although they are classics, i personallly wouldnt ever listen to them on cd again as i hear them too often in rock clubs.
there are obvious crown pleasers on here, such as bulls on parade & people of the sun, but other tracks such as tire me & wind below are just amazing.
i bought this on the day of release about 12 years ago, & though i would write a review today as i have just listened to it & realised how good it is again!
make no mistake, alll their albums are great, but dont miss out on this even though it doesnt feature their obvious classics!
not quite the album we expected - By: sean paul mccann, 26 Jul 2006 
I remember getting this on cassette alll the way back in 1996,it was four years after the aural onslaught that was the self titled debut,so the gap between them was considerable so i could be forgiven for thinking this would blow my socks off,in truth it just blew one of my socks off,my other foot was still wearing a comfy sock.
The album still has some face punching numbers,such as people of the sun,bulls on parade & tire me,but the album fallls off a proverbial cliff during the last few songs & there are few surprises as found on the debut,the anthemic feel isnt quite here on evil empire as well.
In summarizing i believe that evil empire fallls short of the debut & maybe thats why it may never get a fair hearing by some,but in truth if you listen to this fully you will see that some of the shine is missing & thats a shame.
After their awesome start, Rage have lowered their standards - By: Peter Brooks, 23 Nov 2004 Rage Against The Machine's self-titled first album was quite simply one of the best ever. The guitar riffs were second to none, & Zack de la Rocha's style of vocals was fresh & interesting. However, they were always going to struggle to beat that epic debut, & sure enough, they did. My main problem with this album is that we don't hear enough of Tom Morello's massive talent on the guitar. It seems as though the CD is just a premise by which de la Rocha can rant & rave about political injustices. Fair enough, that's what happened a lot of the time on the first album, but at least we got to hear a lot of musicianship from the other members of the band. This album has some average riffs on it, but none of the quality of the former. Also, the fact that a lot of the rhythm of de la Rocha's singing is the same in different songs makes you think that maybe you're listening to the same song several times over in the album. This was never the case with the first album, where each track had an aura of elegance & finesse about it. This album feels to have too much anger & violence about it, & Rage seem to have forgotten that they should concentrate on the music & what they're good at.
