I made a post a while back regarding the latest Scorpion album, Humanity. I've had time since then to spin the disc no less than twenty times. I don't say this lightly, it comes from me with very high recommendations. Granted, you will have to be able to cross over into the metal category, albeit quinquagenarian-style, to be able to embrace the album. Fuck-it, open your mind. What you will find is an album that does a very solid job of describing some of the finer things that are human.

I will not go into an anthology of the band. That has been done before. What is of note is the the Scorpions prove, with this latest album, why the Rolling Stones completely suck beyond all comprehension. While Mic and the galactically embalmed have been producing the same mediocre, formulaic material for decades, a similarly aged band has been attempting new material. With the latest offering, the Scorpions bring in Desmond Child and take a swing at an album that loosely resembles a concept album. The results are fantastic. Not only is the album catchy like the clap, parts of it are actually beautifully composed. I know, it's hard to type that in regards to a Scorpion album.

Still, I cannot help but listen to the album and get a good reflective choke at parts, a spirited uplift at others and a nice smirk in your general direction towards the end. All of this without the mention of religion, which is most conspicuous, given our recent discussions: three, two...one.

Human nature is the reason
For our downfall
And we deserve it playing God
With our machines
Our religions are a prison
That's our fatal flaw
Bombs are flying
While we're sleeping with the enemy...Source: Hour One

I cannot help but juxtapose this album into the meat grinder that we get from Dawkins and Steyn. With Steyn we get the current state of events indicate non-secular is kicking the crap out of the secular, in terms of the reproductive hit-parade. Which is interesting, when considering that Dawkins, the premier biologist of his time, considers the power of science enough to satisfy the intellect. Satisfied or not, not making babies is a sure way to lose the race. That left me with the thought that humanity cannot exist without religion, in some shape or form. And then again maybe not.

What the Scorpions have presented here is an album that articulates ambition, aspiration, remorse, love, masochism, addiction, honesty and acceptance all without the higher-power jargon that other artists choose to associate with these feelings. The Scorpions describe what it is to be human, and nothing more than that. If you only get a few minutes to convince yourself, try these: We Were Born to Fly, The Future Never Dies, Your Last Song, Love is War. (And yeah, that's Billy Corgan in The Cross.)

I'm putting in my prediction for album of the year, in the metal genre.