The Aristocrats Duck (2LPs)

What happens when the world's most raucous rock/fusion instrumental power trio decides to make a concept album? You get Duck, the story of a web-footed Antarctic Island native fleeing a penguin policeman to New York City...where considerable misadventure and danger await. The Aristocrats - Guthrie Govan/guitar, Bryan Beller/bass, Marco Minnemann/drums - have created a kaleidoscopic musical universe, employing both trademark genre pastiches and inventive new arrangement explorations - some surprisingly emotional and sensitive - to move the story along to its frantic conclusion. And while their evident virtuosity and inherent absurdity are present as always, it's now employed in the band's most ambitious compositional and sonic production to date.

"We've always been writing with a storytelling aspect in mind, and our live shows always include our stories behind the songs," says the band, speaking as one. "But the stories had mainly been about us. Then Marco came into the studio with a song about a duck, and we all looked at each other and said, 'What if all the stories for the songs on this album...happened to a duck? What's that story about?' And suddenly, we had a concept album on our hands."

The wildly diverse music follows the protagonist duck into a big city dance club ("Aristoclub") to being forcibly ejected from a dive bar ("Hey, Where's MY Drink Package") to a dark-riffed theme for his penguin pursuer ("Sgt. Rockhopper"), eventually concluding with the action-packed, Balkan-fusion finale "This Is Not Scrotum", featuring violinist Rusanda Panfili (Hans Zimmer Live) as a rare Aristocrats album special guest.

Mixed by Australian sonic guru Forrester Savell, and with original character artwork by Lance Myers (Space Jam), Duck is The Aristocrats' first new studio album in five years. And it's clear that Guthrie Govan, Bryan Beller, and Marco Minnemann have taken their collective artistry to a whole new mind-blowing - albeit ridiculous - level.