Sinning is Our Savior "Painted With Utter Desolation" CD
[self-released]
I don't know how I feel about this, but it's not as good as I had hoped nor anticipated based on its tactful design. I quite like the layout here. The coloring and imagery is consistent, I really like the compact appearance of the typefaces used, etc. Definitely well handled for a self-released effort. But the music is a little disjointed and unoriginal for me. The opening track is an instrumental that has that aimless technical stance to it, almost like a Dillinger inspired metalcore type of thing, whereas the rest of the songs are more in the vein of traditional metal fused with melodic Swedish death/thrash, complete with tons of little leads, gruff yelling/growling vocals, etc. That's okay, I don't mind it (despite the fact that it's largely bland and uninspired), but I don't get into the chunkier rhythms at all, they just don't fit one bit, and there are a lot of outside influences that are cool, but accent the tracks rather than being a focus. Some of the clean passages are awesome, the melodic and energetic 80's metal styled riffing is often awesome (at times reminding me of a far less intense/developed Arsis actually), especially when the band's complex playing is tight and on point (which is usually the case, they rarely start to falter), etc. The biggest problem here is that, even though most of the songs run only four to five minutes, the songwriting isn't very good at all. There are too many changes crammed together for no reason, the structures aren't at all linear as there aren't many strong transitions, the bulk of the riffing is generic or plain rather than focusing on the band's true power, and so on. It's a shame, because they seem to be strong performers (some of the lead styled rhythm runs are totally amazing), and there are some awesome fucking riffs on this thing, but the songs are still really lackluster. Also problematic is the recording. I enjoy the lead guitar tone a lot because it's clear and smooth, while the rhythm tone is close but just a little too crunchy and strange to really work. But the only other thing I like about the recording is that the bass tone is really defined and plays a role aside from the guitars, though nothing really sounds very good. The drums tend to sound like machines a lot of times and the kicks are way too floppy, the vocals sound atrocious and really emphasize a lot of vocal strain and weakness across the board, etc. They're on the right track, despite those faults, but they need a lot of work on the vocals especially. That really dry vocal tone sounds very out of place against the warmer instrumentation, and I honestly think the vocals suck. As far as the lyrics go, the content is pretty abstract, but definitely on the darker side, and I can appreciate that: "Lord of flies now substitutes the light, humanity already signed on the dotted line, With the blood from the one called god's son, Temptation damned creation all to ruins, paradise of suffering in the beginning." The bottom line here is that the songwriting needs to take a major step up. If the songs were well written they could inch by with this recording, and they could probably even make it through with these vocals. I know they've got the ability to do it because some of these riffs are killer, they just need to really think about what they want to achieve musically and set out to do it. Technicality for no reason is never all that worthwhile, and throwing a wide array of influences into the mix can also be a big setback if it's not handled with a certain degree of consideration. I sincerely hope these guys get it together, because there's too much potential here to let it rot like this. The opening riffs to "Coalition for the Grievous" are fucking sweet as hell, they need to recognize what they're best at and hone in on it with no remorse. (5/10)
Running time - 45:02, Tracks: 10
[Notable tracks: Coalition for the Grievous]
Sinning is Our Savior - http://www.sinningisoursavior.net

This review has been displayed 1782 times.