Step "Suffer in Your Stillness" CD
[Illumina]
I was pretty surprised by this band's blend of hardcore/metalcore styles on their last CD, and that continues here, but this time things have gotten more metallic. There's a little bit of a melodic Swedish death metal thing going on, but not too much, and even when they do drop those riffs they're a lot more original than usual. And there's still a NYHC sort of influence to the heavier breaks, as well as a classic 90's metalcore vibe (and I love that). All sorts of vocals are present - from aggressive screams and shouting to speaking and unique singing. They make use of some really creative chord progressions and nice clean breaks... there's just a lot going on. Shit, the opening track is more than eight minutes and runs the gamut of their sundry styles, and most of the other tracks run more than five minutes as well! Shaving a few minutes off wouldn't hurt in a few cases, but generally it's not a problem. I can hear everything from Turning Point and Fury of Five to Darkest Hour and Four Walls Falling in here, and they manage to pull it off most of the time from a songwriting standpoint, it's just the sound that needs work. It's an inconsistent recording. Some songs are louder and a lot cleaner ("Oceans of Lifeless Ashes", ironically the oldest song, sounds the best as it's fuller and heavier), while others are quieter and rawer, so I assume this wasn't mastered. There's not always enough bass in the mix, but other than that it's just a matter of actual tones. I do like the bass tone, it's really smooth and well defined, and the drums are rough but workable, as are the vocals... but the guitar tone is too ragged for their style. It does retain clarity, but it gets too choppy. They need a smooth, well-rounded sound with a lot of heaviness. If everything sounded like "Oceans of Lifeless Ashes" they'd be on the right track, because that would be a strong sound for what is basically a full-length demo of sorts. The CD-R comes in a thin sleeve xeroxed on lightly textured cream-colored paper. The front cover image looks like a stone walkway or something like that. Inside is a thick xeroxed booklet with tons of information (all of the lyrics and rather lengthy song explanations). I'm pretty impressed by the depth of information provided, as well as the length of both the descriptions and the lyrics themselves. It's quite a bit more to offer than their last effort. I'll let these examples speak for themselves. Lyrics: "Broken down through millenniums of failure a history of self defeat robbed of dignity stripped of the confidence imperative to break the cycle there's no way out where there is a will there is a way the fallacies which bring you down are a myth don't let them have you elites make us focus on unattainable priorities when the true sustainability is right before our eyes..." Explanations: "Living within an absolute truth can lead to the same tragedy that may come with a lack of commitment to the same truth. Balance is the key. The last thing I want to do is to shut myself out from the opportunity to experience everything this life and planet have to offer because of some set of established rules that can ultimately not be proven to be in my best interests. We must always weight the positive and negative attributes in any given situation and choose the path that will offer us our greatest potential..." I feel for these guys, because they've got a lot going for them, but they seem to be having a hard time getting everything in order. If they hone the production and tighten their performances a bit (work on the leads and the singing, make sure everything stays in tune, etc.) they really could have something. I have to give them credit for the valiant effort... (5/10)
Running time - 50:23, Tracks: 8
[Notable tracks: Oceans of Lifeless Ashes, Reverse the Downfall]
Step - xstepx@hotmail.com

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