The Taste of Blood "Predator" CD
[Tribunal]
Wait a minute... hold up... what's this? A churning and frantic yet subtly melodic metalcore band that... gasp... actually has some potential and takes a pretty creative stand on songwriting? I'll be damned, I think that is what we have here, folks, and I'm pretty fuckin' stunned myself, as the band name had me more than expecting another slab of melodic Swedish death metalcore bullshit. The last thing I anticipated was a shitload of viciously thick chugga styled power chords chock full of twisted time signatures and pseudo technical death metal riffing that actually holds some serious weight. Don't get me wrong, there are some minor shortcomings, but without a doubt this band holds the potential to absolutely annihilate most of their contemporaries. I'll go ahead and get the bad shit out of the way by saying that I'd definitely encourage the vocalist to calm down a bit. He's got a pretty fierce shout/yell going on, but I don't care for the forced growling or the constant shifts between barked growls and irritating snarls, which definitely tests my limits, due in no small part to the rhythmic nature of the vocal patterns. So it's actually the vocal performance that I find to be the biggest setback here. That's not a big deal of course, but I can't help but wonder how much stronger this record would already be if the dude focused on his hoarse midrange yelling as opposed to forcing out all of those unconvincingly guttural grunts. Other than that they'd just be well served to steer a little farther from some of the typical trappings of the modern metalcore genre. "Signature Tattered Rags" has some weak ass tremolo picking and a few melodic Swedish-ism that do nothing for me, and also demonstrates some of the overly groovy rhythm playing that sort of pushes me over the edge on occasion with this disc, too. On the other hand, check out that thick dissonance in "I Guess That's Why They Make Safety Pins"! Even if it don't stick around for too long, that shit leaves a mark! And they actually land on an oddly melodic and energetic hardcore chord progression later on that, while equally brief, keeps things moving pretty nicely. Both "Milestones Reduced to Garbage" and "Incapable of Abstract Thought" are fairly compact and energetic as well, blending a ton of different influences and running all over the place, but not getting to the point of being disjointed, which almost baffles me. "I've Stolen From Posters and Drawings" is the only other track that comes across as pretty generic, falling prey to more Swedish runs (granted they're stronger here than in "Signature Tattered Rags") and too much groovy chunky stuff and annoying pinch harmonics. But how about those fucked up winding rhythms and odd time signatures in "Business Finds Pleasure"? I'm loving that stuff. The fucked up little discordant changes, the rhythm playing, the quick little melodic bursts, and the wrenching, thick as hell power chords are where this band kicks some major ass. The recording is pretty damn nice as well. At times there are a few subtle inconsistencies in terms of density or rawness, but in most cases the mix is balanced and the tones sound forceful. I'm definitely wishing there was more bass present in the mix, but the drums sound pretty good, and I'm definitely digging the guitar tone. Sometimes there's too much bite during the faster death metal riffing, but the shit sounds excellent for all the churning power chord chugging and palm-muting, so I'm all for that. Another good move was making sure that the vocals are pretty controlled in the mix, because if the frontman was overpowering the guitars the results would likely be disastrous. The design looks solid in addition, keeping a consistent color scheme with nice looking photography and clean, tiny typefaces. The lyrics are somewhat commonplace in their exploration of violent imagery and issues of betrayal and revenge or whatever, but I've seen worse, and you can't understand a damn word of it anyway, so fuck it. In defense of the band's weaknesses, every song on the disc has some awesome riffs in it, so... there's no one track that's actually terrible or anything like that. And these dudes look young as hell, so... I'll definitely be looking for them to sign to a larger label and start doing some serious damage down the line. I could definitely see kids going apeshit over this, because The Taste of Blood's really close to the style of metalcore that's all the rage these days, but they're tighter, they write far better riffs, and they somehow manage to cram a million changes into three-minute songs and make it stick. I'm pretty impressed all things considered. As long as they retain their little bursts of melody and stick with the core of what they're doing here they should progress nicely, so... I'll keep my fingers crossed. Anyone who tosses this band off as the same old same old is sorely misguided. This is a shockingly promising debut. (7/10)
Running time - 34:03, Tracks: 10
[Notable tracks: I Guess That's Why They Make Safety Pins, Reduced to Garbage, Incapable of Abstract Thought, Business Finds Pleasure]
Tribunal Records - http://www.tribunalrecords.net

This review has been displayed 4495 times.