Law of the Plague "The War Inside" CD
[Sinternational]
This is competent and promising death/thrash with a solid recording, it's just too bad the band is totally childish. This thing looks completely ridiculous. As if song titles like "Bite it You Scum" weren't enough, the layout is a joke. There are a ton of different fonts used, the imagery is boring, the band photos are embarrassing (they're all wearing camouflage face paint and camouflage suits)... and yes, the lyrics appear to have been written by five-year-olds. "Fuck your world, Fuck your life, Like to cut it with my knife, Fuck your rule, Fuck your law, Love to watch your empire fall, Fuck the way you look at me, Fuck the one you try to be, Fuck your name, Fuck your face, I'd love to put you in your place..." What? "Like to cut it with my knife"? "Fuck your face"? Are you fucking serious!? Get the fuck out of here... I can't believe they would waste what talents they have spouting such tripe. Musically it's pretty straightforward material. They've got a nice and heavy guitar sound, the vocals are generally gruff shouts or growls with some singing, the bass adds thickness, and the drums sound tolerable. Sometimes they'll use some effects on the leads that are annoying, or they'll get into an overly groovy mode that doesn't really work, but the faster riffing and the arrangements are pretty strong for the style. The clean intro to the title track sounds like it could've been on the first Machine Head record, and there are actually a pretty good number of chord progressions on here that sort of have that vibe... though perhaps a bit more aggressive, at least vocally if nothing else. I think the vocals can be mildly irritating at times, partly because the lyrics are so lame and some of that attitude carries over into the vocal delivery, but I must admit that I love the guitar tone and they do have some killer riffs popping up. Maybe the songs could be shorter on occasion... the tracks that top five or six minutes really need not drag on for that long, but whatever. Brutal honesty? I can't see this band going anywhere with the "image" they've presented of themselves with this CD. If the lyrics were more mature and the layout had some substance I might give this a 6/10 because I think they're on fairly solid ground musically, but the lyrics and band photos are so unforgivable that they're lucky to be walking away with a 5/10. (5/10)
Running time - 44:09, Tracks: 10
[Notable tracks: I'm more into some of the individual riffs rather than any of the complete songs]
Sinternational Records - http://www.sinternational.net

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