Razor Crusade "Are You Wired?" CD
[Reflections]
Damn, yet another great hardcore band from The Netherlands, and another that sounds a bit different from most of what I've heard from the country. This band was formed from the leftovers of Reaching Forward, and I actually enjoy this a lot more. This is melodic, driving post-hardcore styled music with ripping vocal screams, plodding basslines, forceful rhythms, controlled caustic guitar textures, etc. Some tracks are slightly more upbeat and almost catchy in an odd way, others more rhythmic with emphasis on the bass and drums, but they're all relatively short, and the EP ends almost too quickly, definitely leaving me wanting to hear more. Imagine a mix of Quicksand's "Manic Compression" with Shades Apart (circa "Save It") with a little bit of Boy Sets Fire and Drowningman thrown in. The production is really good. The bass tone is perfect, the drums sound great, the guitar tone is the standard for the genre (bright, ringing distortion with a good amount density, but nothing too heavy), etc. It might help to reign the vocals in, but I'm not really bothered by anything. The CD (which is actually a gold tint) comes in a slick glossy digipack that has several panels containing all of the lyrics and additional imagery similar to the cover, with some strangely bleak photos of a sky at sunrise/sunset, overlapped with various textures and landscape photographs, etc. As far as the content, the songs are personal and fairly open, but I'm not really taken by anything. It's fairly standard work. Not bad. "We are the symptom of a sickened world, A cancer in the laziness of irresponsibility, This is here, this is now, this is power, this is us..." Very cool. I'm looking forward to hearing more from this band. This brand of post-hardcore is less common these days than I'd expect, so I'm pleased to hear a band so effectively exploring these sounds once more. (7/10)
Running time - 11:39, Tracks: 6
[Notable tracks: Fountainhead, There is No Us]
Reflections Records - http://www.reflectionsrecords.com

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