Whoopee. Yet another melodic Swedish death metalcore band "mixing it up" with typically chugging mosh breaks and vocals that tend to be gritty growls/shouts (in a hardcore vein) with some smooth singing as well, of course. And... what's this? Keyboards? Well, golly gee, Wally! This must be a real metal band! Sorry. No. Sure, there are a couple of guitar solos here, and it's more metal than hardcore, but it's still stale and rehashed metalcore. There's a lot of tremolo picking and subtle melodies, generic dual guitar harmonies, a few discordant riffs, burly simplistic mosh parts... everything you've heard a million times before. And what the fuck is up with the keyboards anyway? First of all, why are they there? They're so far back in the mix that they serve no purpose other than acting as a major distraction. Secondly, the synth arrangements have almost nothing to do with the song structures themselves. They add additional texture, but nothing fits. This would actually be somewhat tolerable (not good, tolerable) without the keyboards, but everything about the synths strikes me as stupid and unnecessary. The songwriting isn't terrible, it's just boring and I'm not into it. All of their good riffs were stolen from At the Gates, and there are some parts that sound like Pantera meets nu-metal and I'm not feeling that stuff. The recording is okay but it's too muddy and it holds them back. The drums are a weird mix of really rigid tones that are also overly thick in areas, the bass tends to get lost, the guitars are super heavy to an almost overproduced degree, and the vocals tend to sound fine. There aren't enough bright tones bringing out any real clarity, though. They're on the right track there, but the tones need a brighter edge to keep the density in check. The layout looks good, and totally professional, but it is cheesy and derivative. The bloody knife through the heart, the spattered blood... it looks far better than average here, but it's still pretty much the basic, blunt take on the imagery you'd expect to see on a record like this. And I'm not into the "fashion" aspect of it at all, what with the "models" pointing guns at one another and the band's silly image. There are a couple of band members that look like "regular people", where "regular" means "not trying too hard", and the rest of them are flaunting their tattoos, piercings, goofy hairstyles, etc. Hey, they're big and tough, so what? They're wearing eyeliner. I mean, shit, I listen to some stupid bands, flat out... but when it's coming from the "hardcore" scene, I have a hard time swallowing this image based fashion conscious crap. Need lyrics? "Fuck your world and fuck your kind. Go fuck yourself. You're fucking barely alive. I used to think of what you meant to me. I think of you every fucking day..." Been there, done that. Get rid of the stupid keyboards, focus on music rather than image, clean up the edges of the recording, and chop off a couple of songs from the total running time... then you'd be better off. Certain aspects of this release make me want to fucking vomit, and others make me see a lot of potential buried in there. But I'm not into what they're doing at the moment.
[Trustkill]
Running time - 44:56, Tracks: 12
[Notable tracks: On Wings of Lead]
Trustkill Records - http://www.trustkill.com
