Hmmm, yeah, this is one of those reissues that I see no real reason for. This band hasn't released much, and this EP isn't that old (the original press is still available directly from the band) in the first place. Beyond that, this came before their last full-length, which was severely flawed in and of itself. So, as you can guess, these songs are problematic as well. The playing isn't nearly as tight as it needs to be, the writing is rather boring and jumbled with riff after riff and no real cohesion or sense of fluidity, the recording is a little rough, etc. I'm just not into it. There are cool parts, but the songs aren't well written, and the problems with performance and recording often overshadow the good riffs as well. It's basically melodic metalcore with a ton of caustic dissonance in the form of tremolo picking riffs, jarring chords, disharmonic note choices, a few technical metal riffs that are played rather sloppily, generic screaming vocals with spoken passages, and so on. Oh, and don't forget the occasional chugga styled break. For an example of how painful they can get check out the ridiculous pinch harmonics and shoddy picking in "Tied to a Stranger's Hand". Awful. The production sounds alright since the basslines (which are solid) can be heard and the drums are tolerable, but the guitar tone has a bite and there are some significant tuning (and possibly intonation) issues between the two guitars. The vocals actually sound good for what they are, but the mix favors drums and vocals over guitars and doesn't really do much for me as a whole. The last two tracks were recorded live with the band's new vocalist, and they're listenable, but the sound is still pretty bad. The guitars are unbalanced (louder on the left, thicker on the right) and the overall mix is muddy, but I love the fact that you can hear the basslines very well - helping solidify the fact that the bassist in this band is by far the most promising musician of them all (his lines are raging all over the place, he plays with his fingers and really handles himself well). They're no messier live than they are on record, which is good, but of course a lot of performance issues are evident. The vocals are a little deeper and throatier, but I'm not sure how this guy would compare to the old vocalist in the studio. There's no great change there. The layout's not that hot. The booklet folds out from an off-center cut down the right side of the cover, which is a nice touch, but the art is all jumbled and sort of ugly. Same goes with the text, it just feels cramped and bland. Lyrically expect whiny sort of stripped down personal content with no real substance: "With this anguish, Holding onto your soul, I can't wipe these tears, Sadness pins me down..." No thanks. There's supposed to be some live footage on the CD-Rom portion from Furnace Fest, but the Windows Media video wouldn't run on my machine for some reason (people should really only use QuickTime, damnit). I have to pass on this band again. Their bassist should quit and practice just a bit more, because he could probably reach Steve DiGiorgio level, and would be far better off in a technical metal band that actually writes songs with feeling. This stuff just does nothing for me.
[Thorp]
Running time - 29:54, Tracks: 6
[Notable tracks: I'm not into any one song as a whole]
Thorp Records - http://www.thorprecords.com
