What do you know? Another screamo sounding release that actually wins me over!? With songs ranging from less than three minutes to more than six minutes this Canadian act covers a lot of ground, never letting up on the frantic screaming vocals but musically offering everything from standard jangly clean passages and intense guitar textures with noisy picking speeds to sparse clean breaks with light effects adding more atmosphere. During such calmer moments (musically) the drumming really starts to shine with some nice flare on the cymbals and such, and it's also interesting that much of this material is only melodic in very abstract manners. The recording isn't as clear as I'd like, but the maniacal vocals are kept in check well against the instruments, the bass presence is pretty solid and possesses just enough distortion to add a little more bite, and the guitars aren't all that acerbic, so everything tends to come across as lightly rugged and has a bite, but still works out fine. I'd like to hear the rhythm section given as much clarity as possible though, as the drummer is tight as fuck and I like the bass parts, but while natural the tones there aren't quite robust enough to really nail it home. The guitars are solid, however, actually getting somewhat heavy on rare occasions of quick chunkiness. The writing uses a good variety of tempo changes and dynamic shifts without many inconsistencies, so the songs can sound similar to one another, but that doesn't bother me. Opener "Speechless for Once" has some of the most creative layering and note-based riffing in its ranks, making for an early standout (and my favorite song herein) that lets the melody come through a little more up front; "Ashes" breaks in right away with stuttered percussive patterns and pulsing bass behind more raging guitar chords that lock in with the drums later on and beef up just a touch before dropping back to faint bass and guitars with very distant vocals; "Flatlands and Graveyards" has another really sparse break with panned clean riffing and prominent bass; and "Beggars and Bones" opens very softly with a darker sort of edge and sort of shifts back and forth from powerful surges of intensity to spacious rhythms for more than six minutes. The layout looks absolutely fucking incredible on this thing, done up almost entirely with handwritten text and collaged imagery that looks really fucking awesome and probably took an obnoxious amount of time to put together. It was damn worth it though, even if the lyrics can be an immense pain in the ass to read. Fuck it - it was totally worth it! This is absolutely one of the best looking CD's I've seen in awhile, it's got a unique feel to it and you don't see this kind of stuff very often at all. This is good stuff, and definitely amongst the tighter and more effective acts out there within this general style. If you're into this stuff definitely give this one a shot, I don't think you'll be disappointed.
[Exotic Fever]
Running time - 30:21, Tracks: 7
[Notable tracks: Speechless for Once, Ashes, Beggars and Bones]
Exotic Fever Records - http://www.exoticfever.com
