An interesting listen. I was initially pulled to this based on the genre posted, Blackened Metalcore… I wish I could hear the “blackened” in the music. This sounds like all of the other Metalcore out there, this isn’t a bad thing, I was just expecting to hear some true Black Metal influence in the songs. It’s just not there. I hear other genre influences though. There’s a touch of Death Metal in some of the vocal stylings. Maybe even a hint of Djent in a few of the riffs. These could be intentional. If you’re a Metalcore fan this one is for you. If you were thinking of expanding your listening and looking for Black Metal influenced sub-genres, I’d say this is a skip.
No “artwork” on this one, so not much to critique. The photo is a good representation of the title of the album, however feels a little too overly obvious. Unmooring, when we’re talking emotional states, is defined as feeling disoriented, disconnected, or unanchored from one’s sense of stability (Cambridge Dictionary). Displaying someone standing in water up to their knees with a boat next to them feels like a missed opportunity to create some real tension with the artwork that would suit a greater sense of disorientation or feeling of disconnection.
There’s really nothing here that makes this anything more than just another Metalcore band chugging out guitar riffs, throaty vocals, and backing atmosphere. That’s not a bad thing, for fans of the Metalcore genre. They do have a previous EP that I’ll be listening to later today, maybe that’ll be more suited to the genre and they’ve just decided to change to a more mainstream Metalcore sound.
There are a few sections of creativity on this album. And you shouldn’t translate any of what I’ve said here into this being a bad album. It’s not. These single listen, first-impression reviews aren’t meant to be a deep dive into an album. They are, as the category name implies – one listen, write the review. So while I may miss out on some of the underlying structures that surface on a 3rd or 8th listen, as anyone who writes reviews on a regular basis can attest, sometimes a gut feeling is all it takes to form an impression on an album.
From a production perspective this is a clean album. Guitar tones are what you’d expect from a Metalcore band, deep and chunky distortion with a touch of reverb or delay, possibly both. Vocals are mixed well. Blending just a little where they need to. Sitting just above the mix in spots. Drums are clear, if maybe a little dull at points. Listening with my over-ear cans I can normally feel more of the beat from the drums on other albums. That presence just isn’t there with this one. The ambient background noise, presence… whatever you want to call it, is present and never overpowering.
The Bottom Line
While some might say, but you only listened to it once, and feel that listening a few more times would reveal those “blackened” elements to me – I say, if it takes more than 1 listen to realize a subgenre in your music, it’s probably not the correct subgenre. There is a website appearing in Google search results, the Meta description text is deathmetalband, yes all one word. However, the site is down so I can’t confirm if this is the same band. The new album has not been posted to their Bandcamp, which is why you won’t find a Bandcamp embed on this post. With this in mind I feel like the possible down website, the incorrect and varying genres online and the album not being on the band’s Bandcamp listing – all just equates to mismanagement.
As I’ve stated above, this is not a bad album. This is also not a great album. What this is, is a Metalcore album. If I were to base my rating on my disappointment of expecting something different, a blend of Metalcore and Black Metal, this would be a Just Don’t. There’s the odd shriek or two, but I don’t recall a single blast beat or tremolo picked guitar section. There just aren’t any elements that place this into the “Blackened” subgenre. As I don’t know if the listings I found for this album that promote the band as Blackened Metalcore are outdated or just a mix-up I took this out of the final judgement. I can’t say that I’m not disappointed. When you come into an album expecting one thing and get another… it’s like ordering Coke at the drive-thru and they give you Iced Tea, that first sip is just wrong.
