A VITAL MESSAGE – Distances EP

By blending the best elements of Bullet For My Valentine, All That Remains and Shadows Fall with the kind of very commercial choruses championed by Killswitch Engage, this Florida metalcore/post-hardcore based band may not sound wholly original, but there’s no escaping that, in places, A Vital Message manage to push all the right buttons on their 2011 EP.

The strength of this EP isn’t immediately obvious, however, since opening the number attempts to fit too much into a four minute package. After a melody filled intro featuring a simple guitar riff played over some solid pneumatic drums, the first half of ‘The Blind’ favours djent-edged riffs, leading to an all round preference for heaviness over anything else. As is often the case with metalcore, the chorus eschews growling voices for a studio treated clean vocal. This provides a nice contrast (as expected) but that chorus isn’t quite as strong as it could have been – any melodies are still being somewhat pummelled by the heavy riffs. The riffs are cool enough, but there’s a sense that A Vital Message are capable of more. Luckily, during the track’s second half, things definitely improve. A brief instrumental break lightens the mood near at the tracks end; the second part of which capitalises on the melodies hinted at in the intro and the clean guitars ring out wonderfully, in a style that hints at a more progressive metal stance. And then, just as the tune begins to pull the listener in…it ends. Don’t be fooled, though: this is by no means a bad opening statement – the musicians here are as tight as any of those working in a similar field, it just leaves a nagging feeling that the chorus could have been more instant and so much more should have been made of that intro and coda.

In terms of aggression, ‘Who Are You’ fares better all round, since the gulf between sledgehammer riffs and melodies is far wider. During the verses, Jon Jordan adopts a full-on throatiness in his delivery, one to match any number of hardcore punk or metal bands. As he offers the thought “are you running, you should be fucking scared” over a mid-paced, pounding riff, the intensity is such you’d have a hard job to argue with him. The fastest riffing, again, has much in common with the djent community and the chorus adds a more melodic bent, full of clean vocals and an emo-ish anxiety. Unlike ‘The Blind’, this chorus really shines – so much so, it’s hard to believe these guys weren’t snapped up by a major label for this release.

‘If It’s Legal It’s On Camera’ starts with a great intro, combining more clean-toned guitar lines and a slower djent-filled metallic riff. There’s a brief moment where Jordan teases by throwing in a dirty, dirty growl in the melodic death metal vein, but this never fully develops; it merely serves as a bridge into the song’s first verse. While this doesn’t offer anything markedly different from ‘Who Are You’, it’s worth keeping a keen ear, as complex guitar parts busy away incessantly – almost throughout the entire number – and these parts (again, borrowing influence from more math metal/progressive metal influences) provide a superb counterpart to the more in-your-face elements. The chorus follows a similar structure to that of ‘Who You Are’, whereby the studio-treated vocals bring a strong sense of melody and commercial edge to another otherwise sledgehammer riff. Although each of these EP tracks have their own strengths and weaknesses, this number is almost perfect. If you want to experience A Vital Message at their absolute best, this is the best entry point.

The closing track, ‘2009’, presents a slight musical curveball. While the heavy riffing and drum pedals are present and correct in places, the band shifts from their usual metalcore sound into a much punkier territory, and increases their use of clean vocals (more so than even on the other numbers, reinforced by a second clean voice courtesy of Ashley Loyd). It couldn’t ever be described as throwaway, but there’s certainly a more fun air here. A Vital Message still sound like a strong outfit here, but musically it’s nowhere near as insistent as this band are capable of being.

When A Vital Message get it right, the combination of great musicianship and faultless production (so good that other DIY bands should take note) is definitely worthy of much bigger things. Those who don’t dig any of the bands mentioned here are unlikely to be swayed, but metalcore fans really ought to check this out. ‘If It’s Legal…’ is worth the time alone.

February/March 2012

New free track from The Pineapple Thief

UK proggers The Pineapple Thief are giving away free music! Ahead of the release of their next album, you can download a new track in exchange for an email address.

‘Last Man Standing’ is taken from their 2012 release ‘All The Wars’ which won’t be released until September 3rd.

Initial copies of ‘All The Wars’ will feature a bonus disc containing exclusive acoustic re-recordings and a new version of ‘Light Up Your Eyes’, a track originally featured on their 2005 album ’10 Stories Down’.

Get your free download of ‘Last Man Standing’ by visiting the Pineapple Thief website.

‘All The Wars’ confirmed tracklist:

Burning Pieces
Warm Seas
Last Man Standing
All the Wars
Build a World
Give It Back
Someone Pull me Out
One More Step Away
Reaching Out

Special edition bonus acoustic tracks:
Warm Seas
Reaching Out
Last Man Standing
One More Step Away
All the Wars
Every Last Moment
Someone Pull Me Out

+ Light Up Your Eyes (2012 version)

Seventh Wonder vocalist officially joins Kamelot

Symphonic metal outfit Kamelot have officially announced the appointment of a new vocalist.

Joining the band as frontman is Tommy Karevik, previously of AOR band Seventh Wonder.  Karevik replaces previous vocalist Roy Khan, who left Kamelot in 2011 for “personal reasons”. Although he’s taken on duties as Kamelot’s vocalist, Karevik says he has no plans to leave Seventh Wonder.

In addition to being a member of Seventh Wonder, Karevik previously performed as vocalist with hard rock band Firecracker, on their sole release, 2010’s ‘Born of Fire’.   [read a Firecracker review here]

OXYGEN – Final Warning

Swedish vocalist Tony Niva’s career got off to a slow start.  His first band Zanity recorded a demo which ultimately gathered no interest.  The following year, he collaborated with cult glam metal band Swedish Erotica [a wholly second division band whose 1989 debut contained one bright spark in the rather silly ‘Welcome To Rock ‘n’ Roll City’].   Following brief stints with more local bands with truly bad monikers, by the mid 90s, Niva was fronting his own eponymously titled band, which yielded one full length LP – 1994’s Japanese only release ‘No Capitulation’.  In 2011, Niva (the band) released second album, the appallingly titled ‘Gold From The Future’, a disc which, once again, failed to get a release outside of Japan.

In 2012, Tony reappeared as the frontman of yet another new band, Oxygen.   Oxygen’s debut release ‘Final Warning’ (released in the summer of 2012) may have been touted as a new release, but in fact, is just a repackaged version of ‘Gold From The Future’ aimed at the UK/European market.  Since few people actually heard ‘Gold’ the first time around, such a rebranding isn’t entirely unreasonable, and the Oxygen name fits much better with the album’s recurring environmental themes.

Kicking off with the mid-paced rock of ‘Janitor of Love’ (surely a mistake in translation), the band sound relatively tough – the guitars have a reasonable crunch (at least to begin with), and Niva’s vocals are very assured.  By the track’s end, though, it becomes obvious there’s something that’s not entirely right: the guitars step back and slowly become a mush that’s almost barely audible behind a vocal that’s just far, far, too loud.  Yes, vocalists provide an important role in most rock bands, but here, Niva’s Tony Harnell-esque wailing seems to come at the expense of almost everything else.  If you can make it past that (and stop laughing at the bad title), this track actually makes for a reasonable opener, with melodic hooks and a technically sound guitar solo.   ‘Anything For You’ with its hard, punchy rhythm, augmented by a strong chorus with more harmonies than before continues things in a similar vein, but much better still is ‘When Tomorrow Never Comes’, which, despite plundering a whole world of predictable clichéd sounds, manages to achieve excellent results.  Strong vocals, great chorus and a killer guitar solo push the right buttons, and while (once again) the vocal could do with softening, the band sound like they’re really getting off on what they do.

While those first few tracks show promise (at least in terms of simple melodic rock chops, if not studio engineering and suchlike), it’s not long before Niva’s voice becomes far too overbearing.  With each passing song, he just seems to get louder.  There’s no denying there is power in his delivery, but like TNT’s Tony Harnell or Shy’s Tony Mills [hey, this must be an affliction that affects people called Tony!] he’d sound so much better if he could just reign it in.  ‘Gold From The Future’, in particular, is so vocally over the top, it almost sounds like he taking the piss.  There are some painful high registers here, which when combined with muddy keyboards and a whole world of Scandinavian pomp, doesn’t make for a pleasant listening experience at all.  Similarly, the title cut features Niva going all-out vocally, while he’s backed by various shreddy guitar moments  and despite the band’s best efforts to temper these with a far more AOR-friendly chorus, it’s not enough to stop everything sounding like a dense and forgettable four minutes.

In theory, ‘Final Warning’ has all the makings of a really enjoyable melodic rock disc:  The band clearly know how to pen a melodic chorus and Roger Ljunggren’s lead guitar work is mostly spot on.  However, in reality, that voice is very much a love it/hate it affair. As a result, despite being only just over half an hour long, this disc is very hard to listen to all the way through in one sitting…and for something aimed at the melodic rock crowd, that’s not really ideal.

June 2012

Dirty Three to tour UK in November

Australian trio (the) Dirty Three have announced a run of UK dates scheduled for November 2012.

The band – featuring ex-Grinderman and sometime Bad Seeds member Warren Ellis – released their eighth album, ‘Toward The Low Sun’ in February.  The short run of dates finishes with an appearance at London’s Shepherd’s Bush Empire.

Dirty Three UK tour dates, November 2012:

Birmingham Glee Club (20th)
Manchester Cathedral (21st)
Dublin Button Factory (23rd)
Glasgow Oran Mor (25th)
Gateshead The Sage Theatre (26th)
Bristol Trinity (27th)
O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire (28th)