Much like the recent release of label mates A Thousand Times Repent, Georgia’s Hereafter An Odyssey deliver an EP (which was originally self released by the band) plying a style that’s been done to death (core), but do it well enough to warrant your attention if you are a fan of the genre, or new to the genre.
While no All Shall Perish or Whitechapel, HAO’s sound lies somewhere between the German metalcore sound (Heaven Shall Burn, Six Reasons to Kill, Neaera), the crumbling, pseudo death metal stylings of their US Peers (JFAC, etc) and the more melodic, arpeggio filled likes of BTBAM, For Today, Fate and such. So then you know you are in for a pretty unoriginal and cliché filled 5 tracks (including one intro), but still, HAO do it with above average, promising results.
Though not quite as experimental as A Thousand Times Repent as there are no clean vocals or ballads, however, HAO do have a solid grasp of guitar play as tracks like “Absurdist Movement”, “Enduring the Battle”, “A Night of DMT” and especially outstanding, epic closer “Next to Clouds” (which has some very Prayer For Cleansing sounding guitar work) litter the expected ATG hack n slash meets rumbling death metal breakdowns and dual vocal contrivances with some very nice leads and time changes.
In all, a promising effort that puts them on my ‘new young core styled band to keep an eye on radar’ along with their aforementioned label mates, Fate, Across the Sun and a few others.
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i dig
on Jul 9th, 2008 at 17:44This didn’t really sound too appealing to me.
You definitely nailed it the on the head with the review.
Just on a side note to Erik, you have written some really good reviews. I enjoy reading them, you don’t put out any bullshit, and you definitely say if you are going to like it or not.
Good stuff.
on Jul 30th, 2008 at 08:26