The Storm
Relentless
6.5
Synopsis:
Despite being a blatant example of crumbling, growling hardcore meets death metal, The Storm do more right than wrong.
Review:
I wanted to rip this with every fibre of my being. Every aspect of this release, from the artwork, the exaggerated death metal vocals of A..J Leschner, the many huge breakdowns, the gang chants, to the sloppy drumming, the semi melodic At The Gates cantering, the clean vocal injections and the clichéd acoustic track cried “myspacehotopiccare mediocrity!”, but five or six plays into Relentless, each time the album stopped I had a huge grin on my face.
And it's a strange dichotomy--it’s the over the top death metal bellows of AJ Leschner and plethora of breakdowns that actually make this an enjoyable album, assuming you are at least semi-tolerant of the whole metalcore/deathcore thing. That being said, this isn’t sheer deathcore, as it’s far more mid paced and less chaotic, but it isn’t sappy metalcore either, as its got pretty good sized balls. Tracks like “Epic Battle”, The Takeover”, “Never X Never”, “Jumping Ship”, “Burial Song” and the aptly titled closer, “Juggernaut”, deliver girthy if slightly ‘samey’ rumbling, even if some are littered with punkish gang chants. Also the sort of Destroy Destroy Destroy or 3 Inches of Blood sense of intentional hokey-ness that permeates the album (though I may be completely wrong and these guys are deadly serious) is a welcome change.
On the negative side, the gang chants, clean vocals and spoken word injections are awful, the drumming (and the music as a whole) is rudimentary and could be way tighter, and the piecemeal acoustic track “By Fear I Fall” is sheer cliché. Still, with a huge production and plenty of head snapping, Relentless is above average for the genre, and in the very least provides few moments of moshable entertainment.
