Revolting Breed
Rise Against
7.5
Formed in Greece in 2004, Revolting Breed play an aggressive modern style of thrash that will appeal to fans of early The Haunted, early Carnal Forge, and darn near anything churned forth by German thrash gurus Dew-Scented. Simply put, the band is not doing anything fans in the know haven’t heard before, but god damn if they haven’t put together a tasty little slab of flesh searing, face melting thrash metal that is awfully impressive considering it is a completely self-produced, self-financed recording.
After a short little intro, follow-up song "Condemned to Live" rips through the gate with an urgent pace driven by some slightly triggered and fiercely quick double kicks that will drop the jaw in awe, not to mention some luminous fill work and nominal usage of some blast beats. When you listen to other numbers, such as the ferociously vigorous "Backspit", the hate-laced beast that is "Fighting Null", or the head severing you’ll receive near the end of closer "…Scattered in Apathy", it’s evident the man has been playing for years with an obviously strict practice regimen that’s enabled him to play as solidly and competently as he does. This performance, along with sizzling riff after riff after riff, is what helps blast the music along from song to song.
It’s not all about speed when it comes to the Greek five-piece as heard during the lurching verse section of title-track "Rise Against", the groove-laden riff-thrashery of "The Will Crusher", or the tightly executed riff n’ kick interplay during "Inbreeding Insanity" and "Let My Hate Breed". The slower, chunkier moments are plentiful, and I can’t help but feel the desire to start throwing furniture around during what has resulted in multiple listens. The vocals are a cross between the harsher growls of former The Haunted throat Marco Aro and the angered seer of Dew-Scented croaker Leif Jensen. There isn’t a whole lot of variation in the delivery, but the vocals match the intensity of the music to perfection in that the level of hatred is equally felt and heard from both instrument and vocal chords throughout each number.
With 14 songs total on Rise Against, I feel the album would have been better served by having about four or five less songs, as the band could have focused more on making a shorter but more complete album rather than having songs that sometimes seem to blend in with one another at certain points. Also to be pointed out is the lack of melodic licks in some of the tracks. With a dual axe attack it’s almost disappointing that the individual parts didn’t go off on their own from time to time creating more variety - I know, I've always been a stickler about that, and I always will be. Don’t get me wrong though, because the double guitar penetration is crushingly tight and the neck snapping riffs pave the way throughout much of the album, but even some crafty harmonies or a lead or two tossed in here and there would have added a little bit o’ spice to the mix.
At the end of the day, as pointed out above, we are not hearing anything on this beast that hasn’t been done already. But what we are hearing is a very solid debut by a band that - if it were up to me - should be taking the places of bands like The Haunted, Carnal Forge, et al who have seemingly forgotten that this is what creating infectious thrash is all about. Dew-Scented get it, and as pointed out by Matt Mooring in his recent review of the latest endeavor by said group, they take on a "if it ain’t broke then don’t fix it" approach. Other than injecting a bit more melody on their next outing, Revolting Breed shouldn’t change a damn thing on the follow-up release. If this style is to your liking then I have no choice but to urge you to support this band. Overdone style or not, Revolting Breed do it well and I hope some labels take notice and scoop up this impressive group.
