| Evergreen Terrace - Wolfbiker
I can't honestly say I've been a fan of Florida five piece Evergreen Terrace in the past. At the prodding of friends, and intrigued by the fact that they're named after the street where The Simpsons live, I have given an ear to their previous tracks, and although I didnt hate them, I didnt love them either.
Wolfbiker doesn't represent much of a change in direction for the band, but the production on this album is noticeably superior to what I've heard from their previous efforts. Despite the fact that it seems to be largely more of the same, I found myself enjoying Wolfbiker.
As you'd expect from a hardcore band, it's full of heavy riffs (although perhaps more unexpectedly, they are easily air-guitar-compatible) and a lot of guttural vocals, but there's a little more to it than that. The occasional changes in vocal style, somewhat rousing choruses, and interesting music structures that have always been present in ET's work are a little more prominent this time around, and this helps to raise it above the dross that seems to characterise the hardcore genre at the present time.
I won't give you a run-through of the songs on the album, but no prizes for guessing that the best track on the album is the eponymous Wolfbiker, guaranteed to keep both moshers and those who want to sing along happy. Other than that, a few tracks toward the end seem to be filler to some degree, but thats my only real complaint with the album.
At times they resemble a hundred other bands I that I can't quite put my finger on, but the one band they most often sound like, on this album at least, is a heavier version of CKY, and to me that isn't a bad thing. I'd put it on my portable mp3 player, but I wouldnt rank it in the top ten hardcore albums of all time, I'm afraid.
Wolfbiker is due to be released on 24th July, 2007, on Metal Blade Records. |
