Sound: The Color Morale...I've had mixed feelings about this band for ages now. While they never brought anything truly new to the Metalcore scene, they did show promising musical chops and manage to put on a killer live show. However, their new album, My Demon In Your Eyes, is a deal breaker for me. The album is quite literally a re-hash of every metalcore album released in the past year (or three), offering almost nothing original. Are there screamed vocals? Yes. Breakdowns? Too many. Steriotypical clean vocals? Eh, why not? At their strongest here, TCM comes off as a weak Of Mice and Men, and at weakest any metalcore band formed out of a garage in high school.
It isn't fair though to say they didn't try. There are a few hints at some originality sparcely placed, from some cool lead lines to atmospheric effects. But like I said, they're sparce, and hardly compensate for the other 30 minutes of generic filler on this album. // 5
Lyrics and Singing: Lyrics range from relatively well written to absolute rubbish. Lines like "Are we all punished for sins of fathers/It seems so pointless to have an existence/In a world misused" come off with the type of raw power that makes you actually think about the words behind the growls. However, for every good line, there are about four either generic or just plain terrible lines. "Just get me out of this town/It's like a dried up,/lake full of debris and I am starting to drown" is the type of line I've heard rephrased different ways tons of times, which brings otherwise strong writing into obscurity.
Lyrical content aside, the delivery is what makes or breaks a band for most people, not content. In TCM's case, it breaks. The screams are almost exclusively low gutteral growls, which gets pretty old after the first three tracks (think We Came As Romans without any type of emotion). The cleans are generic as well, sticking in the singer's comfort zone the entire time, and sound relatively forced. Maybe time will improve both vocalist's delivery, but this go-around it was truly a low-point. // 3
Impression: The Color Morale need to step it up if they want to be recognized in the Metalcore scene instead of just fading into obscurity like most bands. They show promise musically, if they'd just write a melody line a bit more often and ween off of constant breakdowns. Songs like Human(s) Being and Walkers have the ability to entertain, but still don't stand out from any other metalcore band's filler material.
I have hope that The Color Morale CAN write better music, and quite possibly will, but if they can't, I sure hope they spare us album 3...
For fans of: We Came As Romans, Gwen Stacy, The Chariot // 5
WTF!? First of all, if you knew anything about guitars, you'd realsize that TCM uses so many different techniques and strange chords that no other bands use. This band is one of the most original bands out there today in a world filled with crappy generic scene bands such as Asking Alexandria. I respect your thoughts but I 100% disagree with everything in this review. I have to stand up for TCM because they are one of the most unique bands the scene has to offer. TCM FTW!
(and also the album is My DEVIL in Your Eyes, not DEMON. that might help.)