Summary Judgment
Of all the places I did not expect to find metalcore influence, it's folk metal. Yet that's just what I found with Italian folk metal band Krampus. They were introduced to me by a promotion company who billed them as a folk/death metal band. And at first, they do sound kind of like Eluveitie
. Until the vocals come in.
Ugh. Those clean metalcore style vocals. They also fall into other metalcore cliches. I guess I don't mind these breakdowns, and the trick where they have an extra growler over the top of the main growler for the words they want to highlight. And there are more growls than clean vocals. The music is actually pretty good, as far as metalcore goes. The breakdowns are not obnoxious, and some of the riffs are pretty good. I can't believe they're not billing it as folk metalcore, because that would seem to have mass appeal.Anyway, Krampus are kind of like Eluveitie meets As I Lay Dying
. I'm not a fan of the metalcore side of their sound, so I issue summary judgment against Kronos' Heritage. It is definitely different, though, so check it out.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteUgh is right . . . in my personal opinion (for it's a fact!), the countries amidst the communist-block have the only folk-metal bands worth listening to, save for a minute few scattered about eastern Europe. Besides, folk-metal is so 2007! And on another note, I must admit I'm only impressed by one of the few Italian metal bands I've stumbled upon: Fear of Eternity; overall, I don't like overly-produced records and that's all I've heard from Italian metal bands. And that name, Krampus? I'm sure that name may have some meaning, but it sounds like the scientific terminology for "physical pain resulting from menstra." And it's Cronos!
ReplyDeleteKrampus is a counterpart to Santa Claus in some traditions, who punishes bad children . . . I'm not sure why such a nice guy like St. Nick is hanging out with him. Even as scary as the guy is supposed to look, it's still a dumb name for a band, because (a) it sounds bad to people who don't know who it is, and (b) it's a demon that shows up on Christmas and hangs out with Santa--probably the least scary demon ever.
ReplyDeleteHa!
ReplyDeleteI'm curious, what do you mean when you issue summary judgment on an album?
ReplyDeleteAccording to the Wikipedia article, "In law, a summary judgment is a determination made by a court without a full trial. Such a judgment may be issued as to the merits of an entire case, or of specific issues in that case."
ReplyDeleteFor a full review, I give the album at least three listens (usually more), usually over the course of at least a week, to allow myself to digest it. I then give some fleshed-out thoughts on it and give a score. When I issue "summary judgment," I've decided not to listen to the album more than once (maybe I didn't even finish it, but I'll say so if that's the case), and to give only a brief explanation instead of a full review. Similar to summary judgment in law, I do it because there's a deal-breaker in it for me (much like a simple dispositive legal issue). Thus far I've had a policy of devoting a post to every band that's contacted me (and I feel like I owe them that if they're giving me a free promo), and this allows me to do that without forcing myself to listen to something I really don't like.
It's part of my whole legal theme, which includes calling my interviews depositions (as of the most recent one), as well as metal briefs (brief discussions of three related albums), motions for reconsideration (a fresh look at attitudes toward an older album), giving a "verdict" on my reviews, calling comments "objections", and probably other things I can't think of right now.
Ok, that's a fair way to handle stuff you don't like. Thanks for the explanation, perhaps you could add it to your "Rating Scale" page?
ReplyDeleteI only post about albums I like, the exception being albums added to record label Bandcamps (where I try to track all of them).
I liked this one
Good idea!
ReplyDelete