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The Classic
Struggle - Feel Like Hell - Metal Blade Records 2005
12 Songs
Running Time: 56:03
I'm pissed. Practically livid, in fact. How exactly does a band like South Carolina's
The Classic Struggle sneak three demos past my radar, only to bludgeon
my senses with what could be the best hardcore album of the
year?
The militant pummeling of 'Death March' is deceiving, and nearly had me thinking "Oh
Christ, not another Hatebreed-lite.", but that's only until
the flesh-rending thrash at the two-minute mark set this band firmly out of the
followers crowd
and into that of those actually struggling to find their own sound in a time
when
not encouraged to do so by the mass media. Sure, you could make references to The Crown or Ten Ton Diesel Head when discussing Feel
Like Hell, but if you dig
deeper, what you have is an album of intense battle metal slammed against passionate
hardcore, and not only living through the crash, but thriving in the wreckage.
'Amen To Artillery' begins with a near-doom riff, only to blast into the first
verse, then drag you down through a Bleed For Me-styled interlude - and we're
only thirty seconds into the song. Make no mistake about
it, The Classic Struggle should kneel and give thanks to the inventor of the
breakdown, because if you take those away, it trims this album to about half
of its extended playing time. Still and all, when the vocals bleed such passion,
when the music comes from the heart and not the desire to pad the wallet, it's
hard not to subscribe to The Classic Struggle's take on things. Lamb
Of God riffage and a more static style of chording place this band firmly in the New
Wave Of American Heavy Metal camp, as opposed to the more fluid chops of their
European counterparts. One of the shortest songs here, 'Burn The Fallen', uses
its 3:36 to cement this fact, rarely falling below warp speed, and clearing
a path for 'Storm Of Swords', which is my favourite on this disc. On 'Storm...',
TCS's Tyler Solnosky follows some oldschool tremolo action with off-time rhythm
while managing to inject a straight rock pattern into the attack (1:42-1:50).
'Claim Your Own' is another high point of an album filled with many already,
machinegun snares strafing the fleeing and fallen while Zlinsky's vocals rage
with the urgency of someone who's just swallowed a grenade.
Released through the partnership between Trevor Phipps' (Unearth) Ironclad
Recordings and heavyweight Metal Blade, Feel Like Hell will prove that there's
more to the hardcore scene than that which comes from Massachusetts. Clocking
in at just under an hour (the long album being a death sentence for a band
without the chops to back it up), The Classic Struggle have released the first
metalcore album of the year that can bear the name with pride instead of embarrassment.
www.theclassicstruggle.com |
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