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Rating:
7.5 |
Drawers - All Is One
October 2011
01. Caput Mortuum Ocean
02. Grey Sailor
03. Black Queen
04. Ivory Lighthouse
05. Blue Keel
06. Silver Hand
07. Purple Ride
08. Red Ballet
09. Electric Seat
10. Golden Adieu
11. Muddy Smoke
12. Azurite Constellation
Unless there is some obscure definition of Drawers of which I am unaware, they have one of the more odd choices for a band name. In addition to the place where you keep your socks and underwear, drawers is also a slang term for underwear.
Origin musings and vocab lesson aside, Drawers are another of those posty-sludge bands coming from the Solitude Productions family of sub-labels. Despite all the colorful song names, the music is generally murky - in a dark, foreboding way. It is also perhaps inconsistent.
So All Is One is murky sludgy. Crushing riffs, pounded drums, and throat-shredding vocals give way to occasional drop-out points for a few moments' respite before resuming. The rumbling low end of the bass guitar is also given some prominence in the mix and allowed to thunder under the songs and shine through, which is often a difficult feat with lower end, murkier music. The sound really works.
The songs themselves do go through ups and downs, though.
There are times where they hit a good crushing groove, like "Caput Mortuum Ocean", where they pound out a riff that sounds perhaps like Rising, only with a little less violent conviction. (Or is that violence convictions?)
"Purple Ride" has a bit of a groove when the song hits its stride that makes me smile (perhaps a loose mental correlation with Cathedral's tracks "Violet Vortex" and "Ride", which open The Ethereal Mirror), but the remainder of the song fails to live up.
It just seems across the board there are moments where this band occasionally breaks out and shines enough to make metal hippies trip balls (Oh! A sonic double rainbow! What does it mean?!?) - however, such spots are surrounded by long stretches of well executed, decent but not particularly inspired or memorable music.
That is perhaps the most frustrating thing about this release. It is good, with glimpses into some really great stuff, which leaves it a little flat as a whole. There are moments when it makes me want to go into beast mode and start breaking shit… but the momentum is not carried through the entirety of All Is One.
Again, a solid album that will have me expecting very good things from Drawers in the future if they can bring songs up to the standards some of their grooves and riffs attain.
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Performance:
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7 |
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Songwriting:
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7 |
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Originality:
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7 |
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Production:
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8 |
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Written on 16.03.2012 by
BitterCOld
BitterCOld has been officially reviewing albums for MetalStorm since 2009.
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Comments
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| Maybe it's an awful expression for "the ones that draw something". |
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A drawer is a piece of furniture. These guys are just late to the "I am the table" party.
Honestly I won't be checking this out. Most of these bands are beginning to sound too similar for my ears and it's a sound I'm not all that interested in to begin with. Another well-written review to add to the list, though. |
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