Varioius Artists
Stainless: Dutch Metalcore Comp (released 2007)
Tocado Records - www.tocado.com
What we have here is a compilation of metalcore bands found throughout the netherlands. Sixteen tracks of fastpace hardcore punk and rock, mixed with enough metal flavors to make it metalcore. Get it? Metal plus hardcore gives you metalcore. I think that's how it goes? Anyway, the majority of the tracks are downright brutal. Heavy, blisteringly fast, and full of the expected throat shredding vocals. I never knew there was such a vibrant metalcore scene in The Netherlands, but here I am listening to some rather great material. Within the sixteen tracks featured are contributions from nine artists. One of my favorite tracks, not that any one is more or less better, is Return To Reason's "Remain Inside". The violent assult that the band delivers on the track is hardcore, not metal, there are flashes of metal rock from the likes of Coheed, but this is a beatdown awaiting you. What I find strange about this album though, is that there are quite a few live tracks... Or maybe it sounded as though they were live, as there were a few tracks with the audience clapping and screaming at the end of a few songs. That's pretty impressive if the live show is recording quality. You don't often find that in the hardcore scene, that is for the live set to transfer so well to disc. In my experience, hardcore, metalcore or any core music is loud and explosive, that you find yourself wearing earplugs just to bring the sound back within range of the human ear's response range. Yeah, I'm an old man... I need ear protection, but often times it just makes for a better sound to knock down the shit noise that piles up inside of speaker cabinets. Enough of me spouting on about being a wuss... This disc is a nice introduction to what's happeningin the metalcore scen across the world. Now if only other countries can reach the level of heaviness that the Dutch have, and we'll really be bleeding from the inside out. -MG |
