Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Posted by xjustinx |
This is one of the most highly anticipated reunion records of the last few years, and Earth Crisis definitely don't disappoint with To The Death. The people at Century Media were kind enough to send us a download of the album, and it's my humble opinion that this is probably the perfect comeback record.
The album opens up like a beast with the track "Against the Current." Leading into an album with a mosh part can be risky, but they pull it off nicely by transitioning into a fast part smoothly and following up with a riff that easily could have been on a Madball record in the mid 90s. As a nearly 30 years old straight edge nerd, it's nice to hear a combination of straight/straight edge a good ten times in the opening track.
Up next is the track that has been posted to the band's myspace page, "To Ashes." It's this song that gave me high hopes for the new record in general. The chorus chant of "every meth lab burned" is sure to become a new live staple for them.
Unfortunately, the download didn't include lyrics, but the third track sounds like the albums first foray into the topic of animal rights. Titled "So Others Live", it feels like a classic call for animal rights that would have been heard on any number of Earth Crisis records.
The middle chunk of this record is certainly no slouch. With tracks like "Security Threat #1", "Control Through Fear", and "Eye of Babylon", ExC are solidifying themselves as a legitimate contender amongst the current court of heavy hardcore bands.
The album ends itself with the title track, and it's a great ending to a great record. As the song plays out, it ends with "Vegan for life. Vegan to the death!" It's one of those moments in a song that combines a heavy piece of music with a potent enough chant that it makes you want to destroy whatever is sitting near you.Overall, I'd say that Earth Crisis have crafted a magnificent comeback record. A lot of the riffs sound like they could have been on Gomorrah's Season Ends, but they come through so much better because they don't have the mu-metal sounding production that Gomorrah's did. A number of riffs also sound like they could have found their way onto Destroy The Machines, but they take on a slightly different feel on To The Death, because the production of this record makes the chugs sound a bit more punchy than previous ExC records. As a whole, the production is very clean, but isn't so sterile that the songs seem stripped of all their raw power. This is the album that feels like what should have been their natural progression from Breed The Killers.
If Slither left a bad taste in your mouth, as it did with me, give this new record a shot. It comes out on April 20th in Europe, and May 5th in the US via Century Media, and I really don't think you'll be disappointed. If nothing else, maybe this record will at least get some of the lame scenester kids and flat brimmed hat douchebags into something more intelligent and passionate.
Bottom line: Earth Crisis sound pissed again!



11 comments:

Anonymous said...

"maybe this record will at least get some of the lame scenester kids and flat brimmed hat douchebags into something more intelligent and passionate."

Only if half the lyrical content has something to do with shooting ex-girlfriends, the other half is the word "bitch" and Karl now has long, flat-ironed hair. Otherwise, notgonnahappen.

xCHIPxSEM said...

I laughed

xjustinx said...

A jaded old fuck can deam though, can't he?

Anonymous said...

I'm right there with you, xjustinx, but I think we'll just have to be content being out of style.

rybunal said...

i am stoked.

i hate flat brims.

i teach school and when the kids come in all i want to do is take the hats from their heads and curl that brim right up and hand it back to them and say..."i fixed it for you"... i would also have to take the tag off of it too!

David Agranoff said...

Sounds awesome to me.

Anonymous said...

So I'm on consecutive listen number six of the new EC and it completely owns. I'm so glad Karl and company got back together and put this out, and I'm freaking ecstatic about seeing them in Louisville in April.

Haven't seen them live since 1998 or 1999.

Anonymous said...

they should cover Brokencyde

snoopz said...

can't find the lyrics only, hopefully they will show up somewhere soon

Karl Bakla said...

I just picked this album up today & was so amazed! I was also happy to discover that some of the "nu metal" leanings were gone!

Anonymous said...

Here is a little EC trivia that not many people know. Back in the day,late 80's/90's . Karl would always be sucking his thumb, we all thought may be he was goofin', but nope the man loved to suck his thumb like a baby right into his 20's. God dang funny is what it is. Also his mom was a vocal teacher, she taught Vanessa Williams how to sing. The funny stuff aside, the new cd sounds great.