Near Life Experience,
Break the SilenceBreak The motherfucking Silence. Wow. Why haven't I heard of these guys before? Wondered what Strung Out, Thrice and Avenged Sevenfold would sound like if they came together and jammed fucked up Bad Religion covers? No, neither have I. But still, I guess the end results would be like Break The Silence. Hailing from Chicago, the band play a melodic brand of raucous guitars that mesh screaming with skate punk - a fusion which shouldn't work as well as it does. They formed from the ashes of 88 Fingers Louie and All Else Fails, so with a pedigree you'd expect things to come up trumps.
So yeah, 'Near Life Experience' is a hard rocking amigo if ever I've heard one. Released on Hopeless Records , the band throw their own unique mix of hardcore and skate punk, fuse it together with some magnificent melodies and come out smelling of roses. If 'Six Foot Revolver' sounds stunning, 'Iris' sounds like Sick Of It All at their most dangerous. Follow that with the Bad Religion-on-crack of 'Moving Day' and the far more sane 'Natoma' and there really is something for everyone.
Dan Wintercorn's vocals are really something special, throwing a little bit of everything into the mix - switching from the breathy to the brutal in a swift, sharp stab. 'At War With Instinct' is fucking brutal, guitars fly all over the shop and drums pound like a machine gun spitting out rounds. To be fair the 14 tracks all show elements of fantastic riffery. The drum patterns are inventive and the vocals never resort to just screaming for screaming's sake. I'm going to quit writing, just get the album and listen.
I fucking love this record and it's barely left my CD player since it arrived. If this was a Ross review you'd still have to trawl through another 500 words of superlatives, but my advice is beg, steal or borrow this record. If A7x go large this summer, Break The Silence won't be too far behind. Ace.
www.break-the-silence.com
Hopeless Records
Paul
