Album Review: Titans Eve, Gojira, Maroon 5, Motion City Soundtrack & The Rocket Summer

Review by Steve K

Titans Eve: Life Apocalypse

Titans Eve’s second album lives under the looming shadow of its predecessor, ‘The Divine Equal’.  The good news for ‘Life Apocalypse’ is that it holds up incredibly well on its own.

Titans Eve have kicked their technical proficiency into high gear, delivering an exceptional album of brilliant, horrifyingly astute and elegantly written material; the lyrics are grim poetry set to cruel, brutal and mathematically precise orchestration.

If their last album was in the tradition of Milton, then surely the grim songs of nightmarish, inevitable fate, fear and futility on ‘Life Apocalypse’ are in the tradition of Byron, himself.  These men understand the Terror for what it is, and they capture it in music and voice.

The songs “The Abyss”, the title track “Life Apocalypse”, “Hollow Gods” and “The Void” are outstanding on this disc, speaking brutal truth and cruel fact in untenably honest fashion, their individual tales riding well with the overall theme of this collection.

There’s only one real weakness, on the opener, “Overcast” where they chose to go with the tired audio trick-shot of“left-channel on, right-channel dead / comes back to life on second bar” opening guitar licks.  But it’s over and done with so fast and forgotten even faster that it’s a minor and forgivable flaw.

<rant> You might have noticed: there’s fucking metadata on the songs, so if this album hadn’t already earned a perfect score, they’d have gotten bonus points just for that fact!Music labels, remember: METADATA IS GOOD!  Not having to go online and manually search and / or enter the track title, track number, artist name and album name into an MP3 file after ripping the album to my computer is a REALLY, REALLY GOOD THING!  In fact, considering most of my CDs are single-use rips-to-the-hard-drivebecause I inevitably only listen to music on my MP3 player or laptop, it’s an added value to me, as a music consumer, to have that information already on the music file. </rant>

Titans Eve: Life Apocalypse 10/10

Independent

Gojira: L’enfant Sauvage

This is a different kind of Metal album than our previous entrant.  I find the production on this one is a little too heavy, the producers and engineers not giving the musicians or their music enough breathing room.

While the music is rich and melodious, those melodies are simple ones, with few complex progressions, changes or surprises.  The 11 tracks are standard fare, and I feel as though Gojira are phoning in their fifth album.

Further adding to my disappointment is the absence of metadata on this disc, which seems as uncaring as the music, itself.

Gojira: L’enfant Sauvage – 5.5/10

Roadrunner

Review by Melissa P

June has been a great month for music releases- here are a few reviews of some recent CD’s that I’ve been listening to!

OVEREXPOSED- Maroon 5

The highly anticipated new release of Maroon 5 will not disappoint fans of Adam Levine and the rest of the band. I wasn’t sure what to expect after their last record ‘Hands All Over’ that had me at times completely in love, and at other times I couldn’t change the song fast enough. So far, though, I’ve been pleasantly surprised with ‘Overexposed’. Instead of a few key pop singles and the rest a mix of alternative/rock and other various Maroon 5 styles, the album remains upbeat, cut with a few more melodious tracks here and there (while still keeping with the more mainstream feel). Maybe in that sense it’s lacking a little bit of what you’d usually expect from M5, but it seems to be where they’re at right now with their music and the songs have really highlighted Levine’s unique vocals.

Listen to: One More Night, The Man Who Never Lied, Sad

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 Stars

Go- Motion City Soundtrack

MCS is a band that knows how to release consistently fantastic albums. Although their last record ‘My Dinosaur Life’ didn’t quite pick up as much as they would have liked (considering the amount of money and production that went into it) they managed to pick themselves back up and create a CD that Motion City fans everywhere can be proud of. The band recorded and produced their album in its entirety before choosing a label to release it with, and in that sense it has that really authentic feeling to it that you’ll find in their very first albums. That being said, the guys dug a little deeper with a few of the songs on ‘Go’. Songs like ‘Everyone Will Die’ are much more reflective and introspective than some of their other work- but this really just adds a depth to this CD that I really enjoyed and picked up immediately.

Listen to: True Romance, Timelines, Boxelder, Bad Idea

The Boombox Generation

Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars

Life Will Write the Words- The Rocket Summer

The latest from one-man-band Bryce Avary is a fantastic addition to anyone’s music library. His distinct vocals mixed with the pop/rock sounds that TRS fans have become accustomed to are truly highlighted and given a new depth on the record. Although there is something different in the songs that Bryce chose to include on LWWTW, they still ring distinctly true to his unique style. The album itself is named after lyrics from the song ‘Circa ‘46’ which is definitely one of my personal favorites. It has equal parts upbeat melodies and low-key ones, not to mention Avary’s vocals shine through during the chorus ‘Life will write the words, you chose your own melodies’. But honestly, his voice is one that you come across so rarely, and he manages to hit all the right notes and sing all the right words to hit home with his fans. If this album doesn’t become your summer soundtrack, I don’t know what will!

Listen to: Circa ’46, Revival, Underrated, Scrapbook, Soldiers

Aviate Records

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars