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Post by Blacksalt on Feb 12, 2021 18:58:28 GMT -5
So I've had a leaked copy for about a week, but I threw it on my iPod for work a few days ago and honestly i've been listening to it non-stop. I guarantee this album will be contentious with fans of Architects, it's got a lot more melodic interludes and clean vocals. I've heard a lot of online comparisons to BMTH's Sempiternal in terms of mood and melody. Tbh, this is the best modern metalcore album I've heard since Sempiternal, and I can't get enough of it. The album drops officially on Feb 26th 2021, and i'll post the videos for the singles. If you like modern melodic metalcore, then pick up a copy. Themes of Extinction and Climate change are all over the album, and it's a great listen.
Cheers boys!
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Post by essien on Feb 13, 2021 2:21:28 GMT -5
You've convinced me to give this another go. I didn't really enjoy it on my first listen, despite being a big Architects fan and liking the singles they've released. It's definitely a change in sound and maybe I was missing Tom's guitar work too much. The Sempiternal comparison is an interesting one, what an album that was.
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Post by Zeke on Feb 13, 2021 8:50:51 GMT -5
I've been a big Architects fan since Hollow Crown, so I was reasonably excited. I haven't listened to the leak, only to the released songs and so far it's massively underwhelming for me. It seems too Linkin Park-y and overprocessed. From the released singles so far, I like Black Lungs the most, Animals is okay, but Meteor and Dead Butterflies just fell flat for me. They are trying too hard to make these anthemy songs that people are going to love during the concerts.
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Post by Blacksalt on Feb 13, 2021 10:32:14 GMT -5
I've been a big Architects fan since Hollow Crown, so I was reasonably excited. I haven't listened to the leak, only to the released songs and so far it's massively underwhelming for me. It seems too Linkin Park-y and overprocessed. From the released singles so far, I like Black Lungs the most, Animals is okay, but Meteor and Dead Butterflies just fell flat for me. They are trying too hard to make these anthemy songs that people are going to love during the concerts. I feel like listening to it from start to finish in order will give you a better feeling about the album as a whole. I didn’t mind Animals, and Black Lungs as singles, but listening to the album in order really drove home the songs and was quintessential in me appreciating the melodic to heavy ratio. Dead Butterflies is definitely all about the anthem hook though, and personally I love that track.
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Post by Zeke on Feb 13, 2021 17:35:35 GMT -5
I've been a big Architects fan since Hollow Crown, so I was reasonably excited. I haven't listened to the leak, only to the released songs and so far it's massively underwhelming for me. It seems too Linkin Park-y and overprocessed. From the released singles so far, I like Black Lungs the most, Animals is okay, but Meteor and Dead Butterflies just fell flat for me. They are trying too hard to make these anthemy songs that people are going to love during the concerts. I feel like listening to it from start to finish in order will give you a better feeling about the album as a whole. I didn’t mind Animals, and Black Lungs as singles, but listening to the album in order really drive home the songs and was quintessential in me appreciating the melodic to heavy ratio. Dead Butterflies is definitely all about the anthem hook though, and personally I love that track. Yeah, maybe that'll do the trick for me! It's gonna be out pretty soon, so when it hits Spotify I'm definitely going to give that a whirl.
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Post by Zeke on Feb 26, 2021 18:03:45 GMT -5
Listened to it front to back today. For me it all just kind of blurs together, it lost its Architects-y vibe. Is it just me or the vocals sounds incredibly overproduced in many of the songs?
Not a bad album per se, but it's not up to their usual standard imho. It's the kind of music that's a good introduction to heavier music for people who don't like such genres.
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Post by Blacksalt on Feb 27, 2021 21:20:26 GMT -5
Listened to it front to back today. For me it all just kind of blurs together, it lost its Architects-y vibe. Is it just me or the vocals sounds incredibly overproduced in many of the songs? Not a bad album per se, but it's not up to their usual standard imho. It's the kind of music that's a good introduction to heavier music for people who don't like such genres. See and I don’t even think it sounds anything like their previous albums. It’s more akin to a reinvention.
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Post by stringypoo on Feb 28, 2021 2:13:50 GMT -5
Okay, after all the buzz, I've taken a break from Deicide, Runemaster, and all things metal to listen to this. lol
I'm on track 5, first listen through, and I know one time through won't be enough to make an official decision on it, but I will definitely at least finish this run through. The vibe I get from this which may be the element that gives it lasting power for me is that it has a somewhat familiar production with the 2nd and 3rd albums with Tilian for Dance Gavin Dance in that it has this crystal clear production with a clear emphasis on vocal bits that really cut through and above carefully written instrumental parts. However, I'm not saying this album sounds like DGD, don't get me wrong. Just shares some qualities with a band I like much more than Architects.
As per my feelings at the moment, it's intriguing enough for me to finish the album, but I'm already missing Runemaster and Deicide. haha! There are certainly good things I can say about this Architects album though.
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Post by stfubaker on Feb 28, 2021 20:40:29 GMT -5
Listened to it front to back today. For me it all just kind of blurs together, it lost its Architects-y vibe. Is it just me or the vocals sounds incredibly overproduced in many of the songs? Not a bad album per se, but it's not up to their usual standard imho. It's the kind of music that's a good introduction to heavier music for people who don't like such genres. This is more or less my opinion, but I don't think it's "not a bad album". They've really fallen off the sound that brought all their fans in. It's a hard pass for me. I honestly couldn't even finish it.
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Post by Zeke on Mar 1, 2021 11:39:45 GMT -5
Listened to it front to back today. For me it all just kind of blurs together, it lost its Architects-y vibe. Is it just me or the vocals sounds incredibly overproduced in many of the songs? Not a bad album per se, but it's not up to their usual standard imho. It's the kind of music that's a good introduction to heavier music for people who don't like such genres. This is more or less my opinion, but I don't think it's "not a bad album". They've really fallen off the sound that brought all their fans in. It's a hard pass for me. I honestly couldn't even finish it. It was very repetitive and meh, and I think it's crappy for people who liked their older sound, but there are some catchy songs and I am sure that mainstream people will eat it up. Also they built up such a following over the years that the fanboys are gonna lick their ass no matter what they do anyway jmo.
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Post by stfubaker on Mar 1, 2021 13:05:09 GMT -5
This is more or less my opinion, but I don't think it's "not a bad album". They've really fallen off the sound that brought all their fans in. It's a hard pass for me. I honestly couldn't even finish it. It was very repetitive and meh, and I think it's crappy for people who liked their older sound, but there are some catchy songs and I am sure that mainstream people will eat it up. Also they built up such a following over the years that the fanboys are gonna lick their ass no matter what they do anyway jmo. I went to the Metalcore subreddit and checked their discussions on it. They're worshipping the album..
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Post by Zeke on Mar 1, 2021 16:40:44 GMT -5
It was very repetitive and meh, and I think it's crappy for people who liked their older sound, but there are some catchy songs and I am sure that mainstream people will eat it up. Also they built up such a following over the years that the fanboys are gonna lick their ass no matter what they do anyway jmo. I went to the Metalcore subreddit and checked their discussions on it. They're worshipping the album.. Really? I haven't checked the album discussion thread, but when the singles were released, people were not over the moon about it. To me it also just sounds like they were trying to create a lot of anthem-like songs, that people will eat up at concerts. Like Dead Butterflies with that gooooodbyeEEEEEEEEEE part, or the chorus of Animals and Discourse is Dead. Slowed down, simple, few word lyrics "We're just a bunch of fucking animals"/"So sing me a sad song" etc etc.
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Post by Zeke on Mar 1, 2021 16:43:32 GMT -5
Also that Winston McCall guest vocals felt so out of place for me, idk why.
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Post by Blacksalt on Mar 1, 2021 18:35:24 GMT -5
Listened to it front to back today. For me it all just kind of blurs together, it lost its Architects-y vibe. Is it just me or the vocals sounds incredibly overproduced in many of the songs? Not a bad album per se, but it's not up to their usual standard imho. It's the kind of music that's a good introduction to heavier music for people who don't like such genres. This is more or less my opinion, but I don't think it's "not a bad album". They've really fallen off the sound that brought all their fans in. It's a hard pass for me. I honestly couldn't even finish it. It’s definitely not metalcore or Deathcore at all. If you’re not a fan of modern post hardcore you’re not going to like this.
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Post by stringypoo on Mar 2, 2021 11:05:25 GMT -5
Hahaha, since I put in some quality listening time with this it’s pretty intriguing to see everyone’s varying thoughts on it. To be clear, I don’t really like post-hardcore and metalcore that much anymore since I heard way too much of it for far too many years and exhausted my interest in those sounds, but I did check this out to be fair with you guys about tastes and everything since I usually just ignore any metalcore/deathcore/hardcore/post-hardcore you guys listen to and I wanted to see truly how good this is. Especially I was interested given this strong push for like AOTY.
Not surprisingly from a meat and potatoes metal fan here, this won’t be my AOTY. But I think it’s a pretty good album. It suffers a lot from songs that follow the same patterns over and over, and for me at a point where some songs’ choruses are similar in my mind and resulting in not being so memorable. I think the crushingly heavy breakdowns here and there are actually really well executed thanks to the killer production on this album which really makes the hard hitting moments feel like being hit by a wall of bricks. That element is what I’m most fascinated about with this album. The production is so well done here that I cannot identity if they used real string musicians for the violins/cellos/etc or Virtual Instruments for them. The subtleties in the strings parts sometimes have a unique lifelike quality that makes me feel it’s really played by string musicians, but the kind of writing doesn’t perfectly lend itself to actual string parts (I’ve played violin on a lot of albums/movies, and I still can’t figure out if this is real strings! Lol). The strings are my true favorite element in this album.
As for those angry hardcore-ish vocals by Winston or whoever that is on whatever track (I’m done with this album now, not looking back anymore lol), I really liked those actually. Sure, it’s a different sound which didn’t appear elsewhere so it may feel random and unnecessary to some, but I personally like this shakeup. It was pretty cool, even though I don’t care for this style. Sam’s vocals are certainly the center of this soundscape overall though, and while yes probably a bit overproduced, it is a great sound. He does sound a little like Chester Bennington (RIP) at times, but that’s fine with me. I like that less clean higher range vocal that Sam does.
Standout tracks for me? None really. I think there are plenty of good ones here, but I will come back to what i and others have said and admit it’s hard for me to have favorites when they kind of blend together.
One more thing I wanted to say about this album (coming back to the production job) is that while this production job is extremely well done and much more produced than most albums of its type, it kind of feels appropriate in a way for a band like Architects who have kind of been front runners of the post-hardcore/metalcore scene along with Bring me the Horizon, who have also been very well produced as of late. I can’t help but draw a comparison to another front runner situation with Behemoth, whose latest albums (especially The Satanist) are also wildly high quality. Behemoth have been frequently named in conversations about “best album of the decade” and are extremely well produced, much like Architects here. So while the mixing is real slick here on this album, I couldn’t say when comparing with the success of Behemoth that it’s inappropriate. But it does tend to divide fans a little.
My personal review score for this album? 3.75/5. Not bad at all, quite enjoyable at times. My non-biased, objective review here would be a 4.25/5.
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