Though fully aware of Divine Heresy’s line-up before I was given this release, I’d had only the briefest of listens. I kind of knew what to expect; smatterings of Death Metal and stop-start heavy riffing alongside Metalcore singing and screaming. That’s quite a concise summary, but is essentially what Divine Heresy have to offer, which in today’s musical climate, I think you’ll agree, will appeal to a vast number of Metalheads.
‘Facebreaker’ storms in, in an all-over-the-place technical Death Metal way, snare blasts reverberating until Yeung’s double bass propulsion slices in to dominate. The speed lessens as Travis Neal opens his mouth, becoming choppy and temperamental, and Yeung’s feet stay firmly in line with the riffing.
I seem to remember doing a double-take as ‘The Battle of J Casey’ began in an incredibly Fear Factoryesque manner, which is hardly surprising seeing as Cazares is responsible for the song writing. What was unanticipated though is that there aren’t nearly as many of these moments as one may expect coming from the ex/current/who knows FF guitarist. The vocal melodies simply soar on top of the double bass and guitar chops, and one wonders why most Metalcore bands can’t deliver songs with this level of conviction.
The Death riffage cometh once again with ‘Bringer of Plagues’, the band’s power incredibly apparent as everything is flying past in a blur, which is converted to those walls of thick Cazares riffage and more tight feet flicking. The anger subsides as some melodies surface, unfortunately showing Neal sounding close to the limits of his range.
‘Anarchaos’ really is made by its melody, which has Madder Mortem shades of drama firmly honed into it. A bizarre band to come to mind, but nevertheless, they’re the only ones who write such brooding tunes in this vein. In this case thankfully, Neal’s chords fit in perfectly, making the track a high point.
Fear Factory comparisons are on the horizon once again as the moody verse of ‘Monolithic Doomsday Devices’ ascends, its Death Metalized core almost at bursting point with the constant stop-start rapid fire of its components’ desire to go full steam ahead.
There comes a time during the last few songs when the joy of stop-start carnage wears a little thin and one can’t help but wonder if ‘Bringer of Plagues’ could have been trimmed to some extent. It’s a good album, but drowning in the aforementioned ‘carnage’ and lacking in ‘something’...or maybe I’m just being really pernickety and would prefer to listen to the industrial brilliance that is Fear Factory.
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