Review Summary: A very standard album that had the ability to be more.
Heavy Steps by Comeback Kid is a record that tries to balance the aggressive sound of hardcore with melodic hooks. While they did just about achieve this goal, they did not achieve their full potential leaving the album as a disappointing release.
My main complaint with
Heavy Steps is that it does not sound unique at all. Despite the talent this band undoubtedly possesses, they end up sounding generic and therefore, melds in with the majority of modern hardcore bands. Multiple songs on the record are forgettable due to this and a lot of them blend together. The choruses are mostly unimaginative with hooks that I have heard countless times before. The songs
Face the Fire and
Everything Relates have very similar choruses. The lines in each track “I tried, but I can’t” and “Violate a push and pull” are even sung extremely similarly. Comeback Kid falls into the same trap that many other hardcore and metalcore bands fall into, where they overuse breakdowns. A good chunk of the breakdowns in the record feels tacked on and lacks the impact that is obviously intended. They are there for the sake of one leaving the songs seeming uninspired. Some songs do have promise though.
Shadow of Doubt contains some solid and heavy riffage but goes nowhere with it. There is no pay-off to the momentum that is built up. The track
Crossed, which features Joe Duplantier of Gojira, again has great riffs but does not fully utilise Joe Duplantier in order to make the track feel different or special, instead it is just unremarkable.
As I said before, the band is without a doubt talented and is fully capable of making a great music and they do show this by the few moments of greatness that are sprinkled throughout the record. The opening and closing cuts off the album,
Heavy Steps and
Menacing Weight, are by far the two songs with the catchiest choruses within the tracklist. Also, the title track holds a destructive breakdown.
Dead On the Fence is the heaviest track here with another notable breakdown that is as effective and crushing as you’d hope it to be. These two tracks shows that they do have the ability to make good breakdowns, so what happened with the other ones. The lead guitarist, Jeremy Hiebert, shows off his guitar skills on the song
Easy Way Out with a great and an impressive solo while also having an energetic chorus.
In short,
Heavy Steps mainly falters through it’s lack of identity. Many songs here sound very similar to each other and even to other bands. A majority of the breakdowns are very standard and typical within the genre and has an absence of any sort of real punch. The album as a whole is rather average but it does contain some highlights that I do recommend to check out.
