Review Summary: Though they are technically newcomers, their previous experience allows them to craft their debut album into one of the most solid, catchy, and fun metalcore releases of the year.
Ritual are a five piece metalcore band hailing from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The band consists of former members of Dead and Divine, and formed after their breakup. Though they are technically newcomers, their previous experience allows them to craft their debut album into one of the most solid, catchy, and fun metalcore releases of the year.
The album starts off with a lone guitar playing a fast and energetic riff over some feedback, while the vocalist’s distorted vocals enter the album for the first time, screaming about a relationship that he knows is bad for him, but he stays in anyway. The track, titled Pisces, then explodes into speedy riffs and frenetic drumming, slowing down for the choruses and bridge, only for the speed to pick back up again. The band punctuates the song with a slowed breakdown, serving up a perfect introduction to the rest of the album.
The song leads directly into Gag Order, which features a slowed down pace and more southern-style riffs, with the chorus featuring layered screamed and sung vocals. This slowed pace, however, does not mean lowered intensity, which leads into the next track, Americhrist. This song sounds more like the chaotic bands of early metalcore, such as Botch and Converge, with off time riffs and a morphing song structure. Ritual has the versatility to pull off these variations to their style, but still make a cohesive album.
Next we come to the single released before the album, Rat Queen. This song features more of the fast technical riffs and interesting drumming of the songs before, along with the best and most melodic hook seen on the album, but ultimately ends too abruptly. An extra verse or bridge would have kept the song from leaving the listener wanting. Grim Part II then immediately comes in with a slower, heavier approach to keep the listener on their toes. Hot Pink follows it up by bringing back the southern-style riffs but combines them with the break neck speed seen throughout the album and more melodic hooks.
The next three tracks, Model Wife, White Blooded, and Love Song, play on the established themes of the album with fast technical riffs, sung choruses and a bit of a southern tinge to some of the verses. While these songs are very good by themselves and could be used as examples of the album’s quality, as part of a cohesive album they all kind of blend together apart from the fact that Love Song is only 30 seconds long and seems superfluous in the presence of the rest of the songs. This blurring is one of the only negatives about the album as a whole.
The album comes toward a close as Ripe begins. The song is mostly slow to mid-tempo, featuring the most sung vocals of any song on the album, but features the same anger and intensity as the rest. The song comes to an end with the guitars slowly cutting out until they’re silent for a few moments, but then starts right up again bursting into an angry almost punk sounding minute of riffs and screams.
This leads directly into the last song, Ataxia. Where Pisces served as a perfect introduction to the album, Ataxia is a summary of everything we’ve heard so far. This conclusion is followed by 4 minutes of a repeated reversed line, and the sound of a needle on a finished record. While this would be a fine way to end the album, in the final moments the band sneaks in a reprise of the hook from Rat Queen. This time around it is done with just clean vocals, an acoustic guitar and a reverberating electric guitar. It is the perfect way to end the album, with the chorus from the first song released from it.
Ritual are a band that have a place in this genre for years to come. Their ability to write fun, energetic songs, and the versatility to pull off the different variations in style make this one of the best metalcore releases of the year.
