Review Summary: Disturbed regress
Oh my
God – I’ve been had. Disturbed got me.
Bad. The pre-released cuts, another predictable "our best album ever and has a darker atmosphere" promise from frontman David Draiman – I had
everything: everything that I needed to tell me that Disturbed’s next album would just be a retread of their earlier works, basically 2008’s
Indestructible, except, in theory, much worse. But regardless, I
had hope for Disturbed. I believed in these guys. I held onto how great of a guitarist Dan Donegan was becoming; back in 2008 I squealed with glea during the guitar solos of
Indestructible’s “Inside the Fire” and “The Night”. And let’s face it – you did too. That’s why even after lackluster cuts “Another Way To Die” and “Never Again” were released before
Asylum’s arrival this year, you had hope. You
were just like me.
Oh how the times have changed, my friend, for both of
us. Now, to put wrongs to right, let’s start by saying that Disturbed’s last outing,
Indestructible, was their best. The purists, the long-time fans - they’ll tell you that 2002’s bare-bones
Believe was the band’s best work. No, not true: Stylistically, Disturbed were playing better than ever on
Indestructible, had stronger songwriting, sported better production values (of their own devise), and Donegan was just a beast on his ax – more so than he’s ever been in Disturbed’s history together as an alt-rock radio-destroying machine. It’s this very point of context, looking into the alternative-cum-nu metal band’s sound progression over their career, that utterly blows this year’s
Asylum out of the water and into hell. The band is
fucking regressing on us.
Even worse, it’s at a time when Disturbed were making something promising out of their career-evolved sound. Like, you’re led to believe something has changed, that the band has taken the next step when the fresh feel of the “Remnants” instrumental starts things off on
Asylum. But by the time the recycled-chorus-filled “Warrior” fades into feedback fours tracks in, you realize what’s really going on here: Disturbed sound utterly neutered, utterly
uninspired. It’s like the band have lost the last five years of their time together, coming up with a record that sounds like
Ten Thousand Fists’ predictable commercial drive meets
Believe’s overall diluted feel. “The Animal” even rapes several of
Indestructible’s lyrical topics, particularly that of “Inside The Fire”, but comes out in the end as being a much weaker song in comparison. “Sacrifice” is much the same way, lacking any of the bite that drove
Indestructible to being one of 2008’s best mainstream rock/metal albums. Like these songs, you'll find that
Asylum does nothing but disappoint you from track to track, over and over again.
While Draiman's rhythmic, hibbity vocal delivery has largely remained the same throughout Disturbed’s career, when people say that the band has been making the same album over and over again – they’re full of
shit. Disturbed’s 2000 debut,
The Sickness, sounds nothing like the album that would come eight years into the future,
Indestructible - or even the two between them: The point being, Disturbed
do evolve, but
Asylum is the one release in their discography thus far, where any progression in the band’s sound cannot be found. It’s just not there. The title track that comes right after the opening instrumental sounds years-old in comparison to the band’s best tracks of the past, even something that is five years old like the hit “Stricken”. Hell, even Donegan sounds in the dumps. Third-cut “The Infection” may have a kick-ass solo, overextended maybe, but, uh – where is the guitarist’s presence for the rest of
Asylum?
Well, apparently he’s off working on sub-par fret twinkles and a lot of boring riffs as of those on closer “Innocence”.
Great. One of Disturbed’s best elements, Donegan, has sunk to the bottom level with the rest of the band on
Asylum. To call this album a disappointment is true, first in its being an immediate follow-up to 2008's
Indestructle, but it’s also a disappointment in another sense: That continued progression of the band’s sound that we’ve witnessed throughout their career together? It’s
gone. Disturbed have stagnated. They have
lost in their mainstream career as a band, making promising hits for the future, maybe, but falling back in line with the rest of the slackers, the rest of the bands that do nothing but recycle their old material. Disturbed have also done something here with
Asylum that they have never done before: They have made the first album of their discography that can be truly called bad - not good, not average, just wholly
bad.
