Review Summary: Heaviest BTBAM album by far
I really depended in this band for their progressive death metal talents. Between The Buried And me have diverse influences, from Dream Theater to Soundgarden. They will often include slight traces of black metal vocals, melodeath leads, progressive musical structures and amazingly executed metalcore breakdowns. As in breakdowns, not the ones with extremly-slow-tempo boring monotonous guitar playing. There are just breakdowns that could be a few of the best out of other awesome breakdowns pulled off by deathcore bands like The Contortionist, All Shall Perish, Impending Doom and After The Burial. Thomas Giles is awesome at his harsh vocals as much as he is at his cleans, yet only 3 tracks on the album include his cleans.
Track by Track:
1. All Bodies - Crushing riffs and often insane blast beating. One of the songs that include clean vocals. Not that enjoyable like other tracks on the album. 4/5
2. Alaska - A well pulled off guitar and synth lead introduces the track. Overall, it is pretty insane and enjoyable and owns a few breakdowns, including a truely insane, yet intense outro. 5/5
3. Croakies & Boatshoes - Best to ignore this track. It is arguably generic, but pretty short as well. 3/5
4. Selkies: The Endless Obsession - A progressive track of the album. Starts off with some synth, then a one minute guitar lead, then somewhere into BTBAM's trademark sound. Concluding with a sweet melodic passage and a sweeter long guitar solo. Of course, there are clean vocals on this one as well. Sometimes, this song might feel a bit rushed though. 4.5/5
5. Breathe In Breathe Out - A short passage containing only a melodic clean guitar that comes in well from Selkies. Not giving this a rating though.
6. Roboturner - This is a very crushing and heavy song. The "demonic" scream at the start could surprise some people for the first time(s), especially after Breathe In Breathe Out. However, another awesome breakdown comes in starting somewhere before the 2 minute mark and gets better throughout. The slow 3 minute outro can probably bore some listeners. The lyrics seem to relate to the music industry and how much it sucks. This might not be one of everybody's favourite track on the album, but it is very enjoyable and insane. 5/5
7. Backwards Marathon - This is pretty much a progressive track as well. It basically goes from heavy to melodic and back to heavy, which is easily a common prog metal structure. Its melodic passage kind of dragged throughout the middle of the song; that seems to be the only con of the song. Still enjoyable though. 4/5
8. Medicine Wheel - Another optional listen. It is entirely melodic and it comes in well from the Backwards Marathon. Not rating this either.
9. The primer - There is a melodeath guitar lead at the start and near end of the song. Pretty interesting, and this song shows most of the black metal influence. It is still very enjoyable, but no easily visible cons. Not much to say. 4.5/5
10. Autodidact - This co-album closer is not a White walls quality closer. It is, again, insane and enjoyable. It has its trademark breakdowns too, and its influence on other styles of music. The ending breakdown has a similar sound to the last breakdown on White Walls and Swim To The Moon, and may possibly be repeated at the end of The Parallax Part 2 LP. The cons are also hard to find on this one. 5/5
11. Laser Speed - This is the actual album closer. It sounds more jazzy then anything else. It was a pretty random way to close the album, so some might think Autodidact was enough to close the album. No rating.
This album has its crushing heavy moments and sweet melodic moments. The originality and influence on outside genres makes the album nothing but classic, and it could be influential*. I still think that BTBAM could take more advantage on their progressive rock/metal influences.
*They have seemed to highly influence bands like Arsonists Get All The Girls, Dance Gavin Dance and The Human Abstract.
NOTE: I have no care for the audience of my review. No, I'm not going to improve. No, I am not a die hard fan of this band either. Criticism will not be read.
