Review Summary: For You.
Perhaps it's for selfish reasons, as I have no connection to either person apart from their music, but hearing this demo after knowing that this would be for a release that would never come makes the deaths of Daniel Langlois and Jordan Wodehouse even more sad as it shows one of the most tragic cases of immense potential unfulfilled.
It's hard not to feel the large shadow that the accident left over this material especially as the whole forlorn atmosphere of some of the songs seem to give it more the feel of a tribute than a precursor to the accident. The context however doesn't swallow the demo whole. It succeeds because the songwriting and performances are so good. The band excels at creating simplistic yet very moving pieces of emotionally charged hardcore with a sprinkling of metallic aggression and acoustic beauty. The demo doesn't get bogged down in needless technical exercises or endless chugging, it's both poignant and straight to the point in the execution of it's messages.
For all this though it does leave a feeling that some ideas could've been expanded on with the occasional awkward transition or a song that could've been taken further, especially with the three songs that follow 'For You'. That perhaps is the band's tragedy as they never did get to expand on all these ideas. What the band did leave behind in this demo though stands as a powerful and haunting epitaph to the few, great years they were around. Here's one on the house for them.
