Review Summary: Well, at least it's better than their last album. Not that they had to try hard to pull that off, though.
Miss May I, as far as metalcore goes, is pretty generic. The thing that has separated them from some of their peers is a somewhat more talented group of band members. B.J. Stead and Ryan Neff rock pretty hard at the guitars. Levi Benton's a pretty decent screamer with a not spectacular but sufficient amount of range. They've never been groundbreaking, but they still sounded good on albums like Monument and At Heart, which perhaps benefited also more from good production. Of course, there's also been their most recent album Rise of the Lion, which sounded more like it was recorded in my garage.
It seems they must have realized that they goofed up on that album, because just a little over a year later, they're back with a brand new album, Deathless. They went back to producer Joey Sturgis, who produced their first two albums, and who does seem to have a penchant for bringing out the best in metal bands. And then the lead single came out, and things were sounding pretty promising.
The good news is that Deathless is definitely an improvement over their last record. However, it's not like they had to try that hard to do that. Unfortunately, it seems as if one of two things (or both) is going on: they're still recovering from the mess that was Rise of the Lion, or they tried too quick to make up for it, and couldn't quite give their best. The production quality is better, and there are a few good songs.
"I.H.E." was the lead single off the album, and from a musical and vocal standpoint, it's definitely the best thing they've done since At Heart. (We'll get to the lyrical downside later.) The title track, despite ending on an odd "whoa-oh-oh" note from the clean vocals, holds up well too. "Turn Back the Time" has some pretty crunchy guitar work in it, and there are some other songs with points that stand out higher than others; "Arise" has solid vocals, and "Psychotic Romantic" has a nice guitar riff in it as well.
Probably the biggest downfall of the album is its lyrics. Miss May I have never been masters of that department, but here the lyrics don't hold up very well. "I.H.E.," an otherwise great track, has an acronym which stands for the lyrics "I hate everything, I hate everyone." Not exactly poetry. Other songs like "Trust My Heart (Never Hope to Die)" and "Bastards Left Behind" struggle in the lyrical department as well.
Unfortunately, it's not just the lyrics that are the issue, since that would not necessarily be cause alone for a 2.5 rating. Some pretty bland songs managed to seep in as well. There are songs like "Broken Promises," "Bastards Left Behind" and "Born From Nothing" that just drone on and on. "Trust My Heart (Never Hope to Die)" has an oddly awkward chorus where the unclean vocals don't flow with the music very well (that must've seeped in from their last album).
Ultimately, Deathless is a mixed bag. There's a few songs on here that will attract fans of their better albums, but there's also some stuff that just doesn't seem to fit in very well. Fortunately, they stuck to 10 songs again, as a longer album probably would not have helped in this case. To conclude, I can't recommend buying the whole album, but fans of the band and metalcore in general will want to buy a few individual songs digitally from this. If you didn't like the band before, this won't change anything. Deathless may not be what some of MMI's other albums are, but at least it's better than their last horrific album.
Song Highlights: "I.H.E.," "Deathless," "Turn Back the Time"
