Imitation may be the most sincere form of flattery, but Cove Reber's efforts will always fall short to the greatness of Anthony Green as evidenced here. This still stands as Saosin's best work and in my opinion the best EP in the history of EPs. If they had stuck with this bruising/bandaging post-hardcore formula and could have managed to keep Green in the fold they could have truly been something special.
Although Saosin would go onto great success, as would Anthony Green with Circa Survive, the two combined at this early stage of their career is really raw - and not in the good way, like you want. Green's voice is shrill and scratchy, still trying to find its feet. The band themselves, meanwhile, lapse far too much into generic structure for many of the songs to become particularly interesting. A good band with a good singer, but in a way it's kind of like the Audioslave of 2000s post-hardcore. They really worked better away from one another.
