Bring Me The Horizon have a lot going for them. Young, talented and recently taken on tour with one of the O.C's biggest metal acts, Bleeding Through, BMTH have made a name for themselves in a rather small ammount of time.
Bring Me The Horizon are:
Oliver Sykes (vocals)
Oliver is a very versatile singer, ranging from high shrieks to death metal growls to a pretty good singing voice.
Matthew Nicholls (drums)
Matthew is a very god drummer, nothing incredible, adds nice fills here and there and the occasionaly blast beat, sure to please those who like death / black metal.
Lee Malia (Guitar)
Lee adds nice pull off / hammer ons, particularly on opener 'Re: They Have No Reflections'. He seems to like his tapping, and likes the occasional trill. He adds a metalcore-ish feel to something that is quite a bit heavier.
Matt Kean (bass )
Matt adds some low end, nothing spectacular, hugs the guitar nicely, and does his job very well.
Curtis Ward (guitar)
Curtis harmonises with Lee quite a lot, and so is of around the same ability I suppose. Souding good though.
Opener 'Re: They Have No Reflections' is 5.42 of pure metal. The opening riff is nice, fitting in nicely with the drumming, which is nice and fast. Ollie adds some high screaming, sounding almost black metal. Lee plays a nice pull-off riff over this, whilst Curtis plays a variation of the intro riff. It then goes a bit heavier, Lee and Curtis playing a black metal tremolo picked riff whilst Matthew plays some speedy blast beats, making this section particularly driving. Olivers voice sounds more death metal here. His voice suits the style of very nicely. There is yet another change, one guitar plays open strings whilst the other takes a nice lead line. It all stops suddenly, the drums doing some nice tom work, as Oliver says "Lets nail the casket one more time", before the rest of the band roars back in and Oliver screams the same line, gradually getting lower until it reaches death metal once again. There is yet another change, all cuts out except one guitar and some ambience noises. A brief snare roll follows, a chord is played and left to hang as Oliver screams back in. Some nice double kick pedaling here, and some harmonics from Lee. Yet another change and Lee is playing a hammer on riff as the bass hugs tightly behind. It speeds up nicely before going back into one of the earlier riffs, with Oliver screaming along suitably. One final change, a slow but heavy riff with some pinch harmonics and some brutal screaming, It all closes as the riff slows down, and stops with one final grunt from Oliver.
'Who Wants Flowers When You're Dead? Nobody' follows the same princibal as the previous track: Technical riffing, double kick drumming, screaming, although this one uses some more melodic sounding chords as Lee plays his typical leads. A nice heavy riff follows the melody, open E strings interjected with a tapping part, sounds very swish. The middle eight is Oliver saying something that I can't quite decipher over a snare roll, beofre the screaming comes back in. Tremolo picked riffs follow on, sounding quite black metal. Another heavy riff closes the song nicely at the 4.54 mark.
'Rawwwrr!' is the oddest title for a song I have ever encountered...begins with a snare roll, cuts into some screaming again. Oliver screams over an open E riff, till the backing vocalist (Curtis?) joins Oliver in screaming "Taking back!". Suddenly there is what sounds like a woman screaming, quite a nice touch I thought. The riff that follows is once again very nice, fits well with Olivers high pitched shrieks. One of the earlier verse riffs is played until all cuts out and Oliver says "And if you think you're alive, you're better of ***ing dead" before it kicks back into flat out heaviness until the fadeout.
Closer 'Traitors Never Play Hangman' keeps up the riffing, adding harmonics, bends and brief scales to add variation to the screaming and fast drumming. The riffs in this are similar to the ones that go before, what interests me mostly here is a breakdown where the whole recording actually slows down until the album closes with Oliver screaming "I ***ing love you!"
Pros: + Riffs are varied and interesting
+ Drumming is fast and very nice
+ Vocals are nice and heavy
Cons: - Might be too heavy for some, as it blands death metal, black metal and metalcore.
- Vocals may not be to everyones taste, not much clean singing
- Only 4 tracks
4/5
the band have the whole scene hair thing going on, and they wear womens trousers, but they were a good live band when I saw them at bleeding through. its pretty good stuff, kinda like the black dahlia murder ifyou've heard them?
