Review Summary: Here Comes The Kraken’s 2011 release, ‘Hate, Greed & Death’ is a less than passable album with experimentation that ultimately loses the listeners interest.
Here Comes The Kraken’s full length debut was an unremarkable but steady release. However
Hate, Greed & Death show a band quickly dropping the quality levels and stepping away from a solid deathcore sound. When compared to their self titled release, some features become easily noticeable including the poor clean vocals and some rather annoying DJ work which show a willingness to experiment but fail to impress the masses.
Hate, Greed & Death is a rather unmemorable album from start to finish. Listeners may notice a drum section or an interesting guitar fill from time to time, but those moments will be lost in a sea of mundane riffing and next to thoughtless lyrical phrasing. With so much negative the positives that normally would be considered ordinary become more of a highlight. The track that benefits so much from the rest of the albums poor performance includes “Never Regret”. The track opens with hard hitting riffs and pounding drums, before displaying what could be considered a metalcore structure pattern (the screamed verse followed by a clean chorus). Some trance elements are also thrown in to create more interest for the listener. The track is however plagued by a DJ section which pops up rather randomly and does little for the song. Despite saying this, “Never Regret” could be described as the album’s highlight.
Instrumentation is the high part of the album. Each member knows how to play their instruments but lacks intelligent writing styles to write well crafted songs. The guitar riffs are precise and the chugging doesn’t become overwhelming, also their fills provide some interest for the listener. The drums blast away like any standard deathcore drummer and listeners won’t be surprised when various fills and double bass work enter the mix. The bass guitar is roughly lost in the production and really doesn’t take anything away from the music. The vocal work is mostly an inconsistent shamble. The growls don’t create enough of a powerful driving force to accompany the music correctly and the clean sections are mostly laughable showing very little talent nor technique. The DJ work comes off as uninspired and more often than not annoying, they serve almost no purpose on
Hate, Greed & Death other than adding a slightly higher diversity level.
With all things considered, this album could be described as their self titled release with larger amounts of experimentation. Unfortunately for Here Comes The Kraken,
Hate, Greed & Death comes off worse with very little playback value. Some listeners may spin this once or twice before giving up on it, while others may not even make it through one straight listen. For most listeners, the second scenario is the more likely.
Hate, Greed & Death is a lesson in how not to experiment when making a deathcore album. Here Comes The Kraken would have been better off sticking with the basics with the intention of doing the simple things well.
