Trivium
The Crusade


3.0
good

Review

by ForcedIn USER (1 Reviews)
December 28th, 2006 | 15 replies


Release Date: 2006 | Tracklist

Review Summary: A not-quite-golden return to 'The Era of Thrash'.

Two years ago, Trivium were very much an underground band. After only one full-length release, the hidden gem that was Ember To Inferno, and a demo showcasing second album Ascendancy, word of mouth slowly reached the point where organisers of the Download festival of 2005 shoved them onto the opening slot of the main stage, Saturday morning. This set made Trivium, and put their star well and truely in the, er, Ascendancy. Trivium here return with their third full-length album, The Crusade, which, it's fair to say, is at best pushing it's luck.

The album opens with it's intents clear from the first note of Ignition, and wastes no time in announcing a huge change in musical style for Trivium. Whereas Ember To Inferno and Ascendancy are shamelessly American metalcore, The Crusade takes the band in a more 'classic' direction, they seem to be trying to emulate the golden era of 80's thrash. And while it's a decent attempt, it falls short of its rather lofty aims, and in doing so sounds a bit throwaway and forgettable.

Aforementioned opening track Ignition demonstrates vocalist Matt Heafy's ever-so-slight (Okay, huge) change in his approach to his vocals perfectly. While Ascendancy saw some clean vocals, mostly in the choruses, in Ignition and indeed the rest of The Crusade he takes this clean vocal style and uses it for the entire song/album. The end result is something of a slightly weak James Hetfield soundalike, and threatens to ruin the album from the word go. Detonation shows a slightly death-metal influenced riff, however soon brings it back down to slightly sub-standard early Metallica fare with Heafy's vocals. The song does, however, pick up dramatically after the first guitar solo, where the already clean vocals are actually used to good effect for the first and one of only three times on the entire album.

The Crusade for the majority continues in this vein, with songs like Entrance of the Conflagration and Contempt Breeds Contamination being diluted from great to merely good by the vocals. The only songs on the album that I can truely recommend as being brilliant are To The Rats and Tread The Floods, which both contain the clean vocals, but utilise them well, as well as containing good, interesting riffs and frankly absurdly good drum work.

Ah, the drumming. Here's another gripe. (There's a lot of gripes, trust me.) Travis Smith is an extremely talented drummer. Anyone who appreciates modern metal can appreciate that he is a fantastic player. However this album sees his previously pulverising double bass and original technique severely diluted into simple, very Lars Ulrich-esque beats for the majority. This is a crying shame as his playing is the main joy of previous Trivium work.

The guitar work is another problem with The Crusade that I have. While it is good, in places fantastic, it is such a change from the Trivium style that I loved in the first place that it threatened to alienate me from the band entirely at first. It's again taking far too much inspiration from early Metallica, and to be honest, quite a lot of the riffs are simply recycled. This is taken to the extreme on Unrepentant, which contains a main riff that actually IS Metallica's Through The Never.

The last gripes are the songs This World Can't Tear Us Apart, [Anthem (We Are The Fire)[/i] and The Rising. The latter two are absolutely terrible attempts at singalong rock songs in the vein of Motley Crue. They fall flat on their faces and come across as very, very poor indeed. The former, while being in the same sort of vein for this album as Dying In Your Arms was for Ascendancy, is nowhere near as good, and the lyrics are frankly terrible. Matt Heafy cannot write love songs.

All of these faults, however, are not to say the album is utterly terrible as a whole. The album may indeed fall short of its inspirations, but almost anything would, to be fair. The songs Trivium have with this album are by no stretch of the imagination awful. They are, for the majority (The exceptions being the songs mentioned in the above paragraph) enjoyable songs, stopped from being great by Matt Heafy's love of Hetfield being taken one step too far. Entrance of the Conflagration and Becoming the Dragon are perfect examples of this.

The album as a whole is simply Trivium's attempt at returning to the 80's Golden Era of Thrash that made them love metal at all. While it's a decent attempt, any band wanting to seriously recreate that era has to do it with more originality, less Metallica ripping-off and just do it better than Trivium have.

--------------------------

Recommended Tracks:

Entrance of the Conflagration
To The Rats
Tread The Floods


user ratings (2266)
2.7
average
other reviews of this album
1 of
  • Mikesn EMERITUS (2)
    ...

    Altmer (2)
    Not the classic that it was hailed to be. This album stood the test of time rather poorly ...

    Shadows (1)
    Wait, what’s going on? Wasn’t Master of Puppets released in 1986? When did Metallica h...

    Drunken Viking (1)
    Instead of taking the normal road of progressing musically and actually making listen able...

  • SadlyMisinformed (3)
    Definitly not the masterpiece it was hyped as, but an enjoyable listen for the mainstream ...

    fuggenwaggles (2.5)
    Trivium has showed that they had potential on Ascendency. The Crusade show's that they kn...

    Locrian (1.5)
    A swing and a miss....

    wakeupdead (4)
    ...

  • bfmv15 (3)
    All in all Trivium's new sound is pretty good, this album gives you a mix of trivium's old...

    Kronzo (3)
    Trivium has managed to make a solid release here with some wild solos. But some "expirime...

    Trivium (2)
    Let me start by saying, it has taken me 8 months to realize it, but this album barely dese...



Comments:Add a Comment 
Tarantino's Tarantulas
December 28th 2006


819 Comments

Album Rating: 2.0

This review pretty much sums up my feelings on this album, although I think its slightly weaker. I still think Trivium have the potential to write another good album, maybe if someone can convince them to stop doing Metallica covers.

Oddsen
December 28th 2006


1127 Comments


Great review!

freudianslipknot
December 28th 2006


803 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

Good review.



south_of_heaven 11
December 28th 2006


5614 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

Solid work. I must admit, this wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be, but it's still painfully boring.

ToWhatEnd
December 28th 2006


3173 Comments

Album Rating: 2.0

Solid work. I must admit, this wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be, but it's still painfully boring.
I completely agree with everything you said. This album isn't exactly bad, it's just plain boring at times. But seriously man awesome first review!

Angmar
December 28th 2006


2688 Comments


good review this is just horrid though.

rising2anend
December 28th 2006


50 Comments

Album Rating: 1.0

great review but i seriously wouldnt even think about giving this album a 3 they simply sound like they one day said lets be metallica... un cool i my book. i saw them 3 times met them twice before they started singing everything and then saw them at SOTU where they sang everything it was terrible to say the least.

northerncomfort
December 28th 2006


106 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

Yeah, very good review. Seems to be suggesting a lower rating, but well balanced.



metallicaman8
December 28th 2006


4677 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

Nice first review. I agree with pretty much everything you said.



pos'd

666outcast666
December 29th 2006


2 Comments

Album Rating: 4.0

i like this album



true it might not have been as good as some of there other work but still amazing





northerncomfort
December 29th 2006


106 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

The real problem is it doesn't try and do anything different, just becomes a rehash of metallica done very badly.

Steerpike
December 29th 2006


1861 Comments


true it might not have been as good as some of there other work


That's not saying much. Trivium are too obsessed with emulating their idols and fail to do anything that said idols hadn't already done better 20 years ago.

wakeupdead
January 4th 2007


2229 Comments

Album Rating: 3.5

I love this album! Some songs arent good....Like "And sadness will sear." But I love songs like "Ignition" and "Anthem (We are the fire)" and "To The Rats." It's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be

Steerpike
January 4th 2007


1861 Comments


Or we just fucking don't like it.

metallicaman8
January 4th 2007


4677 Comments

Album Rating: 1.5

But I love songs like "Ignition" and "Anthem (We are the fire)" and "To The Rats."




Anthem is seriously one of the worst songs ever.



EDIT: 'cept for the introThis Message Edited On 01.04.07



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