Chiodos, or The Chiodos Bros. as the name was at the time of this particular release, are a band that I hold very near and dear to my heart, as their recent release
All's Well That Ends Well is one of my favorite release of '06. However,
The Heartless Control Everything EP is a release from a band still strugling to find its own sound, and it deffinitely shows. Not to say that the songs are bad, just the band hadn't completely found their niche at this particular point in time.
As far as the music goes, it's pretty hit or miss, most often being the latter of the two. The guitars leave something to be desired when compared to the new release, the bass rarely makes an appearance, the drummer is far less creative, and the vocals are... well I think meh is a pretty acurate word. The piano is here, but often drowned out by the wall sound produced by the instruments. Which leads me into another gripe, the production quality just isn't up to par. Where as on the new album all the instruments get equal time to shine and all are audible, the bass and piano spend most of their time being drowned out by the guitar's and percussion. As for Craig's vocals, he does a fairly poor job on this album. His voice is either drowned out by the noise, or drowned out by itself as the layered vocal tracks seem to be held together with poor quality masking tape. The screaming on this cd is also very poor when compared to the new release. The screams try to be emotional but they just end up sounding forced and strained, almost as if the guy is screaming for help while choking on a chicken bone.
As far as musicianship goes, its pretty standard all the way through. As before mentioned, the drummer is not nearly as creative as he is now and generally sticks to standard beats. The guitarists are also not very creative and end up using way to many octave chords throughout almost all the songs. Even so, the piano/keyboards add a nice touch when they are audible and it shows they guy has talent. The piano is actually the most impressive instrument on the album in my opinion. Now on to the vocals. Whether he hadn't at this point fully reached his potential, or the production quality brings them down, Craig's vocals are very poor in quality. The layerd vocals on
The Lover and The Liar are extremely hard to understand as they are drowned out by the wall of noise and the wretched screams only make the words less discernable. The harmonized vocals are also fairly poor as they... well they don't harmonize very well on this cd.
The songs are fairly decent as a whole, but none of them really stick with you. While there are rare songs like
Hathaway Lane which feature exremely catchy instrumentation and decent vocals, most of the songs are extremely forgetfull, bland, and uninspired. Perhaps the most interesting song on the entire album is
Ravishing Matt Ruth which opens up with some interesting keyboards and what ends up being Craig's best performance on the cd. Even though its the most interesting, when compared with the new release its still a pretty poor song.
The album isn't bad, its just not up to par with the new album. But the band isn't to blame, as they where still strugling to find their sound at this point. All things considered this is a fairly standard album for the genre with some fairly decent instrumental work. If you enjoy the new cd then I suggest approaching this release with extreme caution, and I would only reccomend this album to rabid fans.
Final Rating
3 (or meh)
