Review Summary: Job for a Cowboy's "Doom" is a sub-par effort that no one should be interested in at all, no matter what colour your fringes are.
Job for a Cowboy is a band that is hated as much as it is loved. This is mainly due to the claim that they were responsible for opening up, and in the process bastardising, the grindcore and death metal scene to the scene kids and, in doing so, opening the field for bands such as Bring Me the Horizon and I Killed the Prom Queen. However, Job for a Cowboy did the drill a bit differently compared to their fellow deathcorers. Their 2005 EP,
Doom, contain some clear influences from both grindcore and death metal.
Regardless of this, their music still relies on the same completely unstructured songwriting that many of their peers put forth and their chugging riffs, that rarely go together, only serve to drive the song towards the next generic breakdown. Occasionally they will change to harmonized leads while they “shred” away but these are rarely anything but sloppy and uninspired.
A major annoyment for many listeners is the pig squeals vocalist Jonny Davy varies the usual mix of growls and hardcore yelling with. Pig squeals are an extremely dangerous thing to attempt and rarely come across as aggressive or harsh. Davy is one of the many that fail. Indeed, the resulting noise sounds very much like the high-pitched screams you can hear from the pigs in The Legend of Zelda when you repeatedly attempt to slash them. Needless to say, this is
not good.
Now, there are some redeeming factors on the release. Davy’s lyrics are over average within Job for a Cowboy’s genre and so is the growl he relies on when he stops squealing. Drummer Elliott Sellers is not a particularly talented musician either, but has some acceptable fills. Perhaps the most promising part of their songwriting is the actually melodic and ambient playing from one of the guitarists that appears at times and for a few seconds manages to create a dream-like atmosphere within the feigned angst.
All in all, Doom is a sub-par effort that no one should be interested in at all, no matter what colour your fringes are. Its songs aren’t interesting on their own, and they definitely are not when the exact same song is repeated five times in sequence.
