Review Summary: pop punk, alternative, rock, thrash metal, and breakbeat fans! UNITE!
Japan, it's known for it's technology, it's known for it's culture, and it's known for anime, but when it comes to music there's not much to write home about. Bands like X Japan, and Dir en grey flourished here in America, while other bands like Asian Kung Fu Generation and Maximum the Hormone only got to peoples ears through anime intros. I had actually heard about this band when they were touring to my town with Iwrestledabearonce, so proceeded to check them out, and I hope X Japan, and Dir en grey can make room, cause these fellas hit the ball out of the park on this American debut.
FACT started out as a Metallic Metal band (their choice of words not mine), but soon started adding elements of pop punk, alternative, and breakbeat along with it. These guys have not lost anything in adding these genre styles to their songs, it sounds very natural. Nothing is out of place or strange. They can have a techno beat placed right next to an almost thrash like riff without it sounding odd.
The opening track "Paradox" is a nice choice, as it sets the tone and gives you exactly what this band sounds like. It opens up with a techno-y beat with some oriental-like vocal before the singer explodes screaming, and then kicks back for melodic singing. It's a very diverse track, and that's only the album opener. "Los Angeles" opens up with a signature riff that combines alternative, and thrash without breaking a sweat before the singer comes in with almost pop punk styled vocals, but afterwords they kick back to Avenged Sevenfold style guitars, and while the lead singer screams heavily, before moving back to New Found Glory pop punk. "A Fact of Life" is their most popular and easily the band's favorite track. It has a very distinctive pop punk sound with the aforementioned breakbeat blended right in, and the guitar riff is also very catchy...hell the entire song is infectiously catchy. "Chain" shows an almost grindcore style, as it doesn't make it past 25 seconds, and it's nothing but nonsensical screaming, with very heavy guitars and rums. "Reborn" again shows them opening with a thrashy riff before they easily turn it into an alternative style song before they open again with screaming, and heavy hard hitting riffs. "Purple Eyes" opens up with metalcore vocals and instrumentals, before instantly changing into a pop punk style song with even gang vocals for sing-a-longs, and it should be mentioned it's one of my favorite tracks off the album. "Lights of Vein" is a melodic alternative song as the band doesn't crank up the heaviness or screams throughout, it's very easy to see this song doing well on the radio. ""Merry Christmas Mr.Lawrence" starts out with a bassy intro which really lays down the sad tone of the song before they come into a mellowful style with even some piano can be heard. before slowly, but surely working it's way up to a breakdown with a lot of brutal screams. It's an amazing track, and again another one of my favorites. "CO3" is an instrumental piece that can be easily mistaken for an old metallica or crowbar piece. "Snow" is a lot like Lights of Vein in the sense it's a alternative mainstream song, and could easily be heard on the radio. "Stretch My Arms" has all their elements present, with thrashy riffs sitting right next to alternative guitars with a pop punk flavored chorus. The vocals really shine on this track as they hit hard and strong....and he's not screaming (though there is some to be found on this track). "45 Days" is a soft song, and a real mellower. Even some acoustic can be heard here, showing an even softer side to this band. "Why.." opens up with a nice alternative metal style and the drums blast with blast beats easily being heard next to Avenged Sevenfold style guitars. Before the band hits harder and heavier then it did throughout the entire song, almost sounding a like deathcore band at one point, before easily switching back to alternative. "1-2" is a nintendocore remix of A Fact of Life & Paradox, with some traditional industrial. It's good to listen to if you want to give your friends something technoy to listen to, but if you ask me this track is pretty pointless. "Rise" is my personal favorite. It takes on pop punk, alternative, and metal almost all at once, and rings nicely. Everything sounds beautifully together on this track, as they end epically with gang vocals of "I will rise and take back myself again!" and ends beautifully. I think the album should've ended here, as you get just an almost hip-hopish/metal/acoustic remix of "A Fact of Life" an interesting listen the first couple of times, but nothing special.
As you can see this band switches and tackles so many genres, it's very hard to keep up with. I listened to the album as I did the review to make sure I didn't make any mistakes. I could reccomend this band to the heaviest metalhead to the most poppish scene kid around. No matter what genre you're into this band has something that'll tickle your fancy. The only flaws of this album is you can tell that the vocalist was learning english WHILE he was making the album, and most of his words don't come across clear, and you'll be consulting the lyrics quite a few times. That doesn't mean he doesn't do his job well however.
This album has almost every single song worthwhile. This band in the future will be something to be reckoned with and I swear it'll happen. This album has something that EVERYONE can enjoy.
Pros-
Excellent Drums
Multi-Genre tackling without it being plainly obvious
Almost every track is amazing
Pretty much everything
Cons-
2 somewhat pointless remixes
Lead singer is not as clear as he should be
