Review Summary: Contender for worst album of the year, and probably one of the absolute worst I've ever heard. Avoid this at all costs.
Woe, Is Me is a band that has quite a history. Started in 2009 by former
Of Machines drummer Austin Thornton. After being signed to Rise Records without even playing a single show, the band recorded their debut album "Number[s]". The album received mixed reactions, but the one constant was praise of Tyler Carter's clean vocal performance. However in August 2011, Tyler Carter left the band citing wanting to move in a new direction musically as his reason. Current clean vocalist Hance Alligood joined the band. However in 2012, Michael Bohn (Unclean vocals) left the band along with the Ferris brothers (Bass and keyboards) due to "personal, professional, and musical differences". With only 2 original members left, Woe, Is Me present us with a new album, with almost an entirely new line up.
The album kicks off with a generic intro, 'D-Day'. The first actual song on the album is 'F.Y.I'. Michael Bohn was never that great of an unclean vocalist, but he puts Doriano Magliano (current unclean vocalist) to shame. Doriano has one tone for his screams, and it's the same kind you've heard a thousand times before. The song features no clean vocals, and is a typical junz riff over lyrics that consist of talking sh*t and never giving up. Sound familiar? Probably because if you listen to this type of music, every generic band has made the same exact song. The next song is 'A Story To Tell'. More junz is what we get with this song, with lyrical gems such as "This isn't over until I'm ***ing dead!". How tough guys. This song marks the first album appearance by Hance. His vocals are above average at best. In my own opinion, he's trying to sound soul influenced like Tyler Carter, but can't come close to it. 'With Our Friend[s] Behind Us' features Caleb Shomo of
Attack Attack!. It starts with your typical breakdown, and lyrics like "I bet you never thought we'd get this far, but in the end we won't give in 'cause that's just who we are, I still have so much left to say, so my best advice to you is to stay the f*ck out of my way". Wow, I bet that took more than 5 minutes to write. Hance's vocals are better in this song than in 'A Story To Tell', but not by much.
'Nothing Left To Lose' sounds just like the songs I just mentioned. I'm starting to notice a pattern with this album. That every single song sounds the exact same. Only decent thing about this song is the "Woah oh's" at the end. Next we have 'I Came I Saw I Conquered'. The lyrics to this song, literally made me laugh quite a bit. Go ahead and listen to it, I'm sure you will too. Afterwords we have 'I Told You Once'. The first single released off this album painted a perfect picture of what the album was going to be. Generic breakdowns throughout every single song, godawful lyrics that sound like a 13 year old who drew inspiration from Attack Attack! could write. However through all this criticism, this song is easily the best on the album. However that's not saying much at all. The final song is 'Family First', and features a guest spot from Matty Mullin's of
Memphis May Fire. This song is an acoustic song about always staying strong and coming out swinging. In the worst way possible. Boring guitar work, decent vocals at best, and more awful lyrics.
You know what, I'm glad this album is done now. Because it has to be one of the most boring, generic, pointless albums in the entire genre. Rise Records started this whole Woe, Is Me vs. Issues thing, and you wanna know who wins? Neither band wins. And we all lose. Issues may be slightly better than Woe, Is Me, but both bands are pretty bad as a whole. Woe, Is Me had a decent idea with their original line up. Solid vocals, solid lyrics, and solid music. However when you take the best members of that band, start a new band, and leave the old one to find new members...Like I said, no one wins. Avoid this album, and just forget Woe, Is Me still exists.
