Review Summary: In which August Burns Red still shine, albeit while trying just a little too hard.
My first experience with August Burns Red was, like many, with their flawed but enjoyable sophomore record Messengers. Fast forward the better part of the decade, past three records – including metalcore near-modern-classic Rescue & Restore – and the band, while progressing, have offered an entirely new plethora of bones in need of picking.
The largeness of sound displayed on Found in Far Away Places seems a characteristic that is a logical expansion from its predecessor, something that was truly begun on Leveler. Additionally is the inclusion of more and more “clean” sections – parts of otherwise heavy tracks that deviate to an almost laughable extent from the metalcore sound at the core of the band’s discography.
The problem with these elements on the record is that the band beat these horses, formerly very much alive, to near-death across the 52-and-a-half-minute span of the album. Take “Majoring in the Minors,” for example. The first two minutes of this track show August Burns Red at their absolute best, with the breakdowns being unobtrusive to the flow and the atmospheres being epic in a “Spirit Breaker” or “Beauty in Tragedy” kind of way.
Unfortunately, August Burns Red tries just a little too hard in throwing a curveball and goes into, like, polka mode or something for a minute and a quarter. And, honestly, it’s not bad, but it’s just a gimmick. There’s no avoiding it. At this point, no ABR fan is surprised by any of these sections anymore after tracks like Internal Cannon. They’re not new to the band’s sound and they’re often just plain unnecessary. “Separating the Seas” is another great track that falls victim to this apparent compulsion to litter lively little non-metal breaks into tracks that would fare just damn fine on their own.
But, on the other hand, it’s not always bad. “Everlasting Ending” has one of the better clean sections the band has offered to date, helping to construct a clear album highlight. Some tracks, such as opener “The Wake,” outwardly benefit from lacking such elements entirely. Though the track did not impress across the board as a lead single, its blatant aural aggression stands out much more in the breakdown-filled, over-the-top context of the rest of the album, and now seems to be a very much welcome dosage of speed that much of the record fails to deliver.
Which brings up arguably the biggest negative aspect of Found in Far Away Places – the unbelievably annoying amount of nondescript breakdowns. The first and greatest offender is second track “Martyr” which, throughout its entire length, (aside from the obligatory plain but nothing-special clean-ish section) is nothing but a breakdown. Even upon repeat listens, nothing stands out whatsoever. Whereas Rescue & Restore’s weak track, “Animals,” had at the very least a unique intro riff as a hook, “Martyr” offers almost nothing but the promise of pit violence during a live performance, shaping up to be one of the worst tracks the band has written to date.
“Identity” and “Separating the Seas” are both impressive in their own right, thankfully, with the former being standard metalcore but with an impeccably written flow. Fifth track “Ghosts” breaks this streak, another potentially great track ruined by too much chug. Though the introduction is decent, and the full band’s entry is indeed quite impacting, the instrumentation only truly stands out during Jeremy McKinnon’s rather abysmal clean vocal feature, which, with its overproduction, sounds like it came straight from a recent Memphis May Fire album.
The final primary issue with the record is that a good chunk of the album is spent in outro mode, with epic-sounding breakdowns covered with repetitive shouts, often backed by gang vocals, such as the end of “Ghosts” and “Everlasting Ending, and “Blackwood.” This never ruins the track, but some more actual content would have been nice here and there, and, as with the clean sections, it is simply overdone.
But, for all the *** there is to sling at a record for which my expectations were perhaps set unfairly high, this is still August Burns Red, and they are still the best modern metalcore band. The riffs, shown best in “Majoring in the Minors” and “Twenty-One Grams,” are top-notch, leaps and bounds above anything their peers seem to be capable of accomplishing. And, aside from “Martyr,” there are no bad tracks. Everything August Burns Red is known and loved for is here, especially in the aforementioned highlights. It’s just that the choice to tone up the atmosphere and chugs and tone down the riffage ends up causing the album to be a bit less up my alley than it potentially could have been.
So, no. Found in Far Away Places is not the crown jewel, discography-topping masterpiece I had hoped it would be. But it’s still pretty damn good overall, and when the band is at their best, they truly leave no doubt as to why they have been, and more than likely will continue to be, on the very top of the contemporary mainstream metalcore scene.
