Review Summary: Third time's still not the charm.
Generally speaking, a musical act's third release is not the place to look for innovation. To be sure, late-in-the-game sonic changes
do sometimes occur (
Power Metal is Pantera's fourth release, and the 'Black Album', Metallica's fifth) but, more often than not, the third outing is an establishing, rather than paradigm-shifting, release for the artist or act in question.
It might, therefore, have been seen as especially misguided to expect anything new from a third release by a
supergroup, let alone one inscribed in a particularly immobile and dogmatic musical genre and which, in their two previous releases, has shown more than a little difficulty in stepping out of their main members' shadows; what one
might have been entitled to expect, however, was a little progression along the curve – something radio-rock quasi-all-star ensemble Saint Asonia frustratingly fail to display at any point throughout their third release.
In fact, if anything, this brand-new batch of seven songs sees the outfit led by former Three Days Grace singer Adam Gontier and Staind lead guitarist Mike Mushok retreat even
further into their comfort zone, eschewing the noticeable progression displayed on their sophomore outing (2019's
Flawed Design) in favour of a sound more straightforward than even the one presented in their 2015 self-titled debut. Indeed, with one notable exception, very single cut across the twenty-five minutes of
Introvert is the kind of stomping mid-tempo Three Days Grace perfected on 2007'
One-X, and have been trying to replicate ever since, with diminishing results; suffice it to say, a full
fifteen years later (and bordering on twenty since the peak of the genre itself) this type of sound comes across staler than ever, particularly as Saint Asonia now appear – puzzlingly – to be attempting to replicate the sound of
later-period Three Days Grace. Quite why Gontier would want to mimick an
inferior era of his former group, only he will know – though such actions might well indicate just how deep the lead singer's unwillingness to let go of the past runs.
Whatever the reasoning behind this puzzling choice, however, the truth is,
Introvert does take more than a few cues from the rockier moment's of Three Days Grace's own brand-new offering,
Explosions – with, perhaps predictably, scarcely more interesting results. Like Gontier's former group on that release, the band
do manage to whip up the occasional engagingly catchy chorus (
So What is perhaps the sole obvious standout among these seven songs) there is nothing on
Introvert even remotely as memorable as
Sirens or
Flawed Design, the song; on the contrary, the vast majority of the songs on the EP amount to little more than another handful of pleasantly middling slabs of background noise – an impression compounded by the excessive homogeneity of the material, with the first six songs on the album blending into a solid lump of chunky riffage, edgily tortured vocals and appropriately 'square' midtempo percussion (courtesy of new recruit Cody Watkins, Saint Asonia's third drummer in as many releases, and heir of Cale Gontier's mantle of least famous person ever involved with the group.)
What little glimpses of innovation there are on the group's new EP are, therefore, saved for the very end of the record, when the band blindside unsuspecting listeners with an out-of-left-field cover of new-wave-inspired The Weeknd banger
Blinding Lights – a choice every bit as bold as the band's previous cover (Phil Collins'
I Don't Care Anymore) and which ends up working just about as well, with the band once again skirting surprisingly close to the original's sound while still adding a rockier twist; the result, while by no means spectacular, is by no means the disaster it could (should?) have been, instead asserting itself as the EP's second standout – which, while not exactly a hard position to fill, still warrants it a listen either in or out of context.
Still, this surprise ending is too little, too late to save what is, otherwise, no more than another disappointingly stolid release from a band which appears to be overcompensating for their own drop in status (after working with Sharon del Adel and Sully Erna in 2019, the sole feature the band endeavoured to score this time around is from TwitterGram musician and quasi-influencer 'Terrible Johnny') and the increasing irrelevancy of their former and main bands.In fact, in that regard, the title of the EP is actually quite accurate - on this third release, Saint Asonia
are displaying
Introvert behaviour, retreating into their shell and sticking to familiar and unthreatening territory; and, as is the case with most introverts, no one is really paying too much attention either way.
Recommended Tracks
So What
Blinding Lights
