Released By : Self Released
Genre : Metalcore, Groove Metal, Modern Metal
Links : http://www.myspace.com/hordofficial
Tracklist:
01. The Waste Land (Part 1)
02. Unreal City
03. Subdued Voices
04. Epidemic
05. The Watcher
06. A Heap Of Broken Images
07. The Burial Of The Dead
08. Through The Ashes
09. The Grand Expedition
10. The Waste Land (Part 2)
Well, eight listens in and I’m still having trouble working out the best way to describe how the new HORD album sounds and I don’t think more listens is going to help me, so I’ll just wing it here and see what happens. I have seen the band described in others places as something called ‘DJENT’, but if you ask me personally that’s a ridiculous name for a genre and sounds more like people just trying to be odd and different just for the sake of it. To my ears THE WASTE LAND is predominately a mix of metalcore, groove metal, industrial metal, modern progressive metal and even a tiny bit of non-wimpy emo stuff too. Maybe I’m way off the mark here, and I’m sure other people will hear and describe things differently to what I have, but that’s what I’ve got work with so there we go.
The album is a concept album with a futuristic storyline that sounds like something you would expect to hear written by FEAR FACTORY, and it is broken up into three chapters plus an intro and a prologue. This is a pretty daunting task for a band to take up on a self-released album, but HORD show with flying colors that they are more than up to the task. Regardless of what type of music you like, as long as you like melody and thoughtful songwriting you will find something to like on this album. The guitar sound is massive and creates a wall of sound that may just have been too much if it weren’t for the fact that the drums & bass rhythm section are just as powerful. While all of this lays a mean foundation, it’s the vocal work here that really grabbed me and I must day that vocalist Jonathan Devaux has one of the better modern metal/rock voices I’ve heard in quite a while.
As is the fact with any album that is meant to be a flowing concept, picking out individual songs to highlight is quite tricky. I will however say that SUBDUED VOICES is the best piece of music on the disc and if labels and promoters listen to this song above all others HORD will be swamped with offers in the near future. THE WATCHER and THROUGH THE ASHES also stuck with me for some reason and are both definitely worth checking out.
If you are a fan of the futuristic industrial concepts that FEAR FACTORY toy around with you may well find plenty to like on THE WASTE LAND, but I would also wholly recommend the album to any and all fans of modern sounding metal that is mixed with plenty of melody and plenty of interesting songwriting. HORD have succeeded in drawing me into their web, now I will patiently await their next release, which should certainly be via a decent record label if there is any justice in this world.
Written By : ZeeZee
Rating : 9/10
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