Featured Review #11: UNTIL THE END by coldrain

[doombox 4421]

Artist: coldrain Album: UNTIL THE END Score: coldrain are fighting for international attention, but are they ready?

Hailing from Nagoya, coldrain is a five piece band that over the last few years has found itself stepping out of Japan's alternative rock scene and into the global post hardcore market. Most recently, they've spent their time recording with notorious hit-maker David Bendeth. coldrain are the type of band who hit the ground running seven years ago and have no visible intent on stopping any time soon.

coldrain crack open this mini album with some stereotypical teen angst lyrics on "AWARE AND AWAKE". Moving past that, the music has a nice groove to it. The time-signature changes and the transitions from heavy verses to arena-rock choruses show small hints of the band's diversity. However, the entire song is quite cookie cutter, predictable, and falls into mediocrity. I can imagine this serves well as an introduction to new listeners who may not know quite what coldrain are capable of. It's wrapped in an easy to grasp package with all the mainstays of mainstream metalcore virtues. If you enjoyed this song, then the rest of the album will bode well for you, but if you're long-time fan, it might leave much to be desired. "EVOLVE" blasts you in the face with much more intricate guitar work straight away. Just when you expect to hear a standard post-hardcore chorus, the song teases you with a sludgy bridge first, which at least is a step in the right direction. This track shows more diversity in the first minute than the previous track en masse and sounds infinitely more brutal- partially due to Katsuma's solid double bass drum work. "AWARE AND AWAKE" sounds whiny and weak in comparison. Lyrically, "YOU LIE" treads familiar territory that other songs on this album have already covered, but it's much more emotional and bears a stronger alternative rock influence that gives contrast to the bridges and breakdowns. This song proves that sometimes less is more, and band's needn't reinvent the wheel to remain poignant and connect with the audience.

 

"FADE AWAY" has a fun, fast-paced, bouncy feel and is the high point of this EP, even if the lyrics are contrary to the atmosphere. This feels like the major crowd pleaser on the record and could easily fuel some fierce circle pits. It also carries the album's most infectious chant-along mantra, "until the end, you never learned, you never learned what it means to love". The band 'chooses their moments', so to speak, with the sparing breakdowns to retain a strong momentum throughout the song. They do a good job of keeping things from becoming monotonous by injecting a monstrous breakdown instead of the default pop formula ending that repeats the chorus into oblivion. Opening with an emotive, squealing guitar, "MARCH ON" is another strong showing. This track ushers in some restrained verses and continues the album's theme of chanted vocals, making this song's title easy to remember. The song builds on solid guitar work and explodes into machine gun riffing before the breakdown (which is unfortunately located at the exact same place as the previous song). The interesting guitar effects from the intro return to add dimension to the end and transitions nicely to the next song. "HOUSE OF CARDS" starts slow and sultry, with a lonely resonating bass line and a delayed piano effect that sounds both haunting and seductive. Drums fill in the hollows of the second half, and by the time the instruments have gelled together, most of the song has already passed you by. The last chorus feels like it slips through your fingers, all too soon, as it returns itself to an echoing wisp of notes. Normally I take issue with ending mini albums on somber notes, but this one leaves us with a great cliffhanger for the next release.

 

UNTIL THE END does as much right as it does wrong and it's hard to say who I would specifically recommend this release to when it comes down to new or old fans. They did the smart thing and tacked these songs onto the deluxe edition of their previous album, The Revelation, for international fans. The variety in the tracklist feels like the band wanted to show all of their strengths in the short number of tracks, but it also brought some glaring weaknesses to light. As for strengths, it really plays on Masato being one of the few English singing Japanese vocalists who was raised bi-lingual from birth. His English is about as perfect as you'll find in this scene. The band has a great pop sensibility and knows how to change with the times; being one of the few bands that has actually gotten heavier as they've gained popularity. Regardless, the major weakness of this album is the stale and formulaic songwriting. One of the pitfalls of having good pop sensibilities is the double-edge of sticking to the cookie cutter format of pop songs. The moments when this album gambles on mixing up that formula are when it truly starts kicking some ass.