Relentless

Approfondimenti

Relentless is a good title for this disc, as it finds this Michigan-based band plugging away with little or no change from their 2007 debut, Changes. As the band's name probably indicates, For the Fallen Dreams are a metalcore band, full-stop. They deliver crunching riffs at various tempos (doomy/sludgy, midtempo/hardcore, speedy/thrashy), with drumming that sounds like a typewriter and vocals in the Cookie Monster/badass-demon mode until the choruses, when the crooning starts. The occasional guitar solos are minimal and non-shreddy, more indebted to radio-friendly alternative rock than to metal. There's a mildly amusing bit of business toward the end of "December Everyday" where the vocalist starts a line in a pseudo-hip-hop cadence not unlike Slipknot's Corey Taylor, but finishes the phrase in a death growl. He does this for an entire verse, and while it's kinda funny, it's the closest thing to an original idea anywhere on the album. Everything else is by-the-numbers crunch and bellow, probably appealing enough to die-hard fans of the genre who just can't get enough, but nobody else needs to investigate this band -- there are no hidden treasures below this album's bland, gray surface.

© Phil Freeman /TiVo