November 2021 Feature Release – The Revolution Edition

So just like that we find that a new month is upon us which of course means that we’ll be nominating a brand new monthly feature release for each clan. This essentially means that we’re asking you to rate, review & discuss our chosen features for no other reason than because we enjoy the process & banter. We’re really looking forward to hearing your thoughts on our chosen releases so don’t be shy.

This month’s feature release for The Revolution has been nominated by Andi. It's the brand new album from Orlando-based melodic metalcore outfit Trivium entitled "In the Court of the Dragon".

https://metal.academy/releases/31487

Thanks Daniel for accepting my Revolution feature release for this month! Here's its summary:

With their 2005 sophomore breakthrough Ascendancy and since 2008's Shogun, Trivium has marked their spot as one of the greatest discography-expanding bands of modern times, despite the flaws of albums #1 and #3. The slightly underrated 2011 masterpiece In Waves began their venture to show great concepts and executions that would carry on in subsequent albums, except in 2015's Silence in the Snow when vocalist Matt Heafy temporarily lost his growling ability. So where does it all lead? Into the Court of the Dragon! In 2020 after the previous album What the Dead Men Say, when Trivium was in lockdown during the virus and couldn't do any live performances, they decided to not waste any time. They spent the rest of that year writing an album that would later be recorded as almost a sequel to the epic thrash-metalcore of Shogun with greater hints of its surrounding albums' sounds. While staying stellar as ever, their performance is probably the most powerful since Ascendancy. The guitars have more fire and crunch than the spiciest crunchiest KFC meal. The drumming is more brutal as well, and the vocals add a greater blend of mature cleans and convincing screams. All of that you can find in 9 songs (after an orchestral intro) that can range from a short swift 4 minutes to an average 5 minutes to an epic 7 minutes, with the epic finale track in relation to one of the greatest video game franchises today, The Elder Scrolls. So going out on a whim here, In the Court of the Dragon marks the band's best and strongest album since In Waves. I would recommend this to anyone who has followed the band far through their over two-decade career. The band's later greatness continues in power and glory. An amazing masterpiece that's probably, for me, the best of the year!

5/5 (maybe even 6/5)

Recommended songs: "In the Court of the Dragon", "Like a Sword of Damocles", "The Shadow of the Abattoir", "Fall Into Your Hands", "The Phalanx"

For fans of (this album is so perfect that it can be for everyone, but just in case...): All That Remains, Unearth, Nevermore

Honestly, I could pretty much copy & paste my review of Trivium's "In Waves" album here as I have very similar feelings about it. Once again we have some very accessible & poppy metal music that relies heavily on the chorus hooks to draw the listener in & it has just enough success to keep me interested despite the generic nature of the tools on offer. Matt Heafy's screamy metalcore vocals certainly aren't Trivium's strong point & I greatly prefer his clean stuff which is often found to be the saving grace on some of these tracks which are fairly flat until the super-catchy chorus kicks in. There are more than a few tasty lead solos scattered across the tracklisting which are a definite highlight while the blast beats sound fairly unintimidating most of the time. As with "In Waves", this really isn't a metalcore record as there's bugger all hardcore punk influence here. "In The Court Of The Dragon" draws its sound from a number of directions with classic heavy metal, power metal & melodic death metal all getting the once over. As I say, this really is a fairly easy-listening metal album & at its worst it often reminds me of a metal version of Nickelback. In saying that though, the strength of the song-writing & arrangements sees the stronger half of the material carrying the album & it just manages to overcome a particularly flat last few tracks to leave me with a mild sense of appeal. "In Waves" is a more consistent record overall but there's really not all that much in it.

For fans of Shadows Fall, As I Lay Dying & God Forbid.

3.5/5

By Jeebus they finally did it; Trivium figured out how to properly produce bass lines!

This is the most fun I've had with a Trivium album since In Waves, despite the fact that within the last ten years, this is the album that sounds the least like In Waves! This "progressive metalcore" or whatever the hell you want to call it, infused with thrash, death and power metal is very well performed, produced and executed. It can be a little overwhelming at times as I explained in my review, and I suspect that many people, including fans of this group, will not appreciate the sporadic nature of In The Court Of The Dragon. 

7/10

P.S. I literally LOL'd at the people on RateYourMusic calling Trivium derivative and generic metalcore because they have obviously never listened to any of Trivium's other album's.

I can completely understand those "generic" comments to be honest. I have the same sort of feelings & didn't really want to like "In The Court Of The Dragon" as a result. Strangely, I can't help but see the appeal in most of the song-writing though. Trivium really know how to compose & position a catchy heavy metal chorus however there's not a hardcore tragic in the world that finds this stuff appealing for its similarities to their chosen subgenre. Despite the use of some screamed vocals & the trademark breakdowns,  this album is the complete antithesis of everything that hardcore's about so the metalcore tag seems a bit odd to me. It's so polished & clinical in the execution & the style is built around easily palatable melodies that are intended to give the band the same sort of crossover appeal as Metallica's "Black Album". The term "bubblegum" often comes to mind & even the blast beat sections sound easy on the ears. I'd actually suggest that this record is much closer to Linkin Park than it is Discharge to be honest. It's certainly not in the same stratosphere as extreme metal & the references to thrash are misguided. The faster guitar parts are drawn from European power metal, not the San Francisco Bay Area. There's plenty of Iron Maiden in the guitar harmonies & Dream Theater/Queensryche in the couple of more progressively inclined moments. There's also a fair bit of At The Gates worship & even some fairly standard sounding groove metal riffs thrown in here & there.

I'm not quite sure what your previous comment is supposed to imply Daniel. Are you saying that In The Court Of The Dragon is not really a metalcore album, and therefore not a generic metalcore album? Or that it is a metalcore album with progressive elements... and therefore not a generic metalcore album? I agree with you that from a traditional metalcore point of view, hell even a melodic metalcore state, this album is the least metalcore that Trivium have ever been. And I agree with some of your assessments; mostly that the most extreme moments on this album are child's play compared to Suffocation, Nile or Cryptopsy. I'm also in agreement about your influences/inspirations of Iron Maiden, Dream Theater, Queensryche and At The Gates. 

That said, your comment about this being metal's Nickelback seems disingenuous. Is it easy, accessible metalcore? Yes, especially the obvious single "Feast Of Fire". But I hear more than enough divergences in the sound between songs, let alone albums, to make tracks stand out. I think that, at the very least, Trivium fans will enjoy In The Court Of The Dragon for its heavy thrash/power influences, while the death adjacent is more than enough to make them stand out amongst bands like Killswitch Engage or more recent bands like Northlane and Architects, and closer to that of Protest The Hero. 

I wasn't implying anything Saxy. I was pretty openly saying that Trivium utilize very familiar tools that I've heard many times before but do it in a catchy way that I find hard not to enjoy. Those tools are borrowed from several different subgenres but all are very melodic & easy on the ear. To answer your other query, yes I was questioning Trivium's metalcore tagging because there's very little hardcore punk influence in this album or "In Waves" other than the use of breakdowns & some screamed vocals. I'm not sure what the correct tag would be but metalcore just sounds wrong & the same can be said for several of their melodic metalcore peers.

As for the Nickelback comparison, I honestly find myself drawing that reference point multiple times across both albums & would be surprised if others don’t pick up on it too. I don’t have any sort of bone to pick with Nickelback as I’ve only ever heard a few singles that I found to be more inoffensive than genuinely horrible. Ultimately though, my message is that I feel that Trivium make a conscious effort to sound as commercially accessible as possible which is generally at odds with my taste in music but they’re talented enough at what they do to convince me of their merit regardless.

I don't much care for metalcore at all, but Trivium's previous feature release, In Waves, I actually found surprisingly listenable, so I was more than a little sceptical about Daniel's Nickelback jibe (I really don't like Nickelback). After listening to In the Court of the Dragon this evening though, I think he has a point. On several songs, but especially on Like a Sword Over Damocles, the shadow of Chad Kroeger is cast long. In fact, I swear a couple of tracks sound like Slipknot/Nickelback collaborations (no, this is unlikely to be a good thing!).

Anyway that aside, following the unexpectedly positive experience I had with In Waves I found this disappointing. It feels like an album that has been written by market researchers, the songs optimised to sell the maximum number of t-shirts. I don't hate it - it isn't offensive enough to generate that much emotion - but it just ploughs a completely different furrow to what I personally find interesting in metal.

2/5