August Burns Red - Thrill Seeker (2005)^{Release ID: 4134}

Metalcore is a form of music which even though it makes you choose whether you want to stay in the metal side or the hardcore side (I'm still on the metal side), it has enslaved many parts of the world from America to England and other countries since the dawn of the new millennium. The music is never outlawed, despite lyrics of suffering, injustice, war, discontent, freedom, and more importantly, rebellion, hence this genre's clan The Revolution! August Burns Red is another band that marches along the course of The Revolution.

With their thrilling debut Thrill Seeker, the band has a sweet blend of melody and brutality with everything bands like Zao, Norma Jean, and even Between the Buried and Me don't quite have. Headbanging groove riffs scattered through metalcore fit well in the band's nice variety of sound, unleashing a sonic assault to maintain.

The album comes in a brutal start with the blazing "Your Suburbia is in Ruins". The opening has a catchy riff and fast drums, leading into an earth-shattering breakdown. That's a fast song with interesting riffs that are never cliche. Then the next track is the melodic but still heavy "Speech Impediment". One of the stronger tracks, "Endorphins" shines in with a cool breakdown with background gang vocals near the midway point.

"Too Late for Roses" starts off with the spectacular riffing and drumming that would become a standard part of August Burns Red, but at the one-minute mark, that's when the song becomes a brilliant endeavor. The slow breakdown of overwhelming intensity gives the song more touch and feeling. "Barbarian" is one of the best songs in this album. With some catchy riff-wrath and a rare metal solo, that song definitely has some of the band's best talent. It is a good song to start for anyone trying metal for the first time. "The Reflective Property" can be considered a metalcore call to arms. "A Wish Full of Dreams" is a great well-written song with nice chord progression. That song, along with "Consumer", both have more stellar riffing, drumming, and breakdowns.

The last 3 tracks show a slower side, starting with the mid-paced "A Shot Below the Belt". The band shows their influences from Metallica instrumentals with their own melodic interlude, "Eve of the End". A perfect lead-in to the strong apocalyptic epic, "The Seventh Trumpet", which I'm guessing they were influenced by old-school Avenged Sevenfold because of that song title. At 8 minutes, it is the longest track of the album and still remains the band's longest song. The lyrics show the band's Christianity, written about the rapture, with metaphors about the blood moon, stars falling, and the incoming end of the world, a prime example being this lyric, "I take one last look at the moon and the stars begin to fall..." There's 5 minutes of brutal guitars and finally a melodic yet heavy passage that goes on until the end. That song is a total standout and my favorite song of the album, an epic progressive song that sounds like something Meshuggah could've done. A perfect dramatic album ending!

Strong music, potential lyrics, good debut, STRONG debut. Enough said....

Favorites: Your Suburbia is in Ruins, Too Late for Roses, Barbarian, A Wish Full of Dreams, Consumer, The Seventh Trumpet