Review by Shadowdoom9 (Andi) for Of Mice & Men - Cold World (2016)

For 4 albums, Of Mice & Men unclean vocalist Austin Carlile was the leader of the pack, but a few months after Cold World was released, he left the band. His departure was for a variety of reasons including his conversion to Christianity, his health, his move to Costa Rica, and the band not letting him write what we wanted for the album. He's focused more towards family life now while still making some music, and there were recently some alleged abuse accusations towards him which he denied.

Did his final album with the band peak as much Restoring Force as and its singles? Not entirely, but they have diversified their sound to cover different tracks of metalcore and hard rock, though the end result is an album of alt-metal wisdom...

The opening track "Game of War", unlike their previous albums, starts this one off with mellow guitar strums (I almost thought this was Trivium's "The End of Everything") and soft delicate vocal melodies. If any fans thought this was gonna be an ambient pop-rock album because of that, they thought wrong... "The Lie" breaks open the gates with the band's typical sound, with the vocals ranging from screaming to singing to spoken, plus a massive ending breakdown. Single "Real" has a lot of the album's catchiness in the chorus and anthemic lyrics worth singing along to. Leveling up the heavy hooks is "Like a Ghost", though it fails to reach the compelling factor for me. The band take on some influence from A Perfect Circle in "Contagious".

The album has two interludes that don't add too much, starting with "-". It segues to "Pain", a total unclean crusher with lyrics about the pain of Carlile's Marfan syndrome, which he inherited from his late mother. "PAIN!!!! Every day that I awake, in my blood and through my veins, now there's nothing left that you can take away from me!" There's a bit of a Korn vibe in "The Hunger". Adding more of the nu metal to their metalcore is the aptly titled "Relentless" that shall work well in live shows. The emotional "Down the Road" has the melody of 2010s Linkin Park.

"+" is the second of the two unnecessary interludes. "Away" should've also been a single with its mid-tempo hooks. Sure it's soft, but even then it's beautiful and lightens up my day. Closing the book is "Transfigured", in which Aaron Pauley shines on in both the bass and the clean vocals that cover the entire track. A great foreshadowing of Pauley taking over all vocal duties after Carlile's exit from the band.

I still enjoy Restoring Force more than Cold World, though here they've added more variety in their writing. Of Mice & Men can surely please more than just metalcore fans. Years of expanding their fanbase have been paying off, and Pauley would make sure the band goes on, even without its original leader....

Favorites: "The Lie", "Real", "Pain", "Relentless", "Away", "Transfigured"