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Texas In July

Salt Of The Earth EP

Written by: TL on 16/11/2008 17:17:44

It happens from time to time, that our beloved editor PP picks up more than he can handle of interesting band names from dark corners of the internet, and sees himself forced to push some of them upon me. Sometimes the selection of what I overtake is rather sensible and sometimes not so much. Take for instance Texas In July, a band I know practically nothing about, other than that I think I'm reviewing them because they're on the same label as Circus Circus - Which, logically (...), should make them just as good.

Ah well, who needs knowledge of a band when one has their debut EP between ones hands. After all, a band's music should speak for itself I think, so that's what I'm counting on "Salt Of The Earth EP" to do. However, if speaking honestly about this band is indeed what their EP does, I'm afraid it isn't saying the nicest of things.

Enter the sound of Texas In July, part melodeath, part hardcore. That means great melodic guitar riffs, annoying inarticulate vocals and 20 seconds of breakdown for every 10 seconds of actual song. The end result you may call metalcore or melodic hardcore - I call it moshcore, as the five tracks on this record are about as accurate a representation of the stupidity that lies within that term as one can come. At no point during any of the songs will you be able to pick up on what is being either generically screamed or generically growled on top of the instruments, except once in "There's Talk Of Strange", where the words have been gang shouted before the 'singer' resumes his nonsense. The drummer of the band proficiently overuses his pedals, kicking out blast beats with only short moments of respite in between, and again, the point of it seems to be.. well, besides the point.

This EP is merely a typical example of a release where a band tries to be as macho and mosh-friendly as possible, and effectively it sounds as hollow as hammering on a steel barrel. There's simply no point in this record, unless you're a hxc unitard who's aching to get out and practice your Karate Kid wannabe moves on hapless music lovers. I know that if you guys listen to this record, you might want to tell me that it's actually not THAT bad, and in some way you're right. Because this is in fact the third or fourth record I've heard this year, where a band's guitarists are really on to something, churning out awesome axework consistently, but also allowing it to be ruined consistently - by cookie-monster pseudo-growls and/or pointless kissing of the hardcore scene's ass. The songs here could be great if they weren't ripped apart by one breakdown after another, and if the singer(s) could actually do the screams and growls so that one could make out the words. Anyway, all in all, "Salt Of The Earth EP" is not so bad that it'll piss you off if you just have it on in the background, but you're never going to catch me saying it's a good record either.

Download: Doesn't matter, all five songs sound the same.
For The Fans Of: melodeath turned into moshcore with shitty 'singers'
Listen: myspace.com/texasinjuly

Release Date 14.08.2008
Ci Records