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ALooP

Dead End/New Deal

Written by: PP on 06/09/2012 02:26:16

It has been seven years since the release of ALooP's debut album, and in the meantime the band has been busy touring, recording, writing songs, and as is all-too often the case, breaking up and then reuniting later. But the Aalborg, Denmark based group felt like they had at least one more album in them, hence we are here with "Dead End/New Deal", a Danish metal album that dares to sound different from their contemporary metal peers. At least to some extent.

Basically, ALooP are a thrash metal band at heart, who have been seduced by both modern production techniques as well as a core-inspired approach to songwriting. The resulting sound is somewhere between aggressive, yet melodic thrash metal and modern metal you've grown accustomed to with bands like Raunchy, Scar Symmetry, etc. They have killer riffs and low-grade growls ensuring a sufficiently evil atmosphere overall for thrash metal, which oftentimes results into a hectic soundscape due to the high tempo of the whole ordeal. But they also have high-pitched clean vocals that don't do their sound much good. It's catchy, yeah, but the contrast between the otherwise aggressive songwriting and the sudden stop-start sequences of clean choruses and more melodic songwriting feels a little...pointy, for the lack of a better expression.

While "Dead End/New Deal" has some promise on the riff department in particular, it suffers from essentially sounding too modern for its own good. It also relies on the same formula from start to finish, which means about halfway through you've heard all it has to offer. It can still be decent, but more is needed to stick out properly in a crowded field.

Download: Point Of No Return, Automation, Plot To Kill
For the fans of: modern metal with thrash references
Listen: Facebook

Release date 27.08.2012
Mighty Music/Target