Conor Fynes
'Amoeba' - Hacride (5/10)
Generally, a two star rated album would be rated as such due to it's general mediocrity and uninspiring nature. A lower, 'mediocre' rated album usually does not have 'great moments' or anything like that. Having said that, 'Amoeba' can be considered a two star album with honours. There's certainly nothing you haven't heard here; this is just progressive death metal at it's heart. Alot of the songs are pretty listenable, and some are even great. I'll have to save the reason as to why I can only rate the album so low for later, but when you consider that with a little tweaking, 'Amoeba' could have been a whole lot better and listenable.
As I say, the majority of the album is pretty solid in fact. The closing track 'On The Threshold Of Death' and the beginner 'Perturbance' are both great songs. The finale of 'Threshold' is a superb, djinty riff and it builds up extremely well before going into an intelligent climax. 'Perturbance' opens the album with a smooth but aptly foreboding acoustic segment before literally exploding onto the soundscape; guitar fury, strange time signatures, percussive destruction and extreme growls typical of the genre. The next two songs also keep the streak of quality going. So.. why is this album rating so suprisingly low? Well suffice to say, the greatest fun is yet to come!
After the third track trails out, an acoustic intro much like the one that opened the album starts playing, and I get excited that this must be another great song. Before long however, the real kicker sets in... As to why Hacride decided to collaborate with a Spanish hip-hop act, I will never know. What results is one of the worst, most annoying tracks I have ever heard. Just imagine a decent, albeit unoriginal progressive death metal album with something that can only be described as the hispanic equivalent of Crazy Frog thrown into the middle. For the sake of being suprising, it certainly worked, but I will still never know why Hacride decided to ruin their album by hiring some women to babble incessantly over their mix and create the single only case in my entire music library where I can't help but press the 'skip' button anytime it rolls around. While it's only one song, it sabotages every semblance of flow or cohesion the album might have had. Much like a bridge, one hole in the album's resolve seems to have made it useless.
Hopefully somewhere in a parellel dimension, Hacride would sooner throw Ojos De Brujos off a remarkably tall bridge before letting them touch their mix. I love it when bands throw unexpected genres into metal, but it really, really does not work here. It might sound strange that I am attributing most of the flaws of the album to a single song, but if you don't believe me, go spend some money and buy the album. If you're anything like me, you'll be as dissapointed as I was.