Earth Crisis

To The Death

Written by: PP on 22/04/2009 13:34:48

Earth Crisis was almost singlehandedly responsible for bringing the straight edge / vegan hardcore movement to the mainstream spotlight with their mid 90s releases on Victory Records. Their early material in the form of "Destroy The Machines" and "Gomorrah's Season Ends" received a fair share of hype back in the day, but their recently re-issued "Breed The Killers" record failed to appeal to their fanbase. That's what their bio tells me anyway. I'm not actually familiar with the first two records, but "Breed The Killers" was an utterly average album that failed to incite any sort of emotions inside of me upon listening to it. Long story short, the band broke up in 2001, only to reunite again in 2007, and now they're ready with a new album called "To The Death".

If I were to take "Breed The Killers" as a starting point for this review, then not much has changed in Earth Crisis' songwriting department. Each and every song features the typical chugga-chugga riffage of boring hxc bands, the down tuned smash-in that's nothingsaying at best, incredibly boring at worst. Think Bury Your Dead, except more hardcore and less metal. The problem with this type of approach lies in two distinct facts: firstly, there aren't any distinguishable riffs to cling onto in the long run, consequently resulting in all 11 songs meshing together like there's no end. That wouldn't be such a problem if it was compensated with something else, like breakneck speed for instance, but Earth Crisis seem content in medium-speed chugging away with next to no variation throughout the record.

Notice how I haven't mentioned any specific songs in this review? That's because the whole album sounds like it's just one long, boring balls-to-the-walls hardcore song that takes itself and its cause waaaaaaaaay too seriously. I suppose if you're into the xhardcorex / hxc 2-step type of stuff, you could possibly find "To The Death" remotely appealing. But even then there are way better bands out there to check out.

5

Download: To The Ashes, Against The Current
For the fans of: Path Of Resistance, Integrity, Death Before Dishonor
Listen: Myspace

Release date 20.04.2009
Century Media

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