Trapped Under Ice

Big Kiss Goodnight

Written by: PP on 23/01/2012 23:47:29

Trapped Under Ice belong to a club of hardcore bands I've never truly learned to understand nor appreciate due to their monotonous, unvaried sound that relies entirely on gang shouts and down-tuned riffs. Their songs are designed with a classic two stepper in mind with muscular riffs and harshly yelled vocals enabling a live environment characterized by 'stomping' crowd members, mosh pits, and annoying karate kids whose wet dream of a live show is one where they get to inflict maximum damage on like-minded crowd members (and all too often innocent collateral standing in vicinity). Their previous album "Secrets Of The World" was already a monotonous borefest from start to finish; their newest album "Big Kiss Goodnight" is a marginal improvement on the formula, that admittedly places Trapped Under Ice above many bands in their own genre, but doesn't change enough to appeal to people whose ideal live show doesn't involve ignoring the band on stage for 90% of their performance.

In other words, Trapped Under Ice play a Serious Fucking Business™ brand of hardcore of the kind that, among others, New Found Glory made hilarious fun of on their hardcore alter ego International Superheroes Of Hardcore. But what's more, it's increasingly difficult to take this type of music seriously after having watched this perfectly executed satire of the style in general:

Yeah. So you like to down-tune your riffs and be all serious and macho and stuff, huh? Good for you...

If you can get over that, then sure, there are some fist-pump inducing songs here, but variation is non-existent, highlighted by the virtually unchanged guitar tone used throughout the album. More importantly, the monotone approach to writing breakdown hardcore lacks considerable substance when compared to hardcore punk (see: Comeback Kid) or melodic hardcore (see: The Ghost Inside). Just because it is testosterone driven doesn't make it a great album. Now, you may argue I've spent too much time in shooting down the genre as a whole in this review, but it's unavoidable because Trapped Under Ice are at the heart of this style, and epitomize it throughout the album. That's enough to let you know whether you'll like it or not.

Download: Pleased To Meet You, Outcast, Born To Die, Victimized
For the fans of: Blood For Blood, Terror, Crown of Thornz,
Listen: Facebook

Release date 11.10.2011
Good Fight Music

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