Traitors

Traitors EP

Written by: MBC on 01/03/2014 01:18:04

There seems to be a growing tendency with modern –core affiliated bands that the only thing necessary to be successful in the music business is guitars with a lot of strings and the desire to tune them below any sort of tonal recognition. The self-titled debut EP from Florida-based Traitors is out on We Are Triumphant and is an unfortunate testament to this trend. Traitors are ready to release their down tuned, hate-filled music upon the world.

The EP contains six tracks including a hidden track and an intro which is the sound of some sort of newscast delivering the story of violent riots due to something called The Hate Campaign. First song “Product of Hate” starts off with a breakdown which leads to another breakdown which goes into another breakdown. I think I detect a pattern here. Yep, this is breakdown-core or down tempo-core or whatever. It does not really matter, this EP is void of technical proficiency and is just not very interesting. Obviously the band cares a great deal about playing songs that are heavy and slow, but the songs sound so incredibly similar that you might make the mistake of thinking you have put the same song on repeat. Every song is played with the same open string or one-note chord and the tempo just drags on through the EP. Vocalist Tyler Shelton follows the slow rhythms with very deep prolonged growls that complement the heavy atmosphere well. The vocals are decent although very repetitive and never stray from the formula. More varied vocals would have added some much needed dynamics to the songs, but the choice of vocal style throughout is probably a very conscious one to create as brootal of an atmosphere as possible.

On “False Intelligence” there is a moment at the end of the song where some double bass is introduced which adds some energy to the otherwise very dull and simple drums. On the same song, a guest performance by vocalist Luke Griffin from Acrania brings a little variation to the vocals, but of course these things are so brief that they hardly matter. The thing is, many parts of Traitors’ songs would have been really good if they had been accompanied by contrasting fast parts or anything really that would break the pattern. I was waiting for something exciting to happen while listening to the EP but it just never came. I like a good breakdown as much as the next guy, if it is well placed in a song and actually serves a purpose, but this EP is just too much of the same thing over and over.

4

Download: False Intelligence, Dead Nerves
For The Fans Of: Immoralist, Black Tongue, Emmure
Listen: Facebook

Release Date 25.02.2014
We Are Triumphant

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