Review Summary: Just thank god this album has no vocals.
Sleep terror disorder is defined as repeated temporary arousal from sleep, during which the affected person appears and acts extremely frightened.
Basically, a waking nightmare.
A more fitting name could not have been chosen for this awful west coast-based outfit. The joke is Sleep Terror, and its punchline is every track on this demo.
Paraphile opens with
Tables Turned Crimson, a harbinger of what lies ahead. Attempting to blend the surf-rock of Dick Dale with incredibly generic grindcore influenced riffage, and topped with a klutzy attempt at imitating virtuoso free-jazz leads, you're sure to be disappointed by the end of this disastrous mess. Tom Morello's trademark turntable noises are even mimicked here by guitarist Luke Jaeger, yet the latter axeman lacks the foresight to see that he has completely ruined the song.
It's easy to initially mistake
Paraphile's genre-jumping buffet of refuse for music that actually contains substance. The average death metal fan will insist that this is "technical jazz-influenced death metal," and may even assert that this kind of music has never been done before. The aforementioned "metalhead" has obviously never been introduced to Floridian titans Atheist and Cynic, among others.
You won't find yourself hard pressed to spot the differences between Sleep Terror and a seasoned jazz-influenced death metal band like Cynic if you compare
Paraphile to
Focus. Sleep Terror lacks the ability to craft a memorable song; every riff, solo, and random jazz break escapes the memory just as soon as it soils the listener's ears.
If Paraphile has one thing going for it, it's consistency; each succesive track lives up to the sloppiness and incohesion that preceded it, which brings me to the prevailing flaw of Paraphile: a lack of cohesive ideas. Each and every moment of every song is forgettable, pointless, unnecesary, and simply unbearable to listen to. The individual sections of each song blur together, rambling aimlessly, leaving the listener bored to tears, and in some cases devoid of the amount of cash they shelled out for this worthless slop-fest. The "jazz-licks" serve only to distract the listener from the lack of songwriting ability commanded by the band, and the other assorted random "wacky" sections are used only to dupe thoughtless metalheads into believing this demo is somehow "progressive."
Honestly Paraphile has only three positive qualities. The first being that it has no vocals. The absence of a singer prevents this demo from further redefining the word "suck". Second, the demo itself is only 13 minutes long. Finally the guitar playing is technical, and can at times sound decent. If only it was memorable and tasteful. Even having listened to this album 3 times today alone, not a single song distinguishes itself from the next.
If you're looking for music that will leave a lasting impression, Paraphile is definitely not for you. However, if random disjointed musical ideas bound together by cheesy cover art impress you, you can end your search here.
