Review Summary: A massive breakdown. Both in terms of content and quality of music.
Annotations Of An Autopsy – Dark Days EP
Let’s face it. Deathcore has been quietly chugging itself into a corner a bit over the past 2 years. While some of the genre’s ilk prove they can vary their sound and basically have some kind of a future beyond becoming genre fodder (Suicide Silence), some others seem perfectly happy to continue writing repetitive breakdowns and scream like dying farmyard animals (Chelsea Grin). Annotations of an Autopsy have made an especially interesting progression through the scene, going from being the most hated band in extreme metal with their squeal ridden EP and debut, to a somewhat credible death metal band with the stunning II: The Reign Of Darkness. And whilst they’ve recently been hyping their most recent release (Dark Days – EP) quite a lot on Facebook, it isn’t quite the genre defying release they might’ve hoped it’d be.
‘Buried in Bad Rep’ gets Dark Days off to a… predictable start. It basically goes by all the deathcore clichés. Opening riff? Check. Gang vocal? Check. Breakdown? Check. Final slug paced breakdown? Check. Oh, and they also bring back the ‘dying pig’ vocals briefly during one of the verses. I’m sure somewhere a heavily tattooed person with a fringe is squealing with delight. Pun intended. The following two tracks seem to two things very well:
1. They seem to make time go about 10x slower.
2. They will probably send you to sleep faster than a cocktail of sleeping pills and an issue of Golfer Pro.
Things pick up a little for ‘Stage breaker’, but then again, only for about 5 seconds and we’re back in familiar territory (beatdowns, growls, gang vocals ect ect….).
Dark Days – EP seems more than a little like an unfulfilled opportunity for Annotations Of An Autopsy. Instead of 15-20 minutes of quality death metal/deathcore, they’ve released what sounds like Emmure B-sides. Listening to breakdown after breakdown gets old pretty quickly, and gets old even faster with a somewhat blasphemous cover of Machine Head’s ‘Ten Ton Hammer’ thrown into the mix. Hopefully AOAA will realise the error of their ways and write some more full on nasty death metal sooner rather than later.
3.5/10
Buried In Bad Rep, 5/10 – Any momentum this song gains during the first minute or so is lost with the first case of ‘Really***ingSlowBreakdown Syndrome’. Not even a gang vocal like “So suck my ***ing dick” can save this one.
Reznov, 3/10 – Let’s be honest, any song named after a Call Of Duty character deserves to be as bad as this one is. There’s barely anything left to say about this kind of generic build-it-up/bring-it-down structure.
Dark Days, 2.5/10 – If you’re still listening by this point you’re either a very dedicated fan or deaf. Either way, this failed attempt at atmosphere only damages the listening experience further. Poof that deathcore and slow tempo don’t go hand in hand.
Stage Breaker, 5.5/10 – Like I said, the first 5 seconds of this song provide perhaps one of the only memorable moments on the EP. Beyond that, it goes back to the tried and tested formula.
Ten Ton Hammer [Machine Head Cover], 3/10 – When all else fails (and it clearly has), use someone else’s song. Nice try, but no thanks…
