Review Summary: Coherency redefined
I remember hearing somewhere that the best word to describe Buried Inside’s
Chronoclast was chaotic. In some ways, this is true, with violent instruments and vocals throughout. But musically,
Chronoclast is a melodic, completely composed, extremely solid album that is the most refreshing metalcore I have heard since I first laid ears on Converge’s eponymous
Petitioning The Empty Sky. Searing metallic hardcore has never been so fresh as is has been presented in this single-song-split-up record.
My first thoughts upon hearing
Chronoclast were awe and amazement at how incredibly melodic the album is.
Time As Commodity and
Time As Surrogate Religion both include some of the best songwriting to impact the genre, taking some flat out beautiful melodies and meshing them in with raw hardcore. Soft interludes and arpeggios engage in a vice grip that makes stopping the album difficult, as you want to hear what these guys can come up with next.
Time As Imperialism is completely dedicated to a beautiful yet haunting guitar line with dissonant echoing yelps floating in and out of comprehensibility, then building into a moving bridge of gang vocals and variant chords, establishing an atmosphere like none other inside the genre.
Time is the defacer. Time is the devourer. The grand mediator of effect and the prosthesis to which we depend.
As depicted by song titles, this album’s lyrical content revolves around the ideal that time is an enemy to mankind, controlling their actions and the way they live their lives. Introspective and chilling as well as insightful and thoughtful, the lyrics flow as perfectly fluent as the musical aspect of the album.
The calendar year is an imperial narrative. The seven-day week is an imperial infliction. Circannual holidays are imperial flag-posts. Mechanical time is an imperial installation.
Chronoclast is still at heart a metallic hardcore album. For every astonishingly powerful melody, there is a refined hardcore undertone.
Time As Abjection keeps a pretty even split of scorching metallic hardcore ideals and soft, brooding orchestrated sounds.
Time As Surrogate Religion runs along the same lines as previously mentioned, except that it contains a more 70-30 split, 70 being tortured metalcore, 30 being soft melodic sequence. Seeing as the album is 10 parts comprising one internal, 40 minute song, it is perfectly balanced, down to the milligram. Never have I heard a more complete album in this way, and never again do I believe that I will. In every way,
Chronoclast’s flawlessly coherent ebb composes itself into the perfect equilibrium.
For sure, the members of this band have gotten their instruments down. Matt Bayles does another grand job in production. I feel that this has been his greatest shine since he produced Botch’s groundbreaking
We Are The Romans. His keen ability to faultlessly layer tracks of an album has made for some of the best mixes in music history. In this case, the bass tone and volume is remarkable. There is never a point on the album at which the bass cannot be heard under the guitars. As much credit as Bayles deserves for mixing the bass, Steve Martin also is due for composing some intelligent, strong, heavy basslines to keep the rest of the album elegantly moving at its pace. Octave walking and arpeggios are only icing on the cake, fringes on the main idea of having a strong rhythm portion of the band.
To put it bluntly, this album is menacing, in a good way. Many a time have shivers been sent up my spine at the relative musical genius that has been put forth in the album, an amazing mark in Metal history. I look forward to the day when Buried Inside progress to an even higher level of comprehensibility within their music, their perfect harmony taken to the next level of perfection, previously untouched by metalcore’s hands. I also look forward to the day in which more bands can expand the horizons of metalcore, as this Canadian-born band has, creating an elegant blend of styles, a progressive metalcore even.
Pro’s[+]
Every conceivable part of the album is perfectly formatted to fit in
The melodic tone to the album is just moving
As one long song, the album is perfect
Con’s[-]
Time As Automation could be argued as unnecessary
Recommended Tracks
Chronoclast
