Review Summary: It had potential, and it fell flat on its face. Not as bad as it's made out to be, in any case.
Children of Bodom has arguably been one of the most successful metal bands of the last decade: With 11 years of being active with the name "Children of Bodom", and even more years if you count their early days as "Inearthed", they've been a force to be reckoned with, with their first 3 albums being considered classics. Now, I'm not gonna lie, I prefer the sound of their recent stuff (Are You Dead Yet?, Hatecrew Deathroll), to the one of their old stuff. I must even admit that Are You Dead Yet? is what I consider their best album. Being heavier and more complex than their old stuff while keeping a lot of melody was definitely something I quite enjoyed. Songs like the title track and Thrashed, Lost & Strungout kept calling me for playing them again. But let's get back on track, a review of Are You Dead Yet?, this is not.
Now, this album keeps the same formula as AYDY?... So why is it I don't rate it as highly? Well, to start with, I must admit that the quality of this album keeps jumping from song to song. The album opens in a good note with the fast, thrashy
Hellhounds on My Trail. This song feels just like the kind of progression they needed, cool keyboard that makes atmosphere here and there. But if there's something interesting about this song, it is the solo. The solo of this song jumps back to the 80's thrash era, it is dissonant, fast, completely insane, yet it fits right in the madness. Even the keyboard solo is completely crazy. But it fits. And then, the title track.
Blooddrunk is quite a good song, the keyboard intro is amazing, the solos are more like classic Bodom, and there's more melody here. Alexi's vocals are stronger than they were on AYDY?, and in both of this songs they fit perfectly. Sadly, this 2 songs might be the only ones of the album I can say that, and maybe Tie My Rope. Both songs are great, but I can't say that with the rest of the album so easily.
You see, one of the biggest problems here comes from Alexi's vocals. In the songs that were previously mentioned, his vocals felt right were they belonged. But in the other songs, he sounds overbearing. Since Hatecrew Deathroll, Alexi started changing his vocals from a harsh black metal like screech to a mid-range scream which you could actually understand and also was more powerful than his screech of early albums, and far better than his attempt at a low growl in Something Wild, which was, admittedly, quite laughable. But in this album, he tries to get his vocals to take over: In songs like
Lobodomy and
Roadkill Morning, his vocals are overbearing and annoying, you just get to wish he shuts up. Alexi has never been one of the most appreciated vocalists out there, but this album definitely won't help those who hate his vocals at all.
Musically, this album lacks an edge: While there are some seriously awesome songs like
Hellhounds on My Trail,
Blooddrunk,
Tie My Rope and
Banned From Heaven, there are some terrible ones like
Lobodomy and
Smile Pretty for the Devil, and the others are just... there, they are neither good nor bad: They're just forgettable. This album suffers from feeling like a collection of B-Sides instead of an actual album, and that quite damages the quality, making it quite jumpy. The riffs in this album are mostly great, going from highly melodic to thrashy, and that is one of the high points of the album. Same cannot be said about the lead guitar work, though: As good as Alexi is, the solos feel recycled and repetitive, with certain exceptions:
Hellhounds on my Trail has that insane Slayer-like solo and
Blooddrunk is quite good. But the rest of his solos are lacking the feeling of the ones in earlier stuff. Drumming isn't anything really special, but it's good. Jaska could do more creative stuff, but he does a good work. The bass has some cool parts like in
Smile Pretty for the Devil, where it sounds cool in the intro, that is admittedly the best part of that weak song, but overall it is M.I.A. during all the album. The keyboards aren't as prominent as they used to be, usually now they just follow the notes, but they shine at times.
Lyrically, this album is simply disastrous. I can't keep it any longer, this album might as well be considered their lowest point lyrically. AYDY? got some of their best lyrics to date, this is totally the opposite. Take, for example, the great
Hellhounds on My Trail:
Watching the c***
But before I'm into worries
I do better think fast
Step beyond the legs
Risk selfdestruction
One more sucker
Wait again
To the wrong turn
To the right direction
Too many ****ing gonna turn
Going too fast
When you call me outrageous
As a questioner
Now, asides from making NO SENSE AT ALL, they are plain terrible. Luckily, that is one of the songs where musically you won't care about the lyrics. But there are cases, like
Lobodomy, where you'll hope "Well, at least this song might have good lyrics". Well, let's look at the source:
You mother****ers wanna give me, a lobotomy?
**** no, then you know who I am?
Well we're about to ****ing see
You started messin' with death
No one said?
I'm a Maniac
*** yeah, you have no power to ask why!
Then I will give you a turn
Well, you get your answer, and it is a no. And don't expect the rest of the album to be any better lyrically, it's just plain terrible in that sense.
In short, this album had potential, but it ended up falling flat in it's face. Alexi tries to hard to take over with his vocals, the songwriting keeps jumping in quality, the lead guitar works usually feels like more of the same, the keyboards which used to give an extra edge to earlier albums aren't there for a good part, and the lyrics are horrid. Their worst album to date, though it has songs like
Hellhounds on My Trail,
Blooddrunk,
Tie My Rope and
Banned From Heaven that save it from being downright terrible. I don't know how their next album will turn out, but I do hope it ends up being better than this one.
Reccomended tracks:
As mentioned before,
Hellhounds on My Trail,
Blooddrunk,
Tie My Rope and
Banned From Heaven. Because those are actually awesome.
