ALBUM REVIEW: Dead Era – Walking Dead on Broadway
It takes a band of immense quality to stand out amongst a saturated and often ridiculed genre. Deathcore regularly gets branded as one dimensional and unimaginative and it takes something special to break that stigma. WALKING DEAD ON BROADWAY are now nearing a decade since their formation and have strung together an extended play and three full length albums, the most recent of which being Slaves back in 2016 which would prove to be the final album with former vocalist Robert Horn who would leave the band a year later. Now, in 2018 with new vocalist Nils Richber in tow the boys look to provide that certain special something to get their heads above the deathcore crowd with their new release Dead Era.
After bypassing the brief introduction track you see the first real taste of the new incarnation of WALKING DEAD ON BROADWAY and it is something truly vicious. The low tuned distorted guitars and machine-like drum beats combine to create a heavy backdrop for the band’s new secret weapon; the voice of Nils Richber whose powerful delivery adds a whole other level to the snarling aggression that is the main artery of this band. The song itself isn’t remarkable, but if the goal for an opening track is to present a high level of energy and impact to lead in to the rest of the album then it is very much job done.
The following song Hostage To The Empire opens with a gloomy, atmospheric synth introduction that wouldn’t be out of place on a DIMMU BORGIR album before unloading an onslaught of blast beats from Stephan Hoffmann and chugging riffs by axemen Michael Kalusche and Maximilian Kette. The overall sound is high octane and frenzied and gives the listener virtually no time to come up for air (although, why would you want to?). One thing of note is the keys in the background that have the same kind of feel that you would get from the The Truth era of BLEEDING THROUGH.
The next highlight on the album comes in the form of the track Gospel Of The Kingdom which displays another wicked concoction of furious riffs that sound similar to the likes of AVERSIONS CROWN or FIT FOR AN AUTOPSY. The drum beats are once again complex and impressive with Hoffman appearing to be more machine than man with the speed and power harnessed through his drum kit. The breakdown towards the end of the song is an absolute monster, destined to reduced venues to rubble and see many patrons to their live shows waking up with shiny black eyes and bloody noses. The lyrics are incredibly articulate and not what you would necessarily expect from a modern day deathcore band with lines such as “We are the beating heart in the body of the monster. We are the inertia at the centre of the confounded eye of the storm” proving that the boys have a little more intellect behind them than the typically angry-teen diary posts that so often accompany the music in this genre.
It goes without saying that the acquisition of new frontman Richber has been a massive gain for WALKING DEAD ON BROADWAY. The man seems to have the lung capacity of a blue whale and manages to fit an insane amount of words in to a small space of time and the delivery is something to be admired with the energy, power and range that is sure to send crowds in to riot when the band hit the road. The music itself on Dead Era is of a high standard, but not remarkable by any stretch with little in the way of musical exploration and variation. This is not to say that the songs are not enjoyable, rather that they are not reinventing the wheel. Nothing that you will see here is revolutionary or ground breaking and the band themselves make no claims to be. But it is good, honest heavy metal music and a great leap forward for WALKING DEAD ON BROADWAY.
Rating: 7/10
Dead Era is out now via Long Branch Records.
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