Scream Aim Fire review

Bullet For My Valentine repudiate mainstream

People love sorting and arranging notions very much. From a psycological point of view this phenomenon may serve as a sort of defence mechanism from new and unknown things. There is no simpler thing than to pin a stylistic level on another young band and grasp their music as a part of something, which already exists, which is familiar and harmless. And in this sense a Welsh band Bullet For My Valentine looks like a potential victim. After the release of their debut album Poison in 2005 the band was unanimously defined as Metalcore, which has obviously influenced on the band's fan base formation. And even though this word describes only a part of Bullet For My Valentine's music many of casual listeners were ready to see this band as a part of Metalcore scene exclusively. It is a disputable question if it is good or bad. Poison turned out to be a pretty successful album among mainstream admirers but at the same time it became an object of mockery for true metal fans. However, it seems like Bullet For My Valentine are not ready to accept this situation. Their new album Scream Aim Fire aims at the very center of headbangers' audience.

A solid metal weight

According to the words of musicians Scream Aim Fire turned out to be much more heavier than their previous record. And actually this is something you cannot argue with. Of course, Poison sounded sufficiently heavy too but the new record has raised this quality on a new level. In particular a track called Waking The Demon sounds very exemplifying. This is a real thrash metal – high-speed cannonade of drums, powerful accents that are ready to tear your speakers and guitar riffs that sound quite typical for this genre. Even Kreator wouldn't have been ashamed to have this kind of track in their catalogue. The album's title track carries a set of approximately the same features and adds another portion of a solid metal weight to the album. This composition goes first in the track list and serves as a perfect start for the whole record. Eye Of The Storm is another excellent song made according to the standards of classic thrash metal. An improvement of melodic structures is another thing worthy of mentioning. Let's take Hearts Burst Into Fire as an example. This is one of the most ballad-oriented songs, which has both acoustic guitars and beautiful solos. But if previously the attempts to make something of this kind looked like a tribute to the rules of mainstream, today Bullet For My Valentine sound precisely like a metal band even in acoustic parts.

Scream Aim Fire: Stylistic hybrid?

However, Bullet For My Valentine have a whole set of features, which you can hardly call positive. You can hear the influence of famous metal bands too often, which is not that bad but Bullet For My Valentine doesn't sound original even from the point of view of the whole genre. Yes, they play fast riffs, yes they sound more than just convincing but when you hear a scream a-la James Hatfield, gallop a-la Iron Maiden or a riff a-la Exodus you just unintentionally start comparing Bullet For My Valentine with these bands and of course Bullet For My Valentine doesn't look like a peer for them. The more so because Scream Aim Fire still has an appreciable share of Mainstream tunefulness. For the most part because of the vocals. It would always remind you about emo bands and things alike. It is not that obvious as it was on Poison but sufficiently typical all the same. However, it would be wrong to assert that this is bad. This kind of stylistic crossbreeding will probably manage to get shaped into something really interesting in the future. Scream Aim Fire looks rather like a bridge album of a band, which is about to find its own way. In other respects this album is a very solid record. Everything sounds massive, highly explosive and uncompromising in the most metal sense of this word. This album is evidently better than their debut record and besides it is quite capable of bringing a new army of fans for the band. In a word, this album is definitely worthy of your attention.