### Eye For An Eye: Downfall

#### 22/04/10 || Khlysty

In their own words, “Eye for an Eye were formed in late 2007 and quickly set out to resurrect the hard rock sounds of the 90’s. Drawing their inspiration from the music they grew up listening to, and taking things back to basics, Eye for an Eye are here to prove themselves, and have a damn good time doing it!”. When I read this paragraph, I started wondering what these guys meant when they said that they “set out to resurrect the hard rock sounds of the 90’s”. Do they mean that they’re gonna do the grunge thingy? The “Black Album” Metallica thingy? The nu-metal shitty thingy? I mean, hey, there were quite a few “hard rock sounds” that permeated the ‘90s. Wonder which one did our boys from the glorious lands of UK chose…

Well, after perusing the sounds emanating from “Downfall”, I can definitely say that the vibe is more “Black Album”-“Load” Metallica, than anything else. What does this mean? Well, it means that in here we got us some basic mid-tempo four-to-the-floor hard rockers, based on blues-rock riffs of the days of yore, pretty melodic stuff, to be sure, but, really, nothing that anyone older than 15 years, haven’t heard – lotsa times – before. Some songs have a slower C.O.C.-groove vibe added to them and the singer sounds like a not-very-successful cross-breed between “Load”-era Hetfield and “Deliverance”-Pepper. He tries his tough-guy throaty bark throughout the record and, please, believe me when I say that his schtick becomes tiresome pretty soon.

The band sounds pretty pro and the production is ace at that: organic and nasty. So, the main problem here is the music, which, although fun to listen to, pretty much lacks character and attitude. The songs sound exciting at first, but lose steam after a couple of more listens, while it’s obvious that the band tries more to sound like its heroes than anything unique or particular. The simplistic songwriting doesn’t really help things, as the songs hide no secrets, no new ideas, no surprises. And this is what hurts me the most: the lack of adventure spirit displayed here. Everything is as it’s supposed to be and nothing is out of order, out of place, out of ordinary. Everything is as it should be, to caress certain pleasure centers, but, well, the orgasm is as far removed from this record as is originality.

Look, I hate to hand out bad reviews, especially to younger bands, and this is not, y’know, bad. It’s just, well, boring and unexciting. Eye For An Eye sounds like a gazillion bands before them and a trillion bands that’ll come after them. They follow a safe road and I won’t be surprised if I learn that their songs are played on the radio, or that their record sells well; they cater to the masses and do a good job at it. Their songs have certain hooks that appeal to certain people who think that “Death Magnetic” is pretty rad. To me, though, this safe road that they take in this here record, this lack of taking chances is something that bothers me. A lot. So, I won’t tell you to avoid them, but I’ll tell you that if you’re looking for exciting music, this it ain’t…

- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: Rising Records
- Website: Eye For An Eye MySpace
- Band
- Tom Norris: vocals, guitar
- Tom Bull: guitars
- Chris Ford: bass
- Rich Cowdry: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. Never be free
- 02. Ask no questions
- 03. Until I’m done
- 04. Getting old
- 05. Downfall
- 06. Seven gods of chaos
- 07. Final sunrise
- 08. It’s been a long time
- 09. Another life
- 10. Brother