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Ravage: The end of tomorrow
13/04/10 || revenant
Mention the words “power metal” in your introduction here at GD and one of two things usually happen to your review:
1 – readers skip on to the next review in the update, or:
2 – readers scroll down to check out the score, then skip on to the next review in the update.
Since I want people to read this here review (hey, I didn’t write it for nothing), one thing I’m certainly not going to do with my introduction here is mention that Ravage here are a power metal band. Oh shit, I’ve blown it already, haven’t I?
Ravage formed in Boston way back 1995. “The End of Tomorrow”, released in 2009, was their second full length release. Not a promising sign, huh? But start listening to the record and you’ll find it isn’t actually all that bad. In fact, I might have even been tempted to give this album a nice high score if it wasn’t for two glaring problems.
The first problem comes in the form of their vocalist, Alec Firicano AKA Al Ravage. Now I’m not going to say this guy has a bad voice, it actually works well at times, but there are moments in the record reminiscent of bad karaoke singing. In many instances he carries notes to long and out of pitch, and the results are appalling. Worse still are his falsetto screams… how can I best describe these? Imagine an episode of “Futurama” where Dr. Zoidberg is raiding the fridge late at night. Bender, being the evil motherfucker that he is, sees old Zoidey bent over, grabs the moment of opportunity, pulls a pineapple out of his chest cavity and rams rans it right up the doctor’s arsehole. That high pitched scream from Zoidberg’s mouth you’re imagining right now is exactly what you get on this album. If you don’t believe me, check out “The Shredder”.
The other apparent problem with this album is the pacing of the songs, particularly through the second half of the album. Now I am not the kind of person that needs every song to be to the beat of a charging horse, but for these songs to really work they needed some serious pacing up. At times, the pace feels like the band themselves are just going through the motions as though their music is a colour by numbers exercise. Come on guys, you’re a metal band, attack your songs with some fucking purpose.
Yet despite these problems, I can’t declare this album a complete shitfest. There is certainly plenty to like about what Ravage have done here, and if they can work through the above mentioned problems they could certainly be a force to look out for in the future. But for now, I’ll give “The End of Tomorrow” a…
- Information
- Released: 2009
- Label: Metal Blade
- Website: www.ravagetheearth.com
- Band
- Alec “Al Ravage” Firicano: vocals
- Eli Joe Firicano” guitars
- Nick Izzo: guitars
- Howie Snow: bass
- Pete Webber: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. The Halls of Madness
- 02. Reign Fall
- 03. Freedom Fighter
- 04. Damn Nation
- 05. The Shredder
- 06. Into the Shackles
- 07. In Shattered Dreams
- 08. The Nightmare’s Hold: Part 1
- 09. The Nightcrawler
- 10. The Nightmare’s Hold: Part 2
- 11. Grapes of Wrath
- 12. The End of Tomorrow
