Coldtrigger (ROI) | ‘Into The Clearing’

Metalcore: a dubious genre now, played mainly by people without an inkling about either Metal or Hardcore. Because let’s face it, if they did, it would be pretty decent sounding. It isnt though - it’s a sinkhole catch-all for bands who are basically the next logical step after nu-metal. They’re lucky they get to wear a tag that lends them much more kudos than they deserve.

Coldtrigger play exceptionally well, and as is increasingly the case with demo output, it’s hard to fault in the production stakes. The band don’t put a note out of place, and sound like they’ve been in the game a lot longer than they have. The trouble is the style they’ve chosen. It’s a product of it’s time and not a great deal more.

Though there is a decent metal band under here providing sometimes excellent double kick powered twin harmony (’God Only Knows’), it will date terribly. The reason for that is that the clean sung vocals are of the variety we’d commonly call Emo. Which means long held notes, sounding saccharine, singing about relationships. It’s tiresome and overwrought, as usual with this style.

The band are so much better when they stick to the metal. Their drummer is tight and capable, making tracks like ‘Sink’ actually live up to the Metalcore badge as it should rightly sound.

Coldtrigger are a group with real ideas. Many of them are hard to debunk completely, though they jar. Take ‘Departed’, which uses a keyboard sound that pops up occasionally. It’s extremely hard to shake the feeling that this has been taken from the recent ‘Nu Rave’ fad, and one gets the image of some slitty lined pink sunglasses cnut with a daft haircut playing it. Yet the notes are the right ones.

This crops up again in the album’s best track, ‘Lost Cause’, which actually manages to open with hardcore speed and intensity before descending into an almost gobsmackingly pop feel. The chorus is infuriatingly catchy. I want to hate it, but somehow admire their chtuzpah. It’s pure NME, and for that reason, ultimately, it just grates.

There’s a collision of styles in here which I admire the band for branching into. I’m not usually one for advocating a band go backwards, returning to metal’s more stone age instincts. Coldtrigger’s audience though is going to be in their teens by definition, simply because so much of their sweeter, harmonised and clean sung vagaries are a product of their time.

On the other hand though, their metal capability is plain to see, if and when they let it out. So it’s with the best will in the world that I wish them every success. But probably in Kerrang, rather than here or anywhere else.

- Earl Grey ::: 16/08/09