Burnt By The Sun – The Perfect Is the Enemy of the Good (Relapse Records)
Fuckin’ metal! Sophomore full-length from these awesome Jersey boys, and it’s better than anything else. Brutal post-hardcore extreme metal with tinges of NWOSDM, grind, and even some black metal, especially in the manic riffing. Insane drums, insane vocals, insane performances all the way. This is gonna end up top five of the year, for sure. The melodies are more prevalent this time around, and there are some parts that’ll just blow your head off. Some sick, sick breakdowns are thrown in for good measure, to make sure no one steps out of line.
Tracks:
1) Noise intro, with radio samples. Ignore.
2) Awesome ripper. A pretty monotone guitar riff that transforms into a cool semi-breakdown pattern, and then back. Some very neat drum fills, and excellent melody towards the end. Almost blast-beats, if you ask me. FCC.
3) Spiraling riff that goes into this downward spiral only to emerge with so much cool melody, it made me do a double-take. Has this unbelievable breakdown, oh man.
4) Oh, man, this keeps getting better and better. The riff here is a little similar, in the same spiraling vein, but it has more mobility, and it eventually fades into a broken part with some awesome guitar feedback and blast beats galore. Then it just blasts right at you with some cool staccato riffing.
5) Starts much the same way as the other songs, with a guitar riff that just sounds odd, but it develops into a mega-thrasher. It’s a shame he says “bullshit” over and over... because the end of this song is just so beautiful. FCC.
6) More radio noises, more pointless interludes. Ignore.
7) Slow instrumental, keeping with the odd feel of the previous tracks. Worth a shot.
8) Vocals like you wouldn’t believe, and just generally excellent instrumentation. Another breakdown, and it kicks ass.
9) Awesome, awesome melody lines just under these crushing riffs. Builds into a monster breakdown.
10) Another radio noise interlude, but it introduces the next song’s main riff...
11) ...which is fucking awesome! Amazing intro melody that sounds like a sitar, and then crushing part, and then an even more melodic part. Oh my god, this is unbelievable.
12) More politically charged lyrics, but FCC.
13) Double bass, double bass, and then double bass. Sick, sick, sick.
14) 40 minutes of radio beeping and noise. I’m sure it fits in well with their artistic idea, but it’s worthless for us, so ignore.