Bullet For My Valentine is a band that I’m often oddly intrigued by. On one hand, they come out with the album THE POISON that has one of my favorite songs, HER VOICE RESIDES on it. The song is gritty, fast-paced, and powerful enough to put you on your ass. On the other hand, though, the disc is also littered with songs like ALL THESE THINGS I HATE and FOUR WORDS, which are the kind of pop-esque inspired ballads of mainstream calamity that typically turn me away from any band. They are, of course, threaded with fibers of the metal world (which, admittedly, the band tends to pull off well) that make it a bit easier to digest, but I always tend to feel like a poser when I’m listening to these songs.
I’m not going to say that these guys don’t know their shit, by any means, because they’ve got a musical sound that’s mostly inspired by their metal roots (the early 80s thrash metal, in particular) that works tremendously well. I think it’s the blend of the new school of music that is their downfall, insofar as I’m concerned, anyhow (and just to show what the fuck I know, they sell records like they’re Led Zeppelin). Trying to infuse the more popish elements of today’s music works well for those that are into that scene, and helps this band to transcend the oft-blurred line of genres to bridge a bit of the metal world into the mainstream, but it also fends off the traditionalists like me, for the most part.
I think that their sound works best when they’re actually picking a side to champion. TEARS DON’T FALL, to me, is where their sound is most grounded. And I can dig that song. HER VOICE RESIDES, also, is a piece that can encompass the whole of a band’s sound very well. And I obviously dig that. It’s just the aforementioned in between that hands them their dunce cap.
Feeling the way that I do, I was waiting excitedly to hear the new disc Scream, Aim, Fire. I had heard the single, and dug it well enough, but I wasn’t sure how they would handle the rest of the album. To my distaste, it was more of the same gray area. The title song is catchy and rocking, but the majority of the space reserved for the rest of the album is not so much to my taste. Maybe it’s the singer’s screamo-type voice that puts me off so much. The music is there most of the time, and the fretwork is top-notch, but it just doesn’t click for me, overall.
The new album will probably stay in my playlist for a while because I liked to give music a bit of time to sink in (not everything can immediately hook you, after all); and also because I’m still digging the title track. I can tell well enough, though, that it’s not going to be on my top albums list anytime soon; nor is the band going to breech a like category.
They’ll just be in that fuzzy gray area (that they tend to inevitably populate) somewhere in the middle of bands that I occasionally have the hankering for.
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