First Review

from www.unboundzine.com

Ripped Off Face-We Are the State
(Metalhit.com, 2009)

It’s quite disappointing to me that I am just finding out about this band and they have already called it a day. While the band has been called death metal, that doesn’t even begin to fully show just what the band had to offer. Elements of death metal, grindcore, hardcore, crust and even doom metal come together to form the Ripped Off Face sound. One thing is certain the band was very good at what they do and was very from from being one dimensional.

What is the most surprising about the album is just how well the band manages to mess the styles and also how almost entire songs aside from the use of screaming aren’t incredibly heavy. The Lioness is more of a mid-tempo song for the most part and features a very post-hardcore style of songwriting although the guitar solo is pure metal as are a smattering of riffs throughout the song. The band also likes to keep the songs fairly lengthy with a number of the songs being over the 5 minute mark. These songs are pretty much epic in scope and feature a staggering amount of sections. It never sounds forced though and no matter where the band goes with their sound it just works. Shallow End of the Gene Pool starts off with a black metal style riff and then goes straight into a riff that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Converge album and yet the band makes it work perfectly.

Bands come and go these days but this is a band that definitely was onto something. The melding of styles and the energy on display make this an album that is damn hard to not pay attention to. Also due to the fact that the album released posthumous the band has decided to make it a free download so you can’t really go wrong.

http://www.wearethestate.com

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~ by wearethestate on February 9, 2009.