There comes a point when I listen to a CD that turns the
\nmaterial either towards the “I like this” or “I loathe this” and
\nfor Autumn Leaves, those moments come at the 2:58 point in the
\nfourth track, “Empty Black Stare,” of their recent release
\nAs Night Conquers Day<\/i>. After some fairly typical death
\nmetal, complete with the annoying growls, the band actually slows
\ndown the pace and ‘grooves’ with some very interesting arrangements
\nof a standard metal riff. The drummer throws in some syncopated
\ndouble bass drums, the guitar throws in some whammy bar tricks and
\nthe bass rumbles a counter-melody to the brilliant guitar solo.<\/p>\n
Now if more death metal bands could do this, I’d see no reason
\nto bash the genre in each review I write about a death metal disc.
\nThe band knows they are death metal, they play death metal songs
\nbut they are smart enough to know that they don’t have to be just a
\ndeath metal band.<\/p>\n
Sometimes this works sometimes it doesn’t. Metallica is a prime
\nexample. They knew they are a thrash metal band, they play thrash
\nmetal songs but they are smart enough to know they don’t have to be
\njust a thrash metal band. Megadeth (
\nRisk<\/i>), Anthrax (
\nVolume 8<\/i>) and a host of others are following suit, releasing
\nalbums that pale in comparison to their finest moments, not because
\nthey’ve sold out, but the songwriting was weaker. And find me one
\nflat-out solid guitar riff on
\nRisk<\/i> and you’ve done better than I.<\/p>\n
So in essence, then, Autumn Leaves, with their cover art of an
\neclipse and dark images, are a death band. They play death metal
\nsongs but they are smart enough to realize they don’t have to be
\njust a death metal band.<\/p>\n
The rest of the songs on the CD encompass many of the common
\ntraits of death metal There are the dark, growly vocals and the
\nfrantic pounding of a drummer who is able to inject intricate drum
\nfills around guitar riffs that often crescendo and decrescendo
\nwithin moments of each other. There are intricate tom-tom fills,
\nmuch in the way Nicko McBrain (Iron Maiden) uses the pitch of his
\ntoms to accentuate the guitar and\/or bass riff.<\/p>\n
Aside from the aforementioned 2:58 point in the fourth track,
\nthere is also the hypnotizing song “The Present Past” which begins
\nfairly typically as a death metal grunt feast before, collapsing
\ninto more of a thrash metal guitar riff.<\/p>\n
Bands like Autumn Leaves come around rarely: talented musicians
\ntwisting their genre around into a new pretzel. Hold the
\ncheese.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":25127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6165],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-36332","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-autumn-leaves","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36332\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36332"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36332"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}