Artist: Concrete Sun
Title: Sky High
Genre: Southern Metal
Release Date: 3rd October 2011
Label: Unsigned
Album Review
No one would have expected Southern Metal to come out of Serbia, but CONCRETE SUN make a brilliant attempt on their debut album of the best blend of Southern Rock and Groove Metal that hasn’t been created since DOWN. As fans will notice right from ‘Just a Beginning’, DOWN seems to be one of the primary influences on CONCRETE SUN with the chugging, gritty guitar tones with semi melodic solos layered on top of them and the sludge pace that makes it easy to just settle back. The vocals are more in the heavy metal singing range as opposed to any screaming or growling, so that makes things all the more enjoyable. ‘Last Man Under The Sun’ takes some ALICE AND CHAINS influence that turns things around for a slow, acoustic piece that is slow grooving rock that serves as the only “soft song” on the entire album. Things pick back up again with ‘D.A.N.U.B.E’ which leans back towards DOWN territory which serves as one of the loudest tracks on the album, but unfortunately begins to run into the issue to sounding too much like the first track. The same can be said for ‘Junkyard Dog’. This goes to show that while riff driven metal can be catchy, at the same time it is limited.
‘God Forsaken Prostitute’ adds some more melody amongst the one-sided riff and tends to switch back and forth between heavy and soft, but overall it doesn’t differ too much from the other tracks. ‘Ruff Song’ throws in some more spoken word vocals that are low, tough, and sound a bit like PANTERA mixed with THROWDOWN amongst some very minimalistic guitar; it sounds like just one is doing all the work during the verses while the other only comes in for the solos. ‘Sky Is High’ tries to be the album anthem, but ‘Euphoria’ beats it to it because it carries such a similar song structure in the Southern Metal vein. Finally there is ‘Hide Behind’ which is a great rock piece that opens similar to ‘Slither’ by VELVET REVOLVER. This is probably the one track fans will really get hooked on, solely for the introduction. The rest of the track is mediocre of best, sounding like ‘God Forsaken Prostitute’, but from the way the solos are constructed CONCRETE SUN definitely chose to go more in the Southern Rock route as opposed to the heavier Southern Metal style of the other songs, making it more catchy, cleaner, and easier to hear all around with less distortion. Overall, those who really enjoy Southern Metal bands from J.D. OVERDRIVE all the way to DOWN will find these Serb’s sound very fun to rock out to without any problems at all. New fans might take some time to get adjusted to heavy sludge tone and wonder if they’re listening to ‘Nola’ from DOWN all over again, but after a while they’ll get it.
Tracklist
01. Just a Beginning
02. Euphoria
03. Last Man Under The Sun
04. D.A.N.U.B.E.
05. Junkyard Dog
06. God Forsaken Prostitute
07. Ruff Song
08. Sky Is High
09. Hide Behind
Line-up
Cerovina Strahinja – Vocals
Mijatovic Bojan – Guitar
Zivkovic Budimir – Guitar
Petrovic Strahinja – Bass
Topic Milos – Drums
Website
http://www.myspace.com/concretesunns
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 7
Sound: 6
Total: 6.5 / 10
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