Artist: We Are Killing Ourselves
Title: The Road Of Awareness
Genre: Groove Metal
Release Date: 31st July 2011
Label: Rastilho Records
Album Review
WE ARE KILLING OURSELVES (aka. WAKO) are up for releasing their sophomore effort just a few years after their debut ‘Deconstructive Essence’. Like their debut, ‘The Road Of Awareness’ is crushing Groove Metal tinged with Death Metal as well, sounding like a cross between LAMB OF GOD on the vocal front (one can definitely hear a bit of that from the ‘Wrath’ album on the track ‘Ship Of Fools’) and MESHUGGAH with the gritty guitar tones that have an audible buzz and “stop n’ go” presence to them. At first, WAKO may seem like the typical Groove Metal band that tends to focus on repetitive rhythms such as on ‘The Shape Of Perfection’, but ‘Ship Of Fools’ proves to be a bit more adventurous. It starts out heavy but also includes large doses of melody which allows the guitars quieter passages as opposed to full on chugging with the drums bursting away in the background. At the same time, as said before, it shows the strongest LAMB OF GOD presence, which may irk some fans to thinking that these guys are just copying their style. Later on the album gets a bit more technical and WAKO ends up sounding more like themselves with a track like ‘The Shadows Collapse Within’. Here the musical structure involves more charging Groove Metal that goes at a mid pace and then explodes in spikes where the instruments are much more technical and much faster, along with a dual mix of high and low vocals which mirror Deathcore slightly, but at a much more even level.
‘Coded Message Of Death’ and ‘Coronation Of Existence’ prove the two most interesting tracks on the album. ‘Coded…’ features the usual chug and churn of the guitars along with the growling, but also feature some interesting clean vocals that aren’t heard on many of the other tracks. Whether or not they come from the band’s vocalist is unknown, but it helps round out the sound. ‘Coronation Of Existence’ holds the most melody, especially in the guitar solo as it starts out slow and then builds up, with the leading guitar rhythms actually going at a slow pace as opposed to just mindlessly slugging along to support it. The clean vocals are also present, but more in a scream-sing mode as opposed to the more melodic vocals heard on ‘Coded…’. Overall, fans of LAMB OF GOD are probably going to get the most enjoyment out of this, though the music may sound a bit more watered down as the former has been around much longer and produces much more groove oriented licks (WAKO’s groove influences are a bit simply, but easy to follow and enjoy in the way that THROWDOWN can be). The vocal abilities are by far the best- harsh, crisp, and well produced without any distortion involved to muddle it. As far as how ‘The Road…’ measures up to the expectations from ‘Deconstructive…’, it sounds just as good, if not better.
Tracklist
01. The Shape Of Perfection - 6:34
02. Ship Of Fools - 4:11
03. Dissonant Dark Dance - 6:10
04. Drifting Beyond Reality - 4:46
05. Extispicium - 5:20
06. The Shadows Collapse Within - 5:15
07. Coded Message Of Death - 3:39
08. The Sorcerer - 6:20
09. Intersected To A Closer Premonition - 4:16
10. Coronation Of Existence - 6:46
Line-up
Nuno Rodrigues – Vocals
João Pedro – Guitar
André Sobral – Guitar
André Landeck – Bass
Bruno Guilherme – Drums
Website
http://www.myspace.com/wakoplanet
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 7
Sound: 8
Total: 7.5 / 10
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