Eve To Adam - Auburn Slip
Mikendra Records - 2001
Philip Whitehouse
I'm sure that site editor Mark Bridgeman would tell you that one bonus of having a team of reviewers with differing tastes on a site such as this is that you can be almost certain that one of them is going to like every CD that comes in for review. Such is the case with Eve To Adam - Rodrigo received the three-track sampler of it, reviewed it luke-warmly and swiftly passed the full release along to me. Obvious a little wary of the band's quality due to the hot-potato nature of the album's arrival into my possession, I slapped it into the CD player and prepared for the worst.
Luckily, I was pleasantly surprised, in more ways than one. Eve To Adam specialise in a form of mainstream rock that comes across sounding like A Perfect Circle going to a church meeting with Creed - it's melodic while still heavy enough to nod your head to, atmospheric and with enough variety in the songs to keep your interest through an album.
The first thing you notice about the album is the excellent nature of Taki Sassaris' vocals - sounding like the singer of Creed after having swallowed a bit of gravel but able to fit his voice around a softer, more emotional style of singing, Sassaris sets the mood of the songs perfectly. AJ Pappas lays down some groovy basslines, while Guarav Bale's guitar work moves from fairly chunky riffs to reverb-laden solos to acoustic chord-strumming with the greatest of ease. Alex Sassaris' drumming rattles away in the background, fitting the music and perfectly adequate, but far from mind-blowing.
Stand-out tracks on the album include the touching 'Memorial Day' - the lyrics and tone of the song change the mood from what could have been a depressing, melancholic reflection on the death of a friend into an uplifting and affecting tribute to a worthy life now ended. Another excellent track is the fairly fast-paced 'Find Yourself Another', which feautres some top-notch vocals from Taki. The instrumental section in 'Red Door' is worth listening to also.
The album isn't faultless, however - the lyrics seem to have come from the Chino Moreno school of free-association writing at times, suggesting symbolic significance while actually showing maddening ambiguity. Also, the mellow nature of the record can cause you to relax to a point where you're not actually paying attention to the music anymore, and the songs go by in a barely-perceived wave of sonic ambience. Overall, this abum made a pleasing change to me from the staple diet of grindcore and death metal I have been living on for a while. While it's not technically a metal album and is, as Rodrigo pointed out, something of an oddity, it is a worthwhile one to check out if you can handle something a little more emotional and mellow than your average Cannibal Corpse record.
Mikendra Records - 2001
Philip Whitehouse
I'm sure that site editor Mark Bridgeman would tell you that one bonus of having a team of reviewers with differing tastes on a site such as this is that you can be almost certain that one of them is going to like every CD that comes in for review. Such is the case with Eve To Adam - Rodrigo received the three-track sampler of it, reviewed it luke-warmly and swiftly passed the full release along to me. Obvious a little wary of the band's quality due to the hot-potato nature of the album's arrival into my possession, I slapped it into the CD player and prepared for the worst.
Luckily, I was pleasantly surprised, in more ways than one. Eve To Adam specialise in a form of mainstream rock that comes across sounding like A Perfect Circle going to a church meeting with Creed - it's melodic while still heavy enough to nod your head to, atmospheric and with enough variety in the songs to keep your interest through an album.
The first thing you notice about the album is the excellent nature of Taki Sassaris' vocals - sounding like the singer of Creed after having swallowed a bit of gravel but able to fit his voice around a softer, more emotional style of singing, Sassaris sets the mood of the songs perfectly. AJ Pappas lays down some groovy basslines, while Guarav Bale's guitar work moves from fairly chunky riffs to reverb-laden solos to acoustic chord-strumming with the greatest of ease. Alex Sassaris' drumming rattles away in the background, fitting the music and perfectly adequate, but far from mind-blowing.
Stand-out tracks on the album include the touching 'Memorial Day' - the lyrics and tone of the song change the mood from what could have been a depressing, melancholic reflection on the death of a friend into an uplifting and affecting tribute to a worthy life now ended. Another excellent track is the fairly fast-paced 'Find Yourself Another', which feautres some top-notch vocals from Taki. The instrumental section in 'Red Door' is worth listening to also.
The album isn't faultless, however - the lyrics seem to have come from the Chino Moreno school of free-association writing at times, suggesting symbolic significance while actually showing maddening ambiguity. Also, the mellow nature of the record can cause you to relax to a point where you're not actually paying attention to the music anymore, and the songs go by in a barely-perceived wave of sonic ambience. Overall, this abum made a pleasing change to me from the staple diet of grindcore and death metal I have been living on for a while. While it's not technically a metal album and is, as Rodrigo pointed out, something of an oddity, it is a worthwhile one to check out if you can handle something a little more emotional and mellow than your average Cannibal Corpse record.
