This band was an early victim to 'omg we're on a label lets listen to what they tell us to do,' and now have found themselves. Nice to hear this kind of music. The bassist used to be in a thrash metal band, but figured they weren't taking music seriously enough so went to Trivium. Either way, are these guys -metal- I don't know. But the way they dressed, and all that had a lot to do with label pressure.
I have a feeling that these guys were young and confused where they wanted to fall at musically. Perhaps initially they weren't true metal, and were easily distracted by other musical influences of their generation. Hell, many of us on the board didn't find metal to later in their lives. I tend to believe him when he says that initially he wanted to front a band but couldnt' sing, so he screamed. Now he wanted to put out music that he truly enjoys, and took the effort to take vocal lessons to learn to sing. Learning to sing also made their riffs and leads change a bit.
If a different band put out this album this year, and had the -metal look-, and it wasn't a Roadrunner release, people in the metal community would be calling this one of the best albums of the year. So are they posers? Perhaps. How many of the true metal -non posers- can play the song Crusade, nonetheless some of their other sounds? Hell how many can come up with an album as complete as this one? With songs that sound different, yet still as Trivium.
Either way I know I won't convince anybody, and don't care if I do. But for those that haven't made up their mind about them, give the album a spin. You might be impressed, or perhaps you'll hate it.