Blatant Disarray – Everyone Dies Alone

Blatant Disarray is the other band on Tribunal Records that I picked up on iTunes the other day. They are also from North Carolina, which leads me to believe that must be where Tribunal is located. The similarities between Blatant Disarray and Colossus seem to end there. Where Colossus has a very early 80s pre-thrash metal feel to it, Blatant Disarray has more of a later 80s thrash sound. Though honestly I would just call this straight up heavy metal, but if you had to throw a tag on thrash will work as well as any other.

It looks like Blatant Disarray has been around since 2000 (releasing an EP and a demo previously) but “Everyone Dies Alone” is their full length debut. Now that I do a little research it looks like this album was actually released in 2010, but I’m guessing it must have just made its way into iTunes recently.

I like this album a lot. It sounds like something I would have listened to in high school but it doesn’t necessarily sound dated. This isn’t a sound you hear a lot anymore (tragically) but stylistically this is not outdated. Metal is metal.

The vocals are clean with a rough edge. The music ranges from mid-tempo to fast with lots of great guitar and drum work. The recording is good, I’d like it even better if it was slightly more crisp and polished, but as it is the sound is just fine. The quality of the songwriting is the important thing right? And I think they’ve got that part nailed so no worries on that front. I read something comparing them to late 80s Testament, and I guess I can sort of hear that at times in the way the singer phrases things, but other than that no one else comes to mind that they sound like. Bonus points for sounding original in an older style of metal.

I have to say I’m pretty excited by the number of quality new bands I’ve heard lately. Throughout the course of the year I will occasionally find myself despairing over the lack of interesting new music, this is usually at times when new releases slow down, like around the holidays. So picking up three new bands that I like in one week is like Christmas in August. And I know for a fact the next two months have some great releases coming.