Thursday, March 31, 2016

Demise Of The Crown - Self-Titled (2016)

Hailing from Quebec, this project mixes together progressive power metal with elements of melodic death and thrash, matching heavily the Nevermore comparison, but not so much the others I have listed on my on my press release. So I'm going to junk those and throw in one that really reminds me of the fucking band – Mercenary. No, I'm not talking about early Mercenary or their latter discs, I'm talking about the stuff in the middle, particularly 11 Dreams. We could also compare them to Sanctuary, especially the version of Sanctuary that Warrel Dane is fronting right now. Additionally, let's throw in some chorus heavy power metal, stuff like Brainstorm and Nocturnal Rites. Yet there's a bit more song structure to some of these pieces than I've heard on a few of their records as of late and I feel that's worth mentioning.

Unfortunately, the disc is only about thirty minutes and feels a little short for a debut (they could have added about three or four more songs) even though it definitely shows what this band is capable of. Their Bandcamp page is a bit vacant, so I'm assuming that one man by the name of Kevin Jardine (Slaves On Dope) is responsible for most of this record, and he certainly shows his strength with the use of such muscular guitar compositions that make this act a hell of a lot more interesting to me than Slaves On Dope ever were. Not only that, but he commands a powerful vocal approach that amounts to mesmerizing harmonies, as well as some falsettos that remind me heavily of Rob Halford, Tim Owens, Stu Block and many others. Because the record plays in the worlds of groove, death, progressive and classic heavy metal; it's very hard to actually pinpoint and that's what makes it exciting. Most notably, the Nevermore and Mercenary comparisons will be made and fans will grasp this disc with a fervor because of that. The band truly sounds larger than life on this debut and I really hope that maybe we'll get more information out of them later, because people need to hear this one to believe it.

Demise The Crown still feels like an EP release, but it shows me that the act has an awful lot of promise, beyond what I can describe here in a review. If you want catchy choruses, hard hitting solos, more melodies than you can shake a stick at, and melodic death metal/groove incursions (that normally wouldn't work well with this kind of material unless they were done properly, which is indeed the case) then you need to look no further than this disc which you can pick up for seven bucks. A dollar a track isn't a bad deal at all, especially when several of these pieces are worth far more than a dollar. Give it a listen, I think you'll enjoy it very much. I can't wait to see what is next for the act.

(7 Tracks, 30:00)

8/10

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