mht
04/07/07, 05:31 PM
Betrayed - Substance
Record Label: Equal Vision Records
Release Date: July 11th, 2006
When a description says "ex-members of Champion and Carry On" and "produced by Kurt Ballou" [Converge], a fan would anticipate one heck of an amazing, crazy and fun album. Unfortunately, Betrayed’s “Substance,” fell short and didn’t meet my expectations that were based upon their past musical efforts.
To my surprise, this album was released on Equal Vision records. This label is currently known for more “audience appealing” bread winning bands. However, Equal Vision is still a good label with notable amazing hardcore bands in the past, present and probably future. Betrayed was just another perfect staple for the Equal Vision team in terms of a band making in-your-face hardcore music.
The album starts out fast and crazy, like I expected it to, and opens up with the song “Think Fast.” This song had my attention with its speedy vocals that lead up to the drums setting up for what I knew was going to be a good simple, yet fun, breakdown. The addition of some gang vocals made it a great opening song that I wished had lasted longer than one minute and seven seconds. This great opener was followed by the title track, “Substance.” I figured this next song would be right up my alley. Unfortunately this was not the case, and the same could be said for the next few tracks. [“Consequence,” “The City Lights,” “Crossroads” and “Work For It”] For some reason, listening to these tracks [2 thru 6] right in a row didn’t work or mesh too well to my ears. It felt like one big jumbled song and the vocals weren’t matching up with the music in these tracks. I felt like his [Aram Arslanian] vocals were very bland and boring at times during these songs, and I lost my high hopes for this album.
Fortunately, after getting to track 7 [“A Light In The Dark”], I was hit by the opening of uplifting guitars and a song I could tap my feet to. This made it very enjoyable after listening to the 5 songs that preceded it. This song brought the fun back into this album with its positive lyrics, fun bridge, an uplifting guitar rift, and some nice gang vocals to make it one of my favorite tracks on the album. Tracks 8 and 9 [“Understand” and “Self Doubt”] continued to bring this album back to something I could actually enjoy. I actually did a double take to make sure I was still listening to the same album. These two tracks [8 and 9] have great bridges where the vocals shine best, followed up by yet again more gang vocals. I am a sucker for songs with lots of fun choir-type vocals because it makes for good driving music that I can sing along to or blast with the windows down. These tracks do just that and are great for mixes or to play on your favorite colored iPod.
The last four tracks [“Nothing Breaks Us Apart,” “Time Will Tell,” “Bring It To Life,” and “I’m Not Afraid”] were just filler tracks that I felt were all okay songs at best but nothing special really stood out about them. There was some good guitar and bass work here and there, and they were much better than the beginning songs on the album.
So, in the end, I guess I was hoping to hear something much better than I actually did. The production wasn’t so hot on this album and I know Kurt-verge can do a much better job. Substance had its bad tracks and its good tracks. It wasn’t that bad of a release, and it definitely showed me the potential these guys would have on a follow-up release. I feel they would have shown improvement from this album, but Betrayed has broken up and left me wanting more.
Record Label: Equal Vision Records
Release Date: July 11th, 2006
When a description says "ex-members of Champion and Carry On" and "produced by Kurt Ballou" [Converge], a fan would anticipate one heck of an amazing, crazy and fun album. Unfortunately, Betrayed’s “Substance,” fell short and didn’t meet my expectations that were based upon their past musical efforts.
To my surprise, this album was released on Equal Vision records. This label is currently known for more “audience appealing” bread winning bands. However, Equal Vision is still a good label with notable amazing hardcore bands in the past, present and probably future. Betrayed was just another perfect staple for the Equal Vision team in terms of a band making in-your-face hardcore music.
The album starts out fast and crazy, like I expected it to, and opens up with the song “Think Fast.” This song had my attention with its speedy vocals that lead up to the drums setting up for what I knew was going to be a good simple, yet fun, breakdown. The addition of some gang vocals made it a great opening song that I wished had lasted longer than one minute and seven seconds. This great opener was followed by the title track, “Substance.” I figured this next song would be right up my alley. Unfortunately this was not the case, and the same could be said for the next few tracks. [“Consequence,” “The City Lights,” “Crossroads” and “Work For It”] For some reason, listening to these tracks [2 thru 6] right in a row didn’t work or mesh too well to my ears. It felt like one big jumbled song and the vocals weren’t matching up with the music in these tracks. I felt like his [Aram Arslanian] vocals were very bland and boring at times during these songs, and I lost my high hopes for this album.
Fortunately, after getting to track 7 [“A Light In The Dark”], I was hit by the opening of uplifting guitars and a song I could tap my feet to. This made it very enjoyable after listening to the 5 songs that preceded it. This song brought the fun back into this album with its positive lyrics, fun bridge, an uplifting guitar rift, and some nice gang vocals to make it one of my favorite tracks on the album. Tracks 8 and 9 [“Understand” and “Self Doubt”] continued to bring this album back to something I could actually enjoy. I actually did a double take to make sure I was still listening to the same album. These two tracks [8 and 9] have great bridges where the vocals shine best, followed up by yet again more gang vocals. I am a sucker for songs with lots of fun choir-type vocals because it makes for good driving music that I can sing along to or blast with the windows down. These tracks do just that and are great for mixes or to play on your favorite colored iPod.
The last four tracks [“Nothing Breaks Us Apart,” “Time Will Tell,” “Bring It To Life,” and “I’m Not Afraid”] were just filler tracks that I felt were all okay songs at best but nothing special really stood out about them. There was some good guitar and bass work here and there, and they were much better than the beginning songs on the album.
So, in the end, I guess I was hoping to hear something much better than I actually did. The production wasn’t so hot on this album and I know Kurt-verge can do a much better job. Substance had its bad tracks and its good tracks. It wasn’t that bad of a release, and it definitely showed me the potential these guys would have on a follow-up release. I feel they would have shown improvement from this album, but Betrayed has broken up and left me wanting more.