CoC : Trivium - Ascendancy : Review

Trivium - _Ascendancy_
(Roadrunner Records, 2005)
by: Jackie Smit (6 out of 10)

They nearly had me fooled, did Trivium. Perhaps it's down to the fact that this Floridian quartet are currently the darlings of the so-called alternative music stations on UK television, and that in the face of much repetition one can't help but grow fond of "Pull Harder on the Strings of Your Martyr", but the truth is that this was a very good song. Sure it didn't do anything we haven't heard before, but it had a certain something -- a slight twist on the melodies, a vocalist which sounded just a hint more aggressive and heartfelt than the majority of his peers. Whatever it was, it had me convinced that Trivium was a little different from the rest of the dross that's currently being hyped up as the future of heavy metal. Sadly, the rest of _Ascendancy_, for the majority, fails miserably to live up to the promise of that song, running the gamut of just about every staid and worn-out metal heirloom around; from the twin-guitar melodies of Iron Maiden, through to the mid-tempo chug of Machine Head. As much as I wished for it to be otherwise, Trivium is boring, by-the-numbers nu-core. The only difference between them and every other flash-in-the-pan nouveau riche act out there is that concrete proof does exist that they may well still have a good album in them.

Contact: http://www.trivium.org

(article published 20/6/2005)

GIGS
9/12/2005	A McKay	Mudvayne / Shadows Fall / In Flames / Trivium	Dodging a Bullet