CoC : Crisis - The Hollowing : Review

Crisis - _The Hollowing_
(Metal Blade, 1997)
by: Adrian Bromley (6 out of 10)

When I talked to Crisis guitarist Afzaal Nasiruddeen way back in CoC #8, we discussed the experimental tendencies of Crisis and the music they create. He mentioned the band's love for bringing multiple styles into their sound. The band's last release, _Deathshead Extermination_, breathed of anarchy and harshness, with lead singer Karyn Crisis detonating huge blasts of anguish and violence through her banshee-like screams. The music itself blended a wide variety of death metal riffs, trippy slow-paced interludes and lots of intensity. The music worked for them. The record did well for the band, too, putting them on tour throughout North America with Voivod and Pro-Pain and helped develop them a pretty good sized following. Now arrives their latest LP, _The Hollowing_, a record not much different than _DE_ as it still caters to the Crisis sound. Singer/screamer Karyn Crisis still growls as the music moves and shapes itself into odd and eccentric entities. After multiple listens, I found _TH_ a much more loose record, where the band has gone off- track with their controlled experimentations and rather than providing us with a very strong, yet versatile release have offered us nothing more than a pot-pourri of sounds and scattered ideas. The band has also lost a bit of their aggression, relying more on a trippy, sedated feel on certain numbers rather than an all-out bursts of mayhem. Don't get me wrong, there is aggression here, and Karyn Crisis' demonic vocals rules, but there is something missing. This album is mediocre in my books and it is as if the band has lost something along the way between records. I hope they can find it come the next recording.

(article published 14/9/1997)

CHATS
14/3/1996	A Bromley	Crisis: Surviving the Crisis

GIGS
18/11/1996	S Cannon	Voivod / Crisis / Pro-Pain	Vicious Violence Vented