Ok, I’ll admit I’m reviewing this because September Riot Records is based in my hometown, and even though the band Estrus hail from Central Illinois, its always nice to see some local folks get involved in an otherwise barren Central Missouri metal scene, even if it is pretty standard modern hot topic styled metalcore/screamo.
Despite calling themselves ‘progressive’, Estrus are a fairly typical band you’d see on the likes of Rise Records, Media Skare or Solid State Records; growly/screamy melodic metalcore with lots of clean vocals and synths and few ambient atmospheric moments thrown in (”Lights on the Path”, “Pripyat”, “The Defining Moments”). And other than some rather wimpy clean vocals, everything is actually pretty decently done with a nice developed sense of songwriting and dynamics that a par for the genre’s course.
The production values are solid, though not up there with the big boys yet, but the band does have the ability to bring something a little more introspective and intelligent to the genre not relying of cure or quirk song titles or breakdowns to carry the material. The keyboards are well placed and gloss the songs with a little sobering character here and there as bands like The Human Abstract and The Demonstration come to mind during songs like “The Abstract”, “The Day of the Rope”, “Blue Ruin” and with songs that range up 6 minutes in length it certainly not the worst example of the genre I’ve heard and considering its origins and that a small town mid Missouri label released it, I cant really complain.
However the band falls into the whole “needless bullshit” and messing around in the studio for a closing hidden track, but that doesn’t stop Estrus from being utterly worthless I might b tempted to check out the next release, whether its on September Riot Records or not.
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Aaron, the guy that runs the label, is a friend of mine – good guy. I’m not the biggest fan of most of the stuff he puts out, but he’s doing really well with the label – they’ve grown so much since they started it a couple years ago.
on Oct 23rd, 2009 at 12:09yeah- he seems cool- hope they release some more, slightly more metal stuff and i always rooted for the little local label to release something great. i wish there were some decent local metal bands for him to sign
on Oct 23rd, 2009 at 12:15I’ve tried to persuade him to pick up a band here or there, but he always seems to be maxed out when I bring it up. There used to be a few good bands around, but most of them have split up. Alot of trendy shit floating around here anymore. I’ve still got some buddies in a couple cool bands though. You should come out some night we’ve got a show going on.
on Oct 23rd, 2009 at 22:47