Personally, the prospect of wading through a “Best of Atreyu” album would seem like picking the best hemorrhoids I ever had. But I’ll give Victory credit for putting together a sellable, goodbye compilation (the band is now on Hollywood Records) that spans Atreyu’s career, as they are arguably one of the more influential of the emo-core bands.
I actually gave this record a few spins as I actually had never heard Atreyu until The Curse, but had heard their debut, Suicide Notes and Butterfly Kisses was far heavier and leaner. Wrong. The 18 tracks (plus 6 video on the DVD) that span this record are all the glossy, sing n scream styled poppy girl-core, that seem barely different on the band’s three albums (On a side note, there should be a five album minimum before a ‘Best Of’ can be allowed). The tracks from the conceptual The Curse smartly choose the better ones like “The Crimson” and “Bleeding Mascara”. But the 5 tracks from 2006’s A Deathgrip on Yesterday seem just a tad shallower and predictably poppy.
Still I imagine Atreyu fans will grab this nicely packaged CD/DVD and further milk the teet of Victory Records as they try to make a buck from a rather mediocre band’s rather mediocre discography before they blow up in the majors.
