Within The Ruins - 2011 Omen (EP)

Band : Within The Ruins

Album : Omen (EP)
Release Year : 2011
Genre : Metalcore | Progressive

Tracklist :

1. Controller (New Song)
2. Infamy (New Song)
3. Carry On My Wayward Son (Kansas Cover)
4. Fight Fire With Fire (Metallica Cover)

Within the Ruins is one of Victory’s shining metal leaders currently, and for good reason. Having just released Invade this past August, the band has already prepared some new material for its fans. Consisting of four powerfully brutal and energetic tracks, Omen  features two brand new WTR songs and two covers (“Carry On My Wayward Son” by Kansas and “Fight Fire With Fire” by Metallica). First comes the original tracks. “Controller” provides an excellent kick off to the EP, leading in slowly and atmospherically at first before erupting into an all-out helluva song. Fueled by the line “this is not the life I had in mind”, the breakdowns found during this track are intense to say at the least. The song is then followed by “Infamy”, which is best recognized as the fast and furious number of the EP; the speed is quite addictive and entertaining. Omen then shows off the two covers, both of which sound great. Rather than try to perform the songs the same way they were originally done, they’ve both been recorded in a WTR fashion, which works extremely well. Overall, you can’t complain that this EP is a tease considering that the band just released a new LP recently. Instead, Omen should be looked at as the gift it is. This is more than a cool bonus release; it’s another killer addition to the Within the Ruins catalog.

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Within the Ruins - 2010 Invade

Band : Within The Ruins

Album : Creature
Release Year : 2010
Genre : Metalcore / Progressive

Tracklist :

1. Designing Oblivion
2. Versus
3. Behold the Harlot
4. Red Flagged
5. Invade
6. Ataxia
7. Cross Buster
8. Feast Or Famine
9. Oath
10. The Carouser
11. Roads

"Invade" legitimately impresses with the level of musicianship guitarists Joe Cocchi and Jay van Schelt display. More often than not their attack is well-constructed like in "Versus" and the titular track which benefit from truely memorable guitar lines and progressions reminscent of Meshuggah. On the other hand, they tend to get lost in a wide range of breakdowns that happen to unravel within one another without any deeper thought. This along with prominent emotionless melodeath noodling makes for such exhausting compositions as "Red Flagged" and "Feast Or Famine." The guitarwork is put at the forefront to such an extent that the rhythm section plays a rather secondary role. Drummer Kevin McGuills delivers a metronomic, machine-gun performance, yet fails to make any lasting impression being nothing more than reliable. Whereas, the bass riffs are surprisingly barely audible throughout the album, which is a real shame given the endless rhythmic capabilities of the instrument especially in this kind of music.
In contrast, the new singer Tim Goergen lives up to his task by providing raspy guttural screams that prove to be admittedly fitting to the style of the band even though his often clumsy lyrics leave a lot to be desired. The lines such as "I believe what I believe so don't force your faith on me" and "Life is what you make it" come as overly trite and simplistic. In consequence, it's no surprise that the two best compositions on the album are completely instrumental. Both "Ataxia" and "Roads" have a more proggressive vibe to them taking full advantage of their curiously varied structure that for once showcases the band producing something different, if not necessarily groundbreaking.
Overall, "Invade" is an album full of contradictions. While being the most cohesive release of Within The Ruins so far, the disc is still a rather direct continuation of their high-on-technicality, low-on-songcraft blend of deathcore. While many listeners might be perfectly pleased with the act's bombastic instrumental performance alone, there is still room for growth in the songwriting department for these excellent musicians. It's advisable for them to vastly improve also this aspect of their music in the near future.

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Within The Ruins - 2009 Creature

Band : Within The Ruins

Album : Creature
Release Year : 2009
Genre : Metalcore / Progressive

Tracklist :

1. The Book Of Books
2. Arsenal
3. Dig A Ditch
4. Call Off The Wedding
5. Extinguish Them
6. Jump Ship
7. Creature
8. Tractor Pull
9. Holy Mess
10. Victory

Within the Ruins sure can play guitar. The leads, technical patterns, and chugging riffs are all executed to near perfection on Creature. The drums are there and sound fine, but they never stand out anywhere near as much as the guitars do. There is probably a bass player, but he is almost always covered up by the guitars. Within the Ruins also has a vocalist, but he’s a trifling annoyance standing in the guitars’ way. Within the Ruins is your typical metalcore band, only better at their instruments and way more interested in showing off.

There isn’t much to this album behind the guitars, but damn are they good. They’re executed flawlessly throughout the album. Though not all the riffs are memorable, a great number of them are. The guitars are always the focal point, even during the chugging breakdown parts you find yourself listening to the chugging instead of the guy yelling monotone over them. The vocalist has two ranges: moderately high and moderately low. He gets his job done, but for the most part he’s pretty boring. The only time he even seems remotely important is during the breakdowns. And even then he only gets a few seconds to be heard before another guitar part comes in flying all over the place and diverting the listener’s attention.
There is a bass player. His name is Madison. If you listen incredibly closely you might be able to hear him imitating the guitar part being played over it. The drummer, whose name is Drummer, is a pretty good drummer. He’s nothing fantastic, but as stated above he gets his job done. He uses a lot of double bass kicks, and a high number of snare hits. And, during almost every breakdown, he smashes the crash symbol in time to the music. It’s incredibly generic, but it fits the music just fine.
Within the Ruins are pretty good, overall. They have plenty of talent and potential, but they really need to work on one aspect of their music; the songwriting. There are some very interesting parts in some of the songs, and Holy Mess seems especially well put together. The band really just seems like a platform for the guitarists, Joe and Kyle, to show how fucking fast they can play, and how fucking weird and technical their riffs are, and how if they play really fucking high and fast they can sound like fucking video game music. The vocalist, Jon, just seems like he was brought into the fold to hang out with them and yell one-liners during the breakdowns. It works, but it could be so much more. Hopefully they will work more on making structured, technical songs with their talented guitarists, instead of making more music to show off their shredz. Creature is still a pretty damn good metalcore album, but it needs work. It’s worthy of checking out for the riffs and the dual guitar interplay, which at times is quite impressive. The songs are nice but are pretty similar to each other. Within the Ruins may be great in the future. They have all the tools. They just need to put them together.

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