An Ocean Between Us

Okay. >Imagine< a band with extremely melodic guitars, breathtaking speed, the most abrasive and brutal roars you could ever commit to music, clean vocals that sound like they come from men instead of whiny teenagers, songs overcharged with aggression but retaining and promoting that essential emotional atmosphere, with thought-provoking positive lyrics about life and a few of atmospheric instrumentals. Now...stop imagining. The CD is right in front of you. Click Buy. This album has about it a forceful power of pure aggression combined with a beauty and completeness rarely applicable to music these days. Oh, and when the guitars feedback at the end of a song, prepare yourself...the track that follows will undoubtedly jolt the heart of the unwary listener!

AS I LAY DYING are back with their follow up album to the superb 'Shadows Are Security' with 'An Ocean Between Us'. At first listen, this album is more diverse than any other As I Lay Dying opus to date and is a new chapter in the evolution of this superb band. The intro slowly builds up into the the opener entitled 'Nothing Left'. This is a brilliant track and well worthy of starting off this album.

Next is the title track, 'An Ocean Between Us' and this is another superb track on this album with its very catchy chorus. Both these opening two tracks are classic As I Lay Dying tunes. These two tracks have more clean lyrics (even though the majority are rough) in them than I have heard in a while from As I Lay Dying and it works extremely well especially when it changes all of a sudden from clean to rough.

'Within Destruction' is for the majority a fast and heavy paced number which will definitely have those circle pits that frontman Tim Lambesis loves so much from the crowd going. 'Forsaken' has a brilliant intro to the song, slowly building up to some outstanding guitar work with some crunching riffs. Another catchy clean chorus is shown in this track and its good to hear that the vocals are not so one dimensional as sometimes they are in an As I Lay Dying track.

As usual, the production is excellent, but what would you expect from one of the best bands on the heavier side of the metal scene today. Guitars, bass, drums, vocals. All are set at the right levels and can be distinguished from one another. This is shown in a typical As I Lay Dying track entitled 'Comfort Betrays'. 'I Never Wanted' is a slower than usual track we are used to from these, but it maintains that heavy atmosphere throughout. More use of the clean vocals are also portrayed within this track. Soon enough we get back to the norm with 'Bury Us All'. As the shortest proper track on album at nearly two and half minutes, this is heavy, fast paced in parts and brutal with its riffs. A song perfect for moshing to.

'The Sound of Truth' is an absolutely brilliant track, with some outstanding riffs, and lyrics as well. The flow of the song is awesome. It is so smooth the way it changes between the chorus and verses that it is a fine example of how to write a brilliant tune. Now recently, there have been a few albums I have listened to with instrumental interludes on, and every single one was pointless as it added nothing to the album. When i first heard this, I thought, 'Oh no, not another pointless waste of time on an album', but I was glad to hear that it actually built up into the next song which none of the others did, therefore giving it meaning to the album. And with that the album comes to a close with two more very good tracks entitled 'Wrath Upon Ourselves' (which has a really good choral section to it) and 'This Is Who We Are'.

'An Ocean Between Us' is a solid album throughout, and shows that As I Lay Dying are still one of the best new age metal outfits out there. The album is more diverse than previous efforts, and it is nice to hear as well as more clean vocals than usual. The tracks flow very well and the energy is never lost on this album from start to finish. Any As I Lay Dying fan will be more than happy with this album, and hopefully they should gain more support on these shores from this release and make them more well known in the UK as they are in their homeland of the USA.

This album was not at all how i expected it to be but as i lay dying have triumphed by balancing tim lambesis' growls with clean vocals from the new bassist almost perfectly, every song on the album is good in a different way, my least favourite is comfort betrays, but my favourite is basically a tie between the rest of the album. There are also solos, unlike any previous offerings from the quintet. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who has taken any interest in as i lay dying or metalcore in general. Where atreyu have failed miserably with their new radio friendly album, aild have triumphed creating an album using a perfect blend of all the various aspects of metal