Metal Reviews

Metalcore yesterday, Thrash metal today, who knows what tomorrow will bring.

And I say Radio Rock as this crap is targeted at the audience who regularly listen to "Active Rock" (meaning not Classic Rock format) radio stations. I'm willing to guess if I turned on Sirius Octane (Home of Pure New Rock TM) there's a good chance Trivium is on right now. In fact I heard it 3 times today at work.

nope, but actually giving them a chance does. and, on Shogun, Trivium are more inspired than most other metal bands, mainstream (certainly moreso than any of the band's they sound similar to that i've heard) or otherwise.

And I've heard (a long time ago) Master of Puppets on the radio. Or not so long ago the new AD/DC song.

Does it matter?

Even Slayers War Ensemble was played on MTV - is it mainstream radio rock?

And does this means anything to if it's thrash or not?

Hahahahahahahahahaha.... Good one dude. Trivium sucks balls and to say they are thrash metal is insulting the entire genre, this is metal-core, border line, I could almost qualify it as being emo and therefore totally gay.

The difference is that Trivium is TARGETED, so made WITH THE INTENTION OF BEING PLAYED ON THE RADIO, whereas Master of Puppets and War Ensemble were not. As to AC/DC, I have my reservations.

hey guys why music was written has everything to do with whether the music is any good or not. how could anyone write a good song unless they were in a Buddhist state of zen being free of any desire for anything other than pure artistic expression with no thought for whether other people will like their music or not? it's impossible! all film soundtracks are awful. Jandek4life. i don't really know what i'm talking about anymore and my parodying of others's opinions has probably gone too far(!) but i do like the new Trivium and if their desire to be played on the radio is what made them write choruses with teh melody instead of just playing unmemorable Slayer-worship retro thrash then i approve of bands wanting to be played on the radio

oh shit the acoustic guitar part at the start of the album is playing the melody from the chorus of the last song. that's fucking prog yo

At least it has much in common with traditional (Thrash) Metal and it's way better than Nu Rock or Nu Metal like Linkin Park, Papa Roach, POD, System of a Down, Slipknot or Nickelback. THIS is radiofriendly bullshit. Metalcore (especially Trivium or BVMV or Shadows Fall) is (despite the catchy chorus / or verse) much more brutal and everything but radio rock...

i hereby start a petition to remove the phrase "radio friendly" and it's synonyms from out vocabulary because it's silly and anyone arguing about it is embarassing themselves.

the prechorus of "Torn Between etc" is really cool, it sucks they only do it in full once

I agree with you.

Take it for another spin, the great guitar work and solos outnumber the core stylings, and one song (forgot wich one) even has a guitar part that sounds totally Arch Enemyish.

I'm presently listening to Shogun and apart from the vocals sounding coreish it's definately more Metal than anything else.
Actually the vocal stylings are pretty much in the same vain as Scar Symmetry latest release( Only have heard their latest)

But I think the great guitar work and the solos ARE big parts of the genre called metalcore! That's a main difference between metalcore like Trivium and nu metal like Slipknot or so. Actually, it has also much in common with melodic Death like At the Gates and yes, Arch Enemy is not much different, but has less core elements and no changing vocal style, which makes metalcore to what it is. Whereas "The Crusade" is more traditional Thrash - and the haters hated them because they sounded too much like Metallica. You can't please anybody...

For me metalcore is much more like Killswitch Engage, it has many breakdowns no solos. Trivium does not fit this description.

But other ones like Bullet for my Valentine or Shadows Fall have solos. And maybe that's a reason why I'm not a big fan of Killswitch or Heaven Shall Burn or As I Lay Dying.

Nearly every genre has it's good bands - and bad bands.

Just finished listening "Shogun" for the first time and it mixes the best elements of "Ascendancy" and "The Crusade" with smoking guitar work by Beaulieu and Heafy. The vocals are also much better and way more varied this time around, making every song on the disc instantly more interesting. IMO it's Trivium's best work to date, the catchy choruses enhances the molody and there is nothing wrong with that when it's integrated well as on this CD.

I have a feeling I'll be enjoying this much more than Metallica's latest release and as Noodles mentionned "Throes of Perdition" intro is great. I also got hooked by "Torn Between Scylla and Charybdis", "Calamity" and "Down from the Sky". Well thats only from the first spin and it's a lot more than I thought it would be.

I don't know, which is better. Both have great parts, but they are very different. It's like comparing And Justice for All with Shogun. Metallica were never THAT exciting and varied and had never 1000 breaks and 100000 riffs and 10000000 different vocal styles in one song. Therefor could Trivium put more value in the catchiness of the hole song and not the chorus alone. There is always room for improvement...

Describing exaggerated extremes is never useful.

SOAD are way better than Trivium. At least they're interesting to listen to. And have you heard the latest Slipknot? There's some sick guitar work on there too.

Weird thing is I prefer Trivium to SOAD and by far... I guess it all comes down to a matter of tastes and preferences.

Apart from the fact that they're totally different genres, SOAD have a lot more originality than Trivium.