"Falling in Reverse - Fashionably Late" Review by Dom

NOTE: I had 2 ideas for the overview and couldn't decide so I'll post both.

Overview 1: Unfashionably Late for the rap-metal fad.

Overview 2: What the fuck happened?

Fashionably Late is the second album from metalcore band Falling in Reverse. This album comes off the heels of 2011's The Drug in Me is You which I thought was a pretty good album. Vocalist Ronnie Radke is formerly of Escape the Fate recording only their 2006 debut, Dying is Your Latest Fashion and then being kicked out after getting jail time.

The Positive: Well, there ain't much. The title track is by far the best track on the album, a catchy chorus and Radke's vocals are on point. "Born to Lead" is another good track with the band shining over Radke for the first time in the band's history. Jacky Vincent (lead guitar) has an incredible solo which leads into a hell of a breakdown. "Champion" opens the album, the first 2 minutes are great and then Radke starts rapping, and while it's corny and unwarranted, it fits the song and Radke actually raps pretty well and the band rewards you with a killer breakdown for sitting through it.

The 'Meh': "It's Over When it's Over" and "Self-Destruct Personality", both tracks are alright, not bad, not good but just in the middle, also known as 'filler'.

The Negative: The other 9 tracks. Let's start with fan favorite "Alone" (please sense the sarcasm there). What a waste of a chorus, I love this chorus so much that I've tried convincing my ears that his rapping is bearable but dammit it's just not. It sucks, he says "White boy on the beat" like he's the first white rapper, I can rattle off 10 white rappers that could rap circles around Radke. These 9 songs, 7 of them are ruined 100% by Radke's shittastic "rapping". Ronnie Radke, you're not "shitting on rappers" and you're sure as hell not "crossing the line", you're just pissing off any fanbase you had. Please do not listen to this song, I beg you. "Bad Girl Club", this song is laughably bad, emphasis on the laughably. I want you to listen to this because you will laugh, literally. "Game Over" is his retarded way of comparing life to video games. "Keep Holding On" is supposed to be his 'heartfelt' track but after listening to all of the tracks beforehand, it makes no sense. Ronnie Radke is an asshat and he knows that, why try to mask it with this track? It's so bad. "Fuck the Rest", who woulda thought a song with that title would've been so light and fun sounding. That's okay, provided the song is good but GUESS WHAT, it's not. Radke says "this is song is for everyone that's had enough, this song is for you" but he sounds so insincere about it and like someone forced him to say it. The country-inspired "Drifter" is pure garbage. I literally can't run out of bad things to say about this album.

Overall: They messed up, how did the rest of the band let this happen, seriously? "Rolling Stone" is a great song, until Radke tears it to pieces and pisses on its corpse with his rapping. They should change the name of the band to "The Ronnie Radke Show" cause it's pretty clear he doesn't give a squirt of piss about the other band members. What happened to the emotion and the passion from tracks like "The Day I Left the Womb"? He's cocky and it doesn't work, comparatively Kanye West is also a cocky ass but his music stays amazing. Radke's ego brings him down and the music down extremely.

Number of Tracks Kept: 5/14

Rating: 3.5/10

"For Today - Prevailer - EP" Review by Dom

Overview: For Today prevails with Prevailer.

For Today is a Christian metalcore band from Iowa who have been around since 2005. This is the band's 5th official release after last year's full-length, Immortal which was a great album. The sound they have now was perfected and solidified in 2010's album Breaker which featured guest vocalists from Stray From the Path and Close Your Eyes.

The band's sound is typical metalcore but with more proficiency on each member's instruments. There are 2 standouts with the band, one, their breakdowns are phenomenal, absolutely heart-stopping and hard-hitting. Secondly is vocalist Mattie Montgomery. His screams are absolutely crushing, yet understandable and most importantly, you can hear his emotion and passion within his screams.

Positive: This EP is contains 5 tracks, 4 brand new and 1 acoustic version of the track "Fearless" which was the lead single off of Immortal. Beginning with "Fearless", the acoustic version is good and it was a nice change of pace for the band but the original still trumps this version for me. Doesn't mean this version is bad, the original is just near perfect. My favorite track off of this EP has to be "From Zion", it's heavy, Mattie's vocals are fantastic and the breakdown is just gnarly. "Flesh and Blood" is also great, the band puts in just as much energy into this EP as they do into their full-lengths and it paid off for the band and definitely paid off for the fans. "Crown of Thorns" is a hard-hitting track as well, each song on here is worthy of being part of the For Today discography.

Negative: I'm struggling to find any bad things to say about this EP. It was too short? It's an EP I can't fault the band on that. The closest I can come to is saying that I wish that they picked a different track to interpret acoustically. At the same time, the acoustics on the track are beautiful as are the vocals.

Rating: 8.5/10

"The Purge" Movie Review by Dom

The Purge is a horror/thriller film directed by James DeMonaco; this is he second film he's directed. The only real notable name in this movie is lead actor Ethan Hawke who, as per usual, brings his A-game and knocks it out of the park.

The Purge is set 9 years in the future in a time where for 12 hours starting at 7pm March 21st and ending 7am March 22 all crime is legal. Crime, outside of those 12 hours is at an all time low, unemployment is at an all time low as well and many believe that this purge has saved the country. Now most horror movies have the one sensible person in the group and everyone else can't seem to tie their shoes without dying, in this film Ethan Hawke is sensible and his family are idiots. His son lets a stranger into their fortified house and never redeems himself, throughout the movie I was hoping that he would get killed.

Rhys Wakefield plays the main villain, who's name is never revealed. Wakefield does a fantastic job at being menacing, clever, creepy and overall is a great villain. I hope this role lands him more villainous roles because truth be told he could knock them out of the park.

The movie, as a horror movie, kind of failed, it wasn't very creepy or scary, only once was I scared. What scared me more was when my girlfriend would scream because she was scared. Once the strangers enter the house the movie turns into a cat and mouse game since both parties have guns it becomes fun to watch. Had they gone completely cat and mouse movie with some horror elements instead of the other way around this movie could've been a lot better. Instead we get a standard home invasion horror movie that fails to scare or live up to the fantastic set up which had a ton of potential.

Negative: It doesn't fail as a film, it does however fail to live up to the hype and deliver on the promise the set up gave us. It's not as bad as some have said but it's certainly not as good as some have said.

Positive: What the film gives us is a villain who is great at what he does, and an intriguing cat and mouse type movie which creates for a fun time at the movies.

Rating: 6/10

"Megadeth - Super Collider" Review by Dom

Overview: Should be called Average Collider.

Super Collider is the 14th album from thrash gods Megadeth. This is the bands 4th album in the last 6 years which is a pretty good amount of music coming out in a relatively short amount of time. To put it in perspective the band Tool has been around for 23 years and has released the same amount of albums.

Negative: For me, the band has kind of been on a downward slope, I loved 2007's United Abominations, 2009's Endgame was pretty good, while 2011's TH1RT3EN was lackluster. I heard the lead single which is the title track and hated it, the song is just plain bad. It's a poppy take on metal and it doesn't work at all for me. This album for me, the bulk of the tracks just blend together and don't stand out for better or worse. By now the Megadeth formula has been pretty standard lately, great guitarwork, Mustaine's trademark vocals, corny yet somehow cool lyrics and a great rhythm section to pull it all together. All of that is present on Super Collider yet somehow it still falls short. The band plays fantastically and Mustaine still sounds Mustaine-y. A complaint I've heard rather frequently about this album is that it's not fast-paced and thrashy, while that's true that doesn't mean it's bad. Slayer's Diabolus in Musica was slower and I personally love that album. Metallica's black album was slower and that brought metal to a whole new level. The difference between those albums and this one is that those albums were good. Mustaine's lyrics are cornier than ever and sound almost uninspired. The track "Off the Edge" made me laugh because he talks of how he's insane and the world is going crazy and it's funny because everyone knows he's crazy and he's acknowledging it now and it's comical, song sucks though. The cover of Thin Lizzy's "Cold Sweat" was odd, it's a decent cover, I prefer Sodom's cover of it and obviously, being a huge fan of Thin Lizzy, I love the original. Megadeth does it justice, but not enough to be a notable cover. Also this album title sucks really badly.

Positive: With all of that being said, this is still Megadeth and they still write some kick ass music. The opening track "Kingmaker" is a great track, one of the faster ones on the album. "Burn!" is a cornier track yet it works so well and it's a great song. David Drainman of Disturbed(yes, I know he has his band Device now but no one gives a shit about them) has a feature on the album, the track "Dance in the Rain" and being a fan of Disturbed I was looking forward to his guest spot and he delivered. The track is a good track without him, the band slows it down and builds it up to a killer solo and then Drainman's vocals and it cements the song together. Drainman doesn't use his typical Disturbed-style vocals(there's no ooh-wa-ah-ah), it's a darker sounding tone and it works with the song. "The Blackest Crow" is an interesting track, complete with a slower tempo and a banjo, you read that right. I don't love the song but something about it keeps me coming back. The final track that I have in the "positive" column is the song "Forget to Remember, it's a pretty good song, it's a midtempo track, it sounds like it should've closed the instead of the Thin Lizzy cover.

The band is fantastic, the riffs are great, Chris Broderick's leads are amazing, as are Mustaine's. Ellefson plays well but there weren't many standout basslines that we've come to expect from him. Shawn Drover's drumming is always great and he doesn't disappoint on this album either.

I really want another track like "A Tout le Monde" a nice slower track with a perfectly placed guest vocal spot(guest vocals not necessary though). I really think Mustaine and the band should take a little while off, they've been cranking out albums like crazy, which is good provided the music stays good. So I think they should tour for this album then maybe take the rest of the year off, from touring and writing, then play some festivals in the summer of '14, then maybe a sweet Winter tour then a few months off for the band from touring and writing again then after that maybe start writing, let everyone recharge their creative batteries. Just my opinion.

Overall: A decent album, definitely not as bad as Risk as some have called it. It's one of the worst Megadeth albums but with a discography the stature of Megadeth's that's not saying that it's really a bad album per se. It's worth picking up if you're a Megadeth completist, if not, check it out on YouTube first.

Rating: 6/10

"Escape the Fate - Ungrateful" Review by Dom

Overview: Escape the Fate make an un-great-ful album.

Ungrateful is the fourth studio album by metalcore band Escape the Fate and the third album with lead vocalist Craig Mabbit who was formerly the vocalist of Bless the Fall. This album sees the band at their heaviest since their debut Dying is Your Latest Fashion with singer Ronnie Radke in 2006.

With many fans being left disappointed after 2010's self-titled album this album cranks up the heaviness for better and for worse. In some songs the heaviness seems forced and not genuine. We all know that Mabbit likes to sing like an R&B star but it doesn't always mesh well. "Live Fast, Die Beautiful" talks of how girls try to take advantage of Mabbit's fame which is fine and dandy but who considers him famous? Altpress and people up to and around the age of 20 know who he is but he could walk down a street without anyone saying something to him. "Risk it All" is an interesting track, where, as the title states, they are risking it all but it makes me wonder what this "all" that they're talking about is. They just signed a new record deal with Eleven Seven Music who's roster boats the likes of Motley Crue, Buckcherry, Drowning Pool and Papa Roach. But what's really the question is: Do they think that this album is risking anything? The short answer is, it's not. It's a rather generic album, with heavy songs where you'd expect them(beginning and end), softer songs where you'd expect them(in the middle to break up the album) and not the most inventive lyrics. "One for the Money" is possibly the corniest and dumbest. The chorus consists of the age-old phrase that nearly everyone is familiar with, "one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready and four to go." What the band does to spice this chorus up is add a gratuitous amount of "motherfuckers" in it which just comes off lazy and idiotic. The bulk of the songs are just plain forgettable, not standing out for being good but also not for being terrible with the exceptions of "Chemical Love" and "Desire", those tracks just plain suck.

Now, the positives. The lead single, "Ungrateful" is a great track, it's heavy as hell, the chorus is well-sung and catchy and the lyrics are actually pretty solid. "You're Insane" is another good one, it's not as heavy but Mabbit's clean vocals really shine on the track and it also has a good solo in it, yes a guitar solo. "Fire it Up", the closing track of the album really fires you up(2 puns in this review is 2 too many). It's a great track with a great solo, chorus and a hell of a breakdown to close the track and the album itself. My other 2 positive standouts are "Until We Die" and "Forget About Me", both of which I wasn't crazy about the first listen through but after listening to the album front to back 3 times these songs really grew on me, with good vocals and not being as corny as some other tracks they truly deserved their spot on this album.

NOTE: I know there are 2 bonus tracks on the deluxe edition, I haven't heard them therefore I cannot comment on them.

Overall: This album isn't great, I'm not sure I could call it good either, it's a few steps up from their self-titled album and This War is Ours but doesn't even come close to touching their debut album. Ungrateful showed me that the band has the capacity and the potential to write some pretty good tracks and perform them well. Hopefully in 10 years we can look back on this album as the stepping stone that brought the band to make great albums. After their self-titled album I had given up on them, declared they'd never make good music again but this album proved me wrong and I'm happy that it did.

Rating: 4/10

Bands I've Seen Live by Dom

3 Inches of Blood (2)
The Acacia Strain
After the Burial
Alesana
All Shall Perish
All That Remains
All Time Low
Ankla
Anthrax
As I Lay Dying
Asking Alexandria (2)
Atreyu
Attila
Balance and Composure
Behemoth (2)
Betraying the Martyrs
The Black Dahlia Murder
Black Tide
Black Veil Brides
Bless the Fall
Bon Jovi (2)
Born of Osiris
Bullet for My Valentine
Cannibal Corpse
The Casualties
Chelsea Grin
Chimaira
Chthonic
Circus Diablo
Close Your Eyes
A Day to Remember (2)
Daath
Decrepit Birth
Dethklok
The Devil Wears Prada
DevilDriver
Diamond
Dirtfedd
Disturbed
Dr. Acula (2)
Emmure
Enter Shakari
Exodus
The Faceless
Far From Proper
Five Finger Death Punch
Fleshgod Apocalpyse
For All Those Sleeping
For Today (2)
Four Year Strong
The Ghost Inside
Go Radio (2)
Godsmack
God Forbid
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals
Green Day
Gwar
Hatebreed (4)
Hatesphere
Heaven and Hell
High on Fire
I the Breather
I Wrestled a Bear Once
Infernaeon
In Flames
In This Moment (3)
Iron Maiden
Jake Owen
Jason Casterlin/The Woodcocks (2)
Job for a Cowboy
Joe & Box
Judas Priest
Kenny Chesney
Killscreen
Killswitch Engage
Kingdom of Sorrow
King Conquer
Korn (2)
Lacuna Coil
Lamb of God (2)
Lordi
Machine Head (2)
Marilyn Manson
Mastodon
Mayday Parade
Megadeth (2)
Memphis May Fire
Metallica (2)
Mobile Death Camp
Modern Day Escape
Motionless in White (2)
Motorhead
Muse
Mutiny Within
Nevermore
Nile
Norma Jean
Outasight
Ozzy Osbourne
The Paramedic
Pierce the Veil
The Ready Set
Red Fang
Rise Against
Rob Zombie
Rush (2)
Set Your Goals
Sevendust
Shadows Fall
The Showdown
Sirena
Slayer (4)
Sleeping With Sirens
Slipknot
Static-X
Straight Line Stitch (2)
Suffocation
Suicide Silence
The Sword
Ted Nugent
Ten After Two
Testament
That's Outrageous!
Thin Lizzy
Through the Eyes of the Dead
Tim McGraw
Times of Grace
Transit
Trivium (2)
Underoath
Unearth
Upon a Burning Body
Van Halen
Warbringer (2)
We Are the in Crowd
We Came as Romans
Whitechapel (3)
William in Control
Winds of Plague
With the Punches
The Wonder Years
The Word Alive (2)
Wretched
Yellowcard
You Me at Six


Total: 145

"Kid Cudi - Indicud" Review by Dom

Kid Cudi tries his hand at self-producing an album in its entirety. Indicud is Cudi's third album, fourth if you count his rock album under the name WZRD. The album is pretty ambitious, Cudi has always been ambitious but this album is a level higher. Some spots it definitely works well, and in some it falls short by a mile.

Firstly, the production is good, not amazing. He really missed some production from GOOD Music leader Kanye West on this project along with the arsenal of producer the label has. Overall the production is just good, it doesn't stand out much, for better or worse.

Negative: Let's get the bad out of the way first. As I said earlier, this is an ambitious album, I mean ambitious to the point where Cudi pulls Michael Bolton out of the woodwork for a 9-minute long track. Now I can handle 9 minutes of Cudi, but Bolton did not belong on this track, it was just weird and did not belong at all. There are also 3 instrumental tracks on here which, knowing Cudi they'd at least be interesting and they all are. "The Resurrection of Scott Mescudi" opens the album out pretty wonderfully with an eerie ambiance leading into a great industrial style beat. Unfortunately "New York City Rage Fest" and "Flight of the Moon Man" don't follow suit and fail to hold any interest. "Unfuckwittable" and "Cold Blooded" are laughably corny and not very good songs.

Positive: Now that that's out of the way, let's get to the good. "Just What I Am" was the first single and it was a warm welcome back into the Kid Cudi we all know and love, with an infectious hook and great beat, you can't go wrong with it; the same goes for the other singles, "Immortal" and "King Wizard". Possibly the most anticipated track on this album was the sequel to "Solo Dolo" from Man on the Moon: The End of Day which features Kendrick Lamar and the track does not disappoint one bit. The weirdest feature on the album is definitely Michael Bolton, but the weirdest feature that worked came from a band named Haim. They're a soft rock band consisting of 3 sisters. They're featured on the track "Red Eye" which oddly enough doesn't feature prominent vocals from Cudi until almost 3 minutes into the track and for some reason I love it. It's smack in the middle of the album so it fits as a nice break from Cudi's vocals and the girls' voices are beautiful, definitely a stand out track. "Lord of the Sad and Lonely" sees Cudi getting back into his depressed mind reminiscing of songs like "Trapped in My Mind" and "Soundtrack 2 My Life". The track "Beez" is an interesting one as it sees Cudi again taking a backseat on vocals and letting RZA of Wu-Tang and solo fame take over. I've heard a lot of people not like this track but I just don't see it, it's one of the better produced tracks, RZA tears the beat up like no one's business and Cudi's vocals compliment the track so well.

Overall: An ambitious album from an ambitious artist, I call him an artist cause it almost sounds insulting to say that Cudi is just a rapper. The production isn't top notch, lyrics on some tracks are below par, even for Cudi. The features (with the exception of Michael Bolton) all do a fantastic job. I forgot to mention how good the track "Brothers" with A$AP Rocky and King Chip is, seriously check that out. And Kid Cudi sounds just as good as ever. While this album is easily the worst of his first 3, it's not because the album is bad, it's because he set the bar so high with Man on the Moon: The End of Day and Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager.

Rating: 7.5/10