Hyde Abbey – Hall of Shame (2011)

Originally released as a free download on the internet “Hall of Shame” marked the debut release of Spanish Deathcore beasts Hyde Abbey. Now being properly released through Suspiria Records, this album delivers 12 tracks of punishing Deathcore/Metalcore that will surely rattle your speakers for a prolonged amount of time.

Not being our favorite genre, we are always skeptical about Deathcore releases since they are a dime a dozen and usually they all sound exactly the same. Hyde Abbey does a great job in delivering a very brutal and powerful sound similar to bands like The Black Dahlia Murder, Oceano, etc, and while not being overly original, the band does create some very badass songs.

Opening with a subhuman growl on “Sons of Iniquity”, this release is off to a brutal beginning. The screams are subpar, but the growls usually make up for them. The riffing is powerful and well distributed, while the drumming is tight but not exaggerated, just the perfect combination in our opinion. “Among those Murders” and “God Pray for Plagues” are two fast-paced songs that are very entertaining, but not exactly anything to write home about.

The first interesting song comes up with the name “To the Hollow”, this track a nice Melodeath feeling to it and there are some nice clean sections near the end where the drums nicely shine and some clean vocals make their way. The guitar work on “Hall of Shame” is excellent and again, reminds us more of Melodeath bands, but this is only used sporadically through the album.

The band keeps pummeling through tracks like “Unlike a Backslider”, “The Collar”, and “Scream, Slap, Snuff”, this last one with some very weak clean vocals that kind of ruin the excellent melodic nature of the track. The chorus sections that we particularly hate of the genre are present in “As Alive as a Corpse”, something that for us is annoying, but it actually is very normal in the genre. Again, the band has a great melodic approach to the song but they kill it with these chorus parts and the clean Metalcore-ish vocals.

Closing with a very well written instrumental “Among those Murders” we can’t help but wonder how much better would this release be without the vocals, only a pipe-dream for us. As a Deathcore/Metalcore release, “Hall of Shame” is pretty standard and will surely please all fans of the genre. We particularly enjoyed the melodic sections that give that extra level of complexity to the tracks, but we can’t really complain about the harsh vocals since they are powerful and decisive, the clean ones… not so much. If you are looking for a release to mosh with your friends to a pulp, be sure to pick this one up.

Release: 2011

Country: Spain