Access Denied – Touch of Evil (2012)

Arriving today from Pitch Black Records we have Access Denied and their weird mixture of Gothic Rock with some Heavy Metal elements. Hailing from Poland, the band deliver nine tracks that the more we listen to them, the more we can’t really get into them. With a very linear and predictable style, this band’s release sounds very hollow and quite dull since the first few songs.

Opening with a quite deceitful intro track that leads you to believe you are in for a treat of epic proportions, the band really brings the standard way down with the childish “Messenger of Death”. In this song we get some insipid guitars alongside some of the flattest female vocals we have heard in quite a while. They do have a few interesting changes, but they might be accidental since the ideas of the song seem all over the place.

Dullness ensues as tracks like “Suicide Mind”, “Secret Place”, and “Don’t Tell Me” fly away with a few ‘decent’ riffs, but heavily repeated. The guitar work is basic at best since there is a lot of creativity missing from the band. The only redeeming quality of this release is the ok drumming, that thanks to the shitty production sound very flat as well. The only thing that sounds consistently well in this release is the bass guitar line (did he produced and mixed the album?) and a few solos here and there that are decent at best.

Making it to the last track “Touch of Evil” has felt more like a chore than a pleasure, and while not best song we have ever listened to, it is for us the best of the release. This track sounds like it might have been some of the latest material they wrote and sounds a bit more mature and well crafted. Anyways, this release is pretty much horrible, we wouldn’t even justify buying this for a few bucks. Eight out of nine tracks are just dull and plain boring and linear, so we can’t really say there is much to listen to here, and trust us, we tried this album more than a few times.

Release: November 6th, 2012

Genre: Gothic Rock/Heavy Metal

Country: Poland