As I Lay Dying – The Powerless Rise (2010)

We try to stay away from as much Metalcore crap that we can, but sometimes we get some releases that are worth listening to and giving them a solid review. “The Powerless Rise” is one of those, it features an As I Lay Dying that has been refining their sound with every release and now, they are good enough for us to enjoy (somewhat).

The band is as brutal as ever and features the traditional breakdowns that most people love to death, however, we enjoy this album because of the brilliant melodic parts that some songs have in this release. The band might have 80% of the elements that makes us despise Metalcore, but objectively and musically, they can also compose brilliant songs.

After a pretty intense first song, we immediately jump into “Anodyne Sea” a song that apparently starts very simple and un-inspired, but it transforms into our favorite song from this band. The music goes into a very interesting clean chorus section that if it did not had the annoying (or extremely ‘epic’ like some would say) clean vocals it would be close to perfection.

The album continues in a similar fashion, in between aggressive songs and sections we find little gems of melodic parts that made us rethink and change our personal opinions about As I Lay Dying. And while we are not going to go and buy some of the band’s t-shirts and shit like that, we have found some respect for their efforts.

Like we said, musically “The Powerless Rise” (for us) is the band’s best album. The drumming is super tight and well executed; the riffing is intense and very diverse through the album. The vocals, while not our favorite style, provide enough energy to drive the music over the top, and while we HATE the clean vocals, we have to admit that they are somewhat ok for Metalcore bands.

Sometimes there are parts that we completely despise, like the breakdowns in “Parallels”, and make us remember why we hate Metalcore music in the first place. But they are musically not that bad, is just something we don’t like how it sounds. As I Lay Daying has come a long way from “Beneath the Encasing of Ashes” and we truly see their music as decent music with shitty parts (for us). The guitar solos through the album are very masterful, and some of the melodies are even better than what some of our favorite Melodic Death Metal bands are coming up in the recent years.

For us, we have to say that “The Powerless Rise” is probably the best Metalcore album we have heard (and reviewed) this 2010, and it will be hard to beat by any other. The band has come a long way, and we sure as hell can listen to this in their music. So if you are a fan of the genre, you will not be disappointed by this release.

Release: May 11th, 2010

Country: USA