H. O. S.: The Beginning

The name of this band is Harvester of Sorrow, but they generally go by the initials "H.O.S." I don't know whether or not they took their name from the Metallica song of the same name, but since so much of heavy metal is self-reflexive, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that they probably did. It's a cool name anyway.

The Beginning is a strong debut album that, musically, took my breath away from time to time. The second track "Fallout" has some really strong guitar work that genuinely surprised me. I love it when guitarists use pitch bends and whammy bars to good effect. The rest of the album is quite strong--again, particularly with the guitars. They bring a solid punch and crunch on every track. The solos are generally strong, though, to me, none of them had the strength of that cool second track. The guitars don't exactly drown out the bass, but they come close.

In terms of the vocals, I just want to say that too many bands are coming along these days that have really good musical ability but they bring on vocalists that don't have the same kind of charisma in their delivery. I'm not saying the vocalist here is terrible--he isn't--it's just that his voice is so thick that it sounds excessive. Imagine Udo with a severe cold and you'll have a picture of what I mean. Maybe I'm being too picky, but I tend to think that thick, throaty, vocals could be used sparingly; at least consider some melodic passages to break things up. Still, this is a generally impressive debut, especially if you like competent, well performed thrash.

Track Listing:
1. Intro
2. Fallout
3. Annihilation of Soceity
4. Road Madness
5. The Haunt
6. No More Traitors
7. The Last Will
8. Ready to Fight
9. Earthquake
10. We Are H.O.S.!

Added: August 10th 2012
Reviewer: Carl Sederholm
Score:
Related Link: Band Facebook Page
Hits: 2716
Language: english

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