San Francisco Bay area band Walken have released their 2nd full length record, simply self titled. This record contains 11 angst filled Hardcore/Metal tunes that find Walken having an almost Emo tinge to them, while being heavier. Fans of bands like Between The Buried and Me might be interested in what Walken are up to.
Most of the vocals are delivered in that stereo-typical screamo shout type of thing, with the odd vocal being sang cleanly. The clean vocals are not this bands shtick and are an obvious downside for them. The aforementioned Emo whining quickly comes to mind. While these guys are a bit more thoughtful with their style of Hardcore/Metal ranting, which includes quite a few harmonized, twin guitar passages, they still fall a bit short with any type of hook or anything to sink your teeth into. These twin guitar passages are weak and there are very few, if any, moments on this CD that you find yourself clinging to. Nothing memorable, nothing exciting and I found myself losing interest pretty easily.
I have seen reviews of these guys that would have you believing that they are a Prog Metal band with riffing and technical expertise all over the place on this Walken CD. But unless I was sent the wrong CD to review, Walken IS NOT that band!! The riffs are basic and there is no technical musicality to speak of, anywhere on this record. I do find the drummer, Zack Farwell, to be a solid find, though. But in this age of very talented musicians with super chops, Walken is not one of those bands, sorry. I simply found the songs to not have very much substance and they definitely are not the types of songs that you will find yourself playing over and over again. This Walken release is what I would call background music and not much else. They never get started and their music goes nowhere.
Track Listing
1. Watch It Burn
2. Nadir
3. Running Out Of Time
4. Thunder Paws
5. Bitter Red
6. In The City Of No Seasons
7. Dylans Song
8. Right At Home
9. 01/21/07
10. Beast Toker
11. The Bridge
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