PREMONITIONS OF WAR “Left In Kowloon”
In 1996 while in high school, I remember a friend asking me if I wanted to go with him to New York City to see BLOODLET at a club in downtown. Being both a) a surburbanite who was still bound to the wishes of his parents, and b) downright scared of the crowd that would populate a BLOODLET show in the bowels of NYC, I politely declined my friend’s offer. So much for that whole teenage rebellion thing, right? PREMONITIONS OF WAR is Victory’s first “sludge” oriented metalcore band since BLOODLET was a staple of their mid 90s roster (we’ll skip over their comeback record), and although the bands share minimal similarities, what can be said is that PREMONITIONS OF WAR retains that scary, intriguing quality. Although only 26 minutes in length, “Left In Kowloon” comes off like a two hour movie score, set for a series of epic battle scenes. The bookends of this release are comprised of lightning fast metalcore that’s purely cut-throat material. And sandwiched in the middle is the band’s ode to the sludge, which will surely be hit or miss dependent upon one’s tastes. While I would have preferred these guys sticking to the heart-racing material for this release’s entire duration, the doom based dynamic does add an eye-popping sensation when the music kicks up in high gear again, and then runs through the disc’s finish. The recording quality on “Left In Kowloon” is pleasantly dense, and an upgrade from the band’s previous EP, “The True Face of Panic.” Lyrically, PREMONITIONS OF WAR tend to write sentences (or phrases) with startling profoundity…or nonsense. “The Octopus” contains the following line, “Fingerprints on clouded out transfers and indentity theft, where forged documents guarantee safety.” Aha. I might just conjecture that fans of this band don’t pay too much attention to the lyrics anyway. “Left In Kowloon” didn’t quite blow me away, but its artistic and unpredictable delivery of a stunningly heavy, well-coordinated sound is something any listener should immediately appreciate…and maybe knock a filling loose.
Victory
