OUTCAST - Awaken The Reason

This is the latest album from the French band, their third if I am not mistaken. Right from the first minute the band shows it's intentions, and their performing skills. They are giving us a mixture of brutality and complexity, a Progressive meets Death Metal blend. This is very interesting, although the songs need your full attention and sometimes more than just a few spins to reveal their secrets. To deliver such an ambitious style of music, the band needs the technical skills, which as I said before, are plenty and obvious. Guitar melodies are shifting from fast and crunchy riffs to more melodic lines with ease, double bass drums are excellent either slower or flirting with blastbeating, the bass lines are great and more on the foreground than most bands, and the vocals either clear or brutal are fitting perfectly with the music. Influences from Thrash also exist here, and this gives a more groovy feeling to their music, something that fans of the genre will love. On the other hand the band has managed to create song structures that are complex enough, and contain enough elements and melodies that giving an extra depth to their album. This shows also the songwriting skills of the band, although their songs sometimes are a bit too long, which doesn't spoil the fun though. What we can surely say is that their sound is not predictable in any way. Constant changes, styles, tempos are widespread through the whole album, most of them wisely chosen, with no less songs, as everything moves on the same quality. The sound might seem difficult in the beginning, with all the changes and styles but after a while, and some careful listening, it grows on you.

7/10