The Convalescence - Poison Words

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This is one of the weirdest albums I have heard in my 33 years in the Metal scene! No, I'm not saying that the album "Poison Words," from the North American sextet THE CONVALESCENCE is a bad thing, but it is really strange in many ways for the readers and listeners. The band follows modern ways into Metal, mixing Deathcore with Death Metal and some Metalcore elements. But the way they do it is with very good technical and complex approach, nasty and modern instrumental tunes, and vocals that uses guttural grunts and high pitched screams. It's good to use caution however, because it's violent and technical, but done with very good taste.

"Poison Words" was engineered and produced by John Burke of Vibe Studios, and the mixing and mastering were done by the hands of Chris Donaldson (CRYPTOPSY's guitarist). So the sound quality is focused in something that sounds violent, aggressive and modern, but with defined tunes that we all can understand clearly. It's heavy, of course (we are speaking about a Metal album, after all). Obviously, "Poison Words" is an album that will cause strong reactions on those who hear it: love or hate, there's not a path in the middle of both opinions.

The brutal and modern "I, Dreamer" with its technical and violent rhythmic session and extreme screams; the violent melodies that we can hear clearly on the guitar riffs of "Gazing into Oblivion"; the modern and aggressive technical feeling that fills "Faceless" (some extreme broken tempos and even Industrial elements can be heard on this song); the violent and intense "Reflections", where Death Metal and Deathcore elements are fused in something technical and violent, where the band's guitars are really great, and the same features can be heard on the explosive "Surgical Sanity"; and the extreme harsh and bitter dynamic between harsh vocals and keyboards found on "The Mouth of Hell" can be pointed as their best moments. It's a very good band, indeed.

Originality: 9
Songwriting: 8
Memorability: 7
Production: 8