Written by Alison Aird
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
Album: Severed Ties
Artist: The Amity Affliction
Release: 30th November 2009
Label: Boomtown Records
When I was asked to review The Amity Affliction the first thing I did was visit their myspace to check out their sound. The giant pissed off bat in their header had me smiling and now their album “Severed Ties” has me hooked.
As a hardcore girl through and through I can appreciate how difficult it is to make something original in what has quickly become an over-saturated scene. The Amity Affliction are obviously taking a few pages out of Alexisonfire’s book, but by increasing the hardcore factor ever so slightly, we’ve managed to make a slightly different breed of the same species which is definitely standing on its own feet.
It’s almost as though someone told The Amity Affliction my own personal selection of pet peeves and loves and Severed Ties has challenged and sated these. For example, I’m one of those “no more keyboards in hardcore” advocates, but now The Amity Affliction, with their subtle use of synth in tracks such as “Snitches Get Stitches” and “Fruity Lexia” has reminded me how synth can be used to the advantage of the genre. On the other side, one of my other loves is hardcore covers of 80s tunes, and as if they hadn’t won me over already, The Amity Affliction pull out a decent cover of one of my all time favourite 80s tracks, Pat Benetar’s “Love Is A Battlefield”.
To break up their great tunes with sing-a-long choruses and heavy riffs, they’ve even got a nice slow down with “So You Melted”, nice little interim between heavier tracks.
My favourite track I knew I loved from the first time I heard it is the album closer “Stairway to Hell”. It’s a great song because of the combination on delicate guitar riff breaking down with the synth and then into the standard heavier stuff. This track is my current “lets stick it on repeat for 3 hour” track.
I’m going to put it out there, this band is something to look out for in the future. I’ve not been as psyched on something out of Australia since I first heard Parkway Drive.
Fortunately enough I am also reviewing The Amity Affliction in their support slot of We Are The Ocean, and considering their success back home on the live circuit, look out for what I expect will be a equally gushing live review.
