underground - connection
reviewed 6/26/03
For some kids that are still in high school this is a really good album. It's also a very good album for me to listen to after work because it is so angry sounding. This leads me to believe these guys work in food service. Anyways, I saw Forty 8 Days open for Mushroomhead a few months back. I really liked them but I wasn't sure if their live set would transcend well recorded. It does.
Domain Cleveland
For so young a band, this a pretty ambitious album. "Imagine Reality" and "Falling", in particular, show an impressive sophistication for a band that at times still seems to be finding themselves. Both offer smooth transitions, varying speeds and the ability to switch speeds seemlessly. But, as is often the case with music, not everything works. For it's varying tempos, "Falling" also seems at times to lose it's way.
"Scars of the Children" is nicely packaged piece of music that combines many a genre, all done without sucking. It has the screaming vocals of a hardcore singer, the pulsating metal riffs, the occasional metal growl, and more than once I heard a jazzy/indie rock type break down that they make fit so well against the vocals. Where most people would falter with all these genres Forty 8 Days makes it work, and makes it sound awesome.
One of the songs I really enjoyed was "Negative End" which featured additional vocals of Rob from Runt. I'm not going to lie but I've never liked Runt, nothing personal against the band, I just can't get into them. Regardless the dueling vocal action they have going on that track is pretty sweet sounding. I also have to give props to the song "Taken". It starts out sounding pretty rough but then just goes into breaks that would make fans of the band Dismemberment Plan salivate.
- Kelly
Likewise, "Negative End" and "Engaged and Forgotten" show a definite move away from just another screaming hardcore act by incorporating more keyboards. But as "Negative End" switches from groove, to heavy keys and into a more straight up hardcore sound, the hardcore parts (which honestly more convey the band's sound) come off as forced - they way have outsmarted themselves on this one.
Overall, the musicianship is really good for a genre that tends to employ musical instruments only as a backdrop for a shrieking frontman. The keyboards on "Engaged and Forgotten" and the drums on "Falling" particularly stand out.
The influences, too are a lot more diverse than one typically finds on this sort of offering. Like so many Cleveland-area acts, the homage to Mushroomhead is obvious on tracks like "Negative End" and "Now Broken", but on "Now Broken" it comes after a cool black metal sounding intro. They've also incorporated a good deal of groove into the album, particularly evident on "Lost", and the influences of bands from the ubiquitous Korn ("End of the Struggle") to the oft-overlooked Fear Factory ("Imagine Reality" and "Engaged and Forgotten").
Overall an ambitous effort that succeeds far more often than it fails by a band that continues to evolve before our very eyes