aaamusic | On 20, Jun 2011

Oddly enough, I believe I encountered Slaves To Gravity several years ago, as the support band for Aiden, and I had a distinct memory of being a bit unimpressed. However, given I was younger and not as well-versed as I hope I am now, I put aside my scepticism and plugged my ears into their latest release, the tongue-twisting ‘Underwaterouterspace’.

The opener, ‘Good Advice’, has a promising build, a slight electro buildup launching into a deluging salvo of swaggering heavy metal, with an alt-rock melodic bent behind the riffing. However, once the vocals kick in, an impassioned raw snarl mixed with a smoother classic rock style, I can’t help but feel like I’m listening to Stone Temple Pilots. The squalling grungy guitar hybridised with cock-rock trimmings feels like the long-lost sons of the aforementioned legends, although there’s a 21st century twist in the hints of nu-metal influences in guitar growl/wail matching and general attitude. To switch things up, ‘Honesty’ favours a somewhat lighter sound, leaning heavily on a solid percussion, the drumming itself a near-faultless balance of scalpel-edged cymbal abuse and a pounding snare march. However, the rest of the song feels a bit throwaway, the melody and riffs (and that cliché chorus) too pop in approach to really match the exciting rhythm section of heavy bass and textured drums.
Standout for me is the Soundgarden-esque ‘Unknown’, reprised on the howling, ominous ‘Lily Liver’. Here, the band seem to finally agree on a sound: accessible hooky vocals drawl the verses with an almost Reznor-style rasp, while the band go hell-for-leather over pounding out some serious rock noise with a catchy backbone, especially in some heated choruses. On the softer side, despite its slightly cringe-inducing name, the bleak ‘Misery Pills’ is a surprisingly rewarding cut of trudging grunge-metal, an oppressively sparse verse giving way to a stomping thunder explosion of a chorus, the tumultuous drums and caterwauling guitar/bass roars drenched with bitter angst, although the attempted nuance of a jangling acoustic moment feels forced.
There is a discrepancy afoot throughout the album, and it’s painfully apparent on ‘She’s Got Big Plans’. On the one hand, half the band seem to want to peddle a watered-down grunge lite, with the requisite “introspective but tough” lyricism, half the band want to get the rock n roll swagger and chops out with driving musicianship and a momentum that carries the slightly trite songs, and then the production seems to want to be a pop album, and the result being that the band feel hemmed in, the sound being too polished to allow any blood and sweat that might merit them some real heavy kudos into the mix, and so it all feels a bit sterile, even when the songs do pick up in a Buckcherry-meets-STP way. Try reconciling this with the sleaze-rock sonic attitudes of ‘Dumb’. The lyrics are from any Seattle band, the riffs from a strip club, the production from the pages of Kerrang! and the result feels both confused and confusing. Even a liltingly chaotic instrumental doesn’t quite redeem it entirely. As for ‘Silence Now’, it just doesn’t quite catch. It feels like Youmeatsix covering Soundgarden, and so it’s not quite soft enough for the former and too anodyne for the latter, a lopsided yet well-delivered patch of bewildering libido dressed as romance. I wish this ghost could stop dogging the promising ‘This Time It’s Terminal’, a passionate yet stilted track that begs to be allowed the breathing room to be a great metal ballad. The sneering southern-fried ‘Youth Serrated’, if you just toned down the banjo in the mix, would be an appealing if melodramatic cut of twisted metal.

I wish I could say I enjoyed ‘Underwaterouterspace’. There are so many ways in which it could potentially have been great. But ultimately, it is hampered by what feels like a confused band ethos, and a sound that for all its swagger, posture, and hot and heavy monstrous riffs, feels undeniably bubblegum round the edges. In all honesty and as little cynicism as possible, Kerrang! will love this band. I’ll admit that they have several good ideas and a definite spark, but nothing outstanding that can break them away from resembling an overproduced collaboration between Scott Weiland and Jared Leto.

Authors:Katie H-Halinski