BURIED IN VERONA: Saturday Night Sever

Produced by Fredrik Nordström
Released: June 4

Fredrik Nordström must be getting pretty well used to being the go-to man for Australian metalcore bands now. Following in the footsteps of the likes of Contrive and I Killed the Prom Queen, Buried in Verona is the latest local act to beat a path to his door. This band's previous album was a rather flat, lifeless collection of generic metalcore that ticked all the right boxes but generally failed to step outside the circle. Nordström's production has at least given Buried in Verona a punchier sound that's more in line with their metal pretentions.

Despite the cringe-inducing title and the artwork that looks like a toddler chewed up a crayon and then vomited, Saturday Night Sever makes better use of melodies and features more memorable songs than Circle the Dead, but the band still refuses to really break any new ground. Buried in Verona has improved without really changing very much, apparently still content to follow the most basic metalcore template available without injecting too much of their own personality. There's a dash of electronics on a couple of tracks, most noticably at the beginning and towards the end, but unlike Anime Fire, who weave beats into their music, here they're just tacked on as if the band felt a last-minute need to make a half-arsed attempt at individuality. Like the previous album, the song titles don't seem to have much to do with the lyrics. There's another Cluedo-inspired one ("Professor Plum...") and most of the others just plain suck: "Hangin' Hoes by Their Toes" plumbs the depths of immature tough-guy posturing directly reflected in their lyrics. Even the promisingly-titled "Rohypnol Sunrise" offers nothing more than another melodramatically angry song full of homicidal rage as if these guys have never had a relationship in their lives that didn't end in betrayal and murder, and totally lacking in any sense of irony, self-mocking or humour. Still, the album sounds huge. The drumming is rock solid and without being earth-shattering, the riffs are vicious and catchy. The lead guitar work has also taken a turn for the better, although BiV was never shabby in that department. They also rely much less on breakdowns than many other bands.

Saturday Night Sever is a marked improvement on Buried in Verona's 2008 effort, but it is unlikely to appeal to those who aren't already fans of their strictly generic angst-ridden overkill. If you like to throw yourself around a moshpit while a dude screams about how much life sucks and how hard he'd punch your face, this will more than satisfy you. For those seeking a more sophisticated, mature worldview, look elsewhere.

1. The End
2. Temptress
3. Saturday Night Sever
4. Professor Plum in the Ballroom With the Candlestick
5. Hangin' Hoes by Their Toes
6. Go Go Gadget Suicide
7. Rohypnol Sunrise
8. Bell Ringer
9. You Left Me With No Goodbye
10. Cut Wrists & Sinking Ships
11. The Beginning

Rating: 68%

BURIED IN VERONA: Circle the Dead

Released: August 23

Buried in Verona is a five piece band from Sydney playing melodic metalcore. I could almost leave this review there and most people would get a good idea of what this album sounds like, but that would probably be unfair. With the demise of I Killed the Prom Queen there is probably a dozen or more Australian bands clamouring the fill the void. Buried in Verona is no doubt one of them, but the reality is that IKTPQ probably broke up at precisely the right time.

On Circle the Dead, Buried in Verona use the template that the Adelaide pace-setters cut on Music for the Recently Deceased and virtually replicate it, making a good fist of it without really doing anything with it. Quirky and unwieldly song titles that don't seem to relate to their lyrics ("Colonel Mustard...") and others stolen from The Simpsons like "Can I Borrow a Feeling?" (which always makes me laugh) aside, Buried in Verona don't really seem to have much else to add to this well-worn genre. First track "Five Bullet Russian Roulette" and the three songs after it are actually pretty full-on metal with some nice snappy soloing and catchy if predictable riffs, probably owing more to an influence from Trivium or Lamb of God than anything. Had they stuck to this sort of thing it would have still marked them as soundalikes, but possibly with somewhere to go. "Taken to the Light" however starts the rot, a commerical metalcore track so formulaic even Prom Queen would have left it alone. The story is pretty much the same for the rest of Circle the Dead really. There's little that reaches out and grabs you beyond the opening few tracks and while all of it is reasonably well put together there isn't much to Buried in Verona's take on melodic metalcore beyond rehashing familiar themes and ideas that have already been done to death. Even the "confronting" artwork is nothing more than overly dramatic emo silliness.

Metalcore as it currently exists reached saturation point some time ago and what it really needs to keep it as a viable genre is a new band to come along with something new to inject into the field. BiV doesn't do this, to their detriment. Circle the Dead is a solid album, but completely faceless among a sea of similar releases and will most likely be forgotten when another one almost the same comes out.

1. Five Bullet Russian Roulette
2. All for Nothing
3. Colonel Mustard in the Conservatory with the Lead Pipe
4. Can I Borrow a Feeling?
5. Taken to the Light
6. Dirt Nap
7. Face of Tragedy
8. Circle the Dead
9. Don't Call Me Baby
10. For Darker Days
11. No Time to Die

Rating: 52%