Colors (2007)

 

Artist: Between the Buried and Me
Release Year: 2007

Rating: 9/10

Track Listing: 1) Foam Born (A) The Backtrack; 2) (B) The Decade of Statues; 3) Informal Gluttony; 4) Sun of Nothing; 5) Ants of the Sky; 6) Prequel to the Sequel; 7) Viridian; 8) White Walls.

Colors: the result of splitting light into different wavelengths, or of splitting metal into different genres.

Oh, the nostalgia that comes with this one-- and I didn't even listen to it nearly as much in its time as my friends did!  And as usual for metal, I'm not going to pay attention to the lyrics, mainly because I can't understand them, and I don't feel like looking them up.  That doesn't hamper my enjoyment of this album, though-- whether they're screaming, growling, or singing.  So what makes this one work so well for me?

Simple: the striking dynamism from beginning to end.  No more than five minutes at a time are spent on the same motif, so they easily avoid a problem that has made a lot of metal difficult for me.  No, this band seems to have followed the superior process of being interesting and varied first, then adding the heaviness.  There's always a new genre injected in, always a new breakdown or riff or vocal hook around the corner.  Sure, we have to start out with the usual spooky chromatic chords at the beginning, but then we launch into the groove.  Well, kinda– "Decade of Statues" does less for me as a mostly straightahead metal number, but they at least intersperse it with some nice riffs and cool breakdowns.

But then we get to the main course, when everything opens up in ways I couldn't have predicted.  I almost don't want to spell it all out here, for fear of spoilers-- but this album is almost 20 years old now, and it's not like anybody's reading this anyway.  

So then, what about the Arabian chant at the beginning of "Informal Gluttony", or the didgeridoos at the end?  How about the piano breakdown, then later, the power ballad-sounding "chorus" section in "Sun of Nothing"?  Or the almost Steven Wilson-sounding vocals in the middle verses?  And I could go on about the exquisitely frenetic "Ants of the Sky", which includes a heavy-funk solo like something from Living Colour, then blends later into a Spanish guitar piece, then wraps up with the laid-back, jazz-fusion solo near the end, which abruptly segues into something from a hoedown.  

No notes.

Then we get a nostalgic, soaring intro to "Prequel to the Sequel", followed by a polka breakdown to screamo vocals to thrash riffage, before a smooth instrumental transition to the crushing epic "White Walls".  From the curb-stomping intro to the mysterious "step back" section, which sounds like swimming under dark water, to the slow buildup to the throwbacks to classic metal in the dizzying solo section that caps it all off, this is probably my favorite on the album.  

Throughout Colors, the transitions from heavy to smooth make a hell of a lot more sense than you usually hear in bands that are just trying to sound intelligent, and are placed in just the right spots to deliver satisfaction and respite, like little oases in the wasteland.  It all fits, and it all keeps us listening on, like a novel we can't put down.  Sure, the harsh sections don't have the same kind of sludgy groove that Mastodon's best work does, but that's likely not the point.  The point is the journey throughout all these disparate scenes, the contrast between light and dark, and there's no doubt about their success in that regard.  Perhaps most tellingly, I was a fan of this album even before I began to appreciate metal, which means it might help make a believer out of someone else one day.