At the Dawn of Your Deterioration

As a genre of music ages, it seems that the average 'professionalism' of said genre increases. One of the most obvious examples of such phenomena is in rock music; the technical skill and songwriting ability (when taken as to face value with regards to what sounds are percieved as most ideal to the average person) have increased manyfold since its creation. Certainly, the same has happened to metal; however, such an increase in production values does not necessarily correspond to an increase in artistic quality. Surely, the product now is slicker and cleaner than ever, but can it really compete with the early, passionate releases we hold so dear.

Ashura embodies this spirit of stunning professionalism. Even with their debut LP 'At The Dawn Of Your Deterioration', Ashura sounds like they've been working together for at least a decade, despite merely forming in 2002. Even now Ashura sounds a cut above the competition, their music is so clean, precise, and seemingly engineered to be pleasing. Of course, such compliments must certainly come with a delicate hedging. Too bad the hedging isn't too delicate in this case: Ashura lacks focus.

While at its core a death metal band, Ashura's stylistic leaps are quite disconcerting. All the tracks on this disc fall within the same genre, but damned if they don't jump around quite a bit. Opener 'Able To The Worst' makes you think this'll be a fast-paced, brutal death metal album. Then comes 'Ashura' with it's bizarre metalcore influences, and then the Arch Enemy-inspired sound of 'Dans Le Cercle'. This is all well and good when a band can pull off all the styles well, but Ashura isn't at this stage capable of such leaps.

This is not a worthless album by any stretch. 'At The Dawn Of Your Deterioration' certainly shows promise with such musicians on board. However, I can't entirely recommend Ashura at this stage in their career. This album is rather lacking in consistency, so only the more die-hard death metal enthusiasts will want to pick this up. The rest of us should wait for a sophomore release.

(Originally written for www.vampire-magazine.com)