I am somewhat hesitant when I listen to very modern sounding death metal bands. Maybe it's the look or the slick sounding production or even the fact that some groups flirt dangerously with the deathcore genre. But if you think that this review is about a group who shows those traits in this album (minus the part about deathcore), then you are mistaken. Burn the Empire makes the modern sound work very well, and their first, full length record, Dethrone, demonstrates this. There are a lot of odd and peculiar tempos, harmonies and contrasts that I had mixed feelings about, but it ultimately was a satisfying listen.
"Eminence" is our first number of Dethrone, and it starts off quiet and then unleashes its fury. Once the intro is done playing, a deathcore-like groove ensues with blast beats all over the place, and it foretells just how blistering the riffing and drumming will get on this album. When I got in contact with Burn the Empire's bassist, I found out that the drummer here is actually a drum machine. That wasn't surprising because some of the "drumming" I heard in these eight songs was berserk and just a little bit too perfect. So, if I had to give potential listeners one piece of advice, I'd say that they should prepare themselves for some technical songwriting. I mentioned earlier in this review that there were some odd time signatures, and the mother of them all is in the middle of "Stratagem." According to Burn the Empire Bassist, Tyler Capone-Vitale, it's in 17/16 time signature. As impressive as that is, I couldn't really get into such an off-kilter time signature.
To be honest, I couldn't really "get into" the technicality of Dethrone for the most part. There were some killer breakdowns like in "Stratagem" and "Revolt," but there weren't that many super groovy parts and as a drummer, this is very important to me. The level of musical skill shown to me was impressive however. Darren Liwen and Tyler Capone-Vitale, along with guest musicians Nate Parker and Jake Bintner, are skilled musicians and they kept together amongst themselves very well.
But enough of this talk about technicality, because there is more to this record, including the many different kinds of metal and the aforementioned deathcore that you can find here. For example, if you were to play the beginning of "Spiral" I would hands down, 100% believe that I was listening to a black metal band like Darkthrone, and then seconds later on the same track, a tech-death band would begin its ultra-fast light speed assault on your ears. Seconds it would return to the black metal sound. Some tracks sounded like some deathcore, such as "Ascendency," and I even heard some Evoken in "Eminence." This all led to a sound that I can describe as eclectic and very much "acquired." To me, this was musically intriguing.
One thing that I did not find intriguing however, was the blast beats played over lighter, flowing and more acoustic lines and were slightly distracting. A portion of "Eminence" can be used as an example, because there were so many small cases of this happening. But the "Eminence" instance was particularly disappointing because one, it was a very nice song, and two because this was the only track that Nate Parker played in. And although it may have been nice to some, the 1:42 mark of "Renouncement" wasn't on my list of things that I liked about Dethroned. Straight quarter notes of "clash chords" played over and over might be your cup of tea, but it sure isn't mine.
So I recommend that you listen to this album, because it is an example of band members bringing more than just one instrument to the table. We can learn quite a bit from these four gentlemen whom showed off a wide array of playing styles. With another musical installment arriving in this Fall, Burn the Empire will keep me waiting for some more complex songwriting, as well as some more grooves and fun "mosh friendly" parts. Those would be nice.