Throughout their career, Evergreen Terrace has been one of the only metalcore bands that truly incorporates punk and hardcore elements into their music, not just breakdowns. They carry the speed, and the attitude of any good punk band, and it would separates them from the pack, if only the stayed true to their roots.

Like many other metalcore bands, Evergreen Terrace suffers because of their lackluster melodic singing. At times, the clean vocals seem out of place, and the band is at their best when Andrew Carey’s throaty roar is the only voice heard. On the other hand, there are cases where the melodic singing makes, like in “Almost Home (III)”.  The song showcases layered harmonies, and the melody actually matches the music.

“God Rocky, Is This Your Face?” is a furious song filled with dissonant chords, and it shows the band at their best.  On this track, the band has balanced their sound, blending their metal and punk sounds together better than most groups know how. To put a fork in this topic, this song excludes all melody, and it’s a much better track because of it.

“Mario Speedwagon” is a fireball of a song, including nice tremolo work towards the end of this mini-epic.  The song clocks in at 2:29, and it carries more weight than songs that are twice as long.

Illustrated by “The Letdown” and these last two mentioned songs, it seems that the band is at their best when they keep it simple. When they give themselves room to spread their wings, the tracks come out seeming somewhat uninspired and simply flat.  It’s so confusing that a band can create such vicious songs, and then go ahead and follow them up with generic, by-the-numbers ones. The band needs to drop the melody, and give the listeners their best shot. Here’s to better luck next time.