Headbangers are the most demanding crowd ever. We simply want the best from our bands. And it doesn’t matter how they do it, it’s their job to please us. So, HM bands have to be the heaviest – seriously? -, strongest, noisiest, play with the biggest heart and soul, and let’s not forget, to add plenty of emotion. But not a mere cheesy emotion, HM emotion, which is particularly different.
Well, this YOB “Your Raw Heart” fills all the above blanks. “Your Raw Heart” is the album to whom want to explore some music with big heart and passion. The thing about YOB is that emotion isn’t lost in the midst of chords and instrumental. No, YOB are a band which build songs to sound emotional, and not otherwise. Add that to a vocalist that really knows what is his part in the band. Gritty, well-balanced, warm. Exactly what Mike Scheidt has to offer us. Big job. Remind that Mike Scheidt was the guy who almost died in a surgery table while listening to his own band last year. Guess what? YOB’s music saved him. Read the article here. Haters would wish things go otherwise, but fortunately everything went well and he could finish this “Your Raw Heart” for our delight.
There are seven tracks in “Your Raw Heart” and all of them, except for “Ablaze” are a bit shoegazed. Also, all of them are long. In my mind, a song with more than five minutes is long, and they all are. Doomy would be a sudden opinion about YOB’s style, but they’re not. “Your Raw Heart” has a lot more to offer in terms of sonic variety. Though songs like “In Reverie” do sound doomy, others like the aforementioned don’t. YOB have a unique skill of mixing modern metal influences into their music in order to give it more strengthful. “Original Face” does that. And they do it well. Funny fact about “In Reverie” is that Mike Scheidt voice reminds a lot Nazareth’s Dan McCafferty. I’d take that as compliment.
“Your Raw Heart” is an album that stands out the crowd due to its very well built instrumentals and songwriting. As a juggler, YOB deal with a fine tuning for emotion and heaviness. They are perfectly dosed in this album. Some songs have impressive intros as “Lungs Reach,” which could be selected to a soundtrack to some movie. Simple, but effective bass line to burst in a ferocious guitar chorded riff and some voice from the seven depts of hell. Let’s not forget all the poetry contained in “Beauty in Fallings Leaves.” Also a remarkable track. Therefore, YOB did it well in “Your Raw Heart.”
YOB “Your Raw Heart” is being released today, June 08th, via Relapse Records.
Track Listing:
- Ablaze
- The Screen
- In Reverie
- Lungs Reach
- Beauty in Fallings Leaves
- Original Face
- Our Raw Heart
Watch “Our Raw Heart” official video here:
I’m just a lucky guy who has chosen metal to live with for a long time. Metal changed my life for good. It made me more confident and stronger. Metalheads are naturally far away from the mass mediocrity and don’t accept impostures from anybody else. Metal is more than music, it’s a life changing oportunity!