Canadian metalcore crew Arrival of Autumn have been on my radar for a few years, since I stumbled upon their debut album Shadows in 2014. When they signed to Nuclear Blast a couple of years later, I was excited to see how they’d take their melodeath-tinged sound going forward and now, in 2019, we get to see the results on Harbinger.
Opening with “Hurricane on the Horizon”, Arrival of Autumn fly out of the gates with technical riffing and a quick tempo which refuses to let up until album closer “Apocalyptic”. They clearly take on acts such as Darkest Hour as influences and, while they don’t particularly add anything to it, they execute it well. Guitarist Brendan Anderson is a hell of a musician and contributes some tasty guitar solos to the opening tracks (particularly the solo to “End of Existence”), and good transitions as seen in “Witness” - a track which bounces back and forth between technically challenging riffs and big chorus hooks, while vocalist Jamison Frieson has a distinctive bark to him, while tracks like “Witness” and “Better Off Without” show off his clean singing capabilities, and the production mixes in the bass nicely. However, there is a glaring problem with the album and its production, which I will get onto later.
As already mentioned, Harbinger is utterly relentless in its aggression from the first notes until the final track. There are occasional moments where things revert to a more mid-range, accessible sound, such as the chorus to “Witness” and its subsequent archetypal metalcore breakdown, the more groove driven approach to “Old Bones / New Blood”, or even changing things up with the scattered electronics of “The Horror” or the dark, brooding intro to “Better Off Without”. It means that there isn’t necessarily a lot of variety on show on the whole, but it’s entertaining for what it is and not everyone will appreciate a token slow track, which always carries a risk of killing the momentum of the album. Arrival of Autumn refuse to take that chance and instead ride the momentum for all it’s worth, and the quality of the riffs is enough to keep you engaged without being worn down by the album’s intensity. Even though there’s not much genera variety in terms of style, there is still some more substantial variety if you pay attention, with the band willing to set aside its more technical writing in favour of a more streamlined, melodic approach when necessary, such as when accommodating Frieson’s clean vocals, or implementing a more groove driven approach. It offers variation within the strict confines of the genre they play, which can be difficult to do.
With all that said, a glaring and potentially fatal problem remains on this album: the drums. Drummer Ty Fox is good at what he does, but the mixing on the drums is appalling. It sounds as though Lars Ulrich was put in charge of getting the snare sound, which sticks out like a sore thumb – especially in Harbinger’s faster moments, like on “Witness” or the blastbeats of “Old Bones / New Blood”. I’m not sure whose choice it was to tune the snare that low, but it really distracts from the rest of what’s going on and stops you from enjoying an otherwise good album if you can’t mentally tune it out yourself. If you can look past it then you have a very decent album without many other issues of note on your hands, but otherwise some moments feel almost unlistenable, much like how some fans have criticised the drumming on Metallica’s infamous album St Anger. The inconsistency of the drum mix is confusing too. In some moments the drums feel a lot more toned down (such as in “Better Off Without”), while in “Witness”, they are considerably louder and more off-putting. It seems odd that this is such an issue when the production and mixing for everything else is more or less fine: the guitar tone is nice and thick, the bass is audible and clear, and the vocals sit just right. The only explanation is that this drum sound was intentional, which is questionable in and of itself.
There are other issues with the album too, although these are fairly minor. The main culprit being the fact that Arrival of Autumn are not bringing anything new to the table. The whole of Harbinger sounds like it could have been written 15 years ago by another metalcore/melodeath band such as Darkest Hour or Shadows Fall. Whether that’s a weakness or not, though, is entirely down to the listener. If that is what you’re looking for then Arrival of Autumn are an excellent fit for you, but if you want music that’s a bit more willing to push the boundaries of its genre, then I recommend you look elsewhere. It’s just a shame that certain production choices have tainted an otherwise credible effort.
Arrival of Autumn’s new album Harbinger is out now via Nuclear Blast. Stream the album below and follow the band on Facebook.
Opening with “Hurricane on the Horizon”, Arrival of Autumn fly out of the gates with technical riffing and a quick tempo which refuses to let up until album closer “Apocalyptic”. They clearly take on acts such as Darkest Hour as influences and, while they don’t particularly add anything to it, they execute it well. Guitarist Brendan Anderson is a hell of a musician and contributes some tasty guitar solos to the opening tracks (particularly the solo to “End of Existence”), and good transitions as seen in “Witness” - a track which bounces back and forth between technically challenging riffs and big chorus hooks, while vocalist Jamison Frieson has a distinctive bark to him, while tracks like “Witness” and “Better Off Without” show off his clean singing capabilities, and the production mixes in the bass nicely. However, there is a glaring problem with the album and its production, which I will get onto later.
As already mentioned, Harbinger is utterly relentless in its aggression from the first notes until the final track. There are occasional moments where things revert to a more mid-range, accessible sound, such as the chorus to “Witness” and its subsequent archetypal metalcore breakdown, the more groove driven approach to “Old Bones / New Blood”, or even changing things up with the scattered electronics of “The Horror” or the dark, brooding intro to “Better Off Without”. It means that there isn’t necessarily a lot of variety on show on the whole, but it’s entertaining for what it is and not everyone will appreciate a token slow track, which always carries a risk of killing the momentum of the album. Arrival of Autumn refuse to take that chance and instead ride the momentum for all it’s worth, and the quality of the riffs is enough to keep you engaged without being worn down by the album’s intensity. Even though there’s not much genera variety in terms of style, there is still some more substantial variety if you pay attention, with the band willing to set aside its more technical writing in favour of a more streamlined, melodic approach when necessary, such as when accommodating Frieson’s clean vocals, or implementing a more groove driven approach. It offers variation within the strict confines of the genre they play, which can be difficult to do.
With all that said, a glaring and potentially fatal problem remains on this album: the drums. Drummer Ty Fox is good at what he does, but the mixing on the drums is appalling. It sounds as though Lars Ulrich was put in charge of getting the snare sound, which sticks out like a sore thumb – especially in Harbinger’s faster moments, like on “Witness” or the blastbeats of “Old Bones / New Blood”. I’m not sure whose choice it was to tune the snare that low, but it really distracts from the rest of what’s going on and stops you from enjoying an otherwise good album if you can’t mentally tune it out yourself. If you can look past it then you have a very decent album without many other issues of note on your hands, but otherwise some moments feel almost unlistenable, much like how some fans have criticised the drumming on Metallica’s infamous album St Anger. The inconsistency of the drum mix is confusing too. In some moments the drums feel a lot more toned down (such as in “Better Off Without”), while in “Witness”, they are considerably louder and more off-putting. It seems odd that this is such an issue when the production and mixing for everything else is more or less fine: the guitar tone is nice and thick, the bass is audible and clear, and the vocals sit just right. The only explanation is that this drum sound was intentional, which is questionable in and of itself.
There are other issues with the album too, although these are fairly minor. The main culprit being the fact that Arrival of Autumn are not bringing anything new to the table. The whole of Harbinger sounds like it could have been written 15 years ago by another metalcore/melodeath band such as Darkest Hour or Shadows Fall. Whether that’s a weakness or not, though, is entirely down to the listener. If that is what you’re looking for then Arrival of Autumn are an excellent fit for you, but if you want music that’s a bit more willing to push the boundaries of its genre, then I recommend you look elsewhere. It’s just a shame that certain production choices have tainted an otherwise credible effort.
Arrival of Autumn’s new album Harbinger is out now via Nuclear Blast. Stream the album below and follow the band on Facebook.