I'll be the first to admit that I often judge a book by its cover the same way I judge a band by their name and cover art. Simply based on these indicators, Death Before Disco did not give me great first impressions. I mean, Death Before Disco; not only is it a terrible name for this bands sound but it sounds suspiciously similar to Panic! At the Disco, which is the last band I would want to be mixed up with. The cover art is also laughable; a scenester bleeding onto a pile of roses with soaring black ravens cascading around him. Just looking at the cover of this album makes me cringe and what this band might sound like.
Death Before Disco, according to their liner notes is, "creating a sound that adds the most chaotic and melodic parts of The Dillinger Escape Plan, the indie rock sensibilities of Coheed and Cambria and Thursday and the progressive overtones of The Mars Volta, Thrice, and Dredg to create a masterpiece all their own." Let me debunk this statement right now before it falsely lures some vulnerable kids out there who are probably drooling over the list of bands above. I will offer you all a free piece of wisdom; any description listing a ton of bands you like is either entirely false, or the band is a just a contrived mash up of the bands listed in the description. I'm afraid Death Before Disco falls in the latter.
Based upon the first few songs, Death Before Disco sounds like an emo-core band in denial of assuming their identity. This is shown in their first track "Etireno" which sounds like Velvet Revolver trying to imitate The Mars Volta. The song is pretty bad, and the next song "Barricades of Rumble" sounds like Death Before Disco is more intact with their sound until a completely non-fitting bridge cuts off the catchy chorus. Not only that, but the end of the song contains a Dillinger-esque transition which completely ruins the song altogether. The little added efforts that Death Before Disco attempt at making themselves original are really poor attempts because it sounds so contrived and forced that it really dampers all the songs. Despite these missteps, there are songs on here that aren't complete failures. Songs like "Modern Times" and "Goodbye" are decent emo-core songs, but still nothing that hasn't been done hundreds of times before.
I don't want to completely write off this band since they are at least trying to progress themselves in some way past the emo-core mold, but in this attempt they failed pretty miserably. I wouldn't really recommend this CD for anyone, even those who are into the emo-core scene already. I would tell Death Before Disco to drop the experimentation and just master what sound comes most naturally to them. Also, a new name couldn't hurt.
