OF MICE & MEN – The Flood
(Re-Issued) Rise Records 2012
The Flood was originally released on June 14th 2011 and was re-released July 24th 2012, featuring 4 new songs. Selling over 13,000 copies in its first week, it’s already clear that The Flood was a very much anticipated album.
Starting off on the four new songs, ‘The Calm’ is just 1:51 of quiet, peaceful instrumental; completely different to the rest of the album. ‘The Storm’ picks up the pace slightly, featuring all scream and no clean vocals, which gives the album a bit of variety. ‘The Flood’ and ‘The Depths’ also contain only screaming.
Back to the original track list of ‘The Flood’, ‘O.G. Loko’ brings back the clean vocals of Shayley Bourget. ‘Ben Threw’ boasts amazing clean vocal melodies along with a mid-song twist, a few of these genius ‘twists’ are used throughout the album, ensuring that ‘The Flood’ isn’t your average scream record. ‘Still YDG’n’ (supposedly a ‘part 2’ of OM&M ‘s song ‘YDG’ released on their 2010 self-titled album) is a very unique song with different pitch changes. ‘Let Live’ is next, and is one of my personal favourites on ‘The Flood’. It is a truly amazing song, and is an example of Of Mice & Men at their best. ‘My Understandings’ comes after, and is another one of my favourites. Using a build up of dynamics, and a very clever use of clean vocals over scream vocals, it creates a beautiful little masterpiece.
Back into the heavier side of the album, ‘Ohioisonfire’ brings a faster tempo and some nice drums! Track 7 is ‘Purified’. Again, I really like this song. With some clean vocals in the verse and not just in the chorus, it is another little gem on ‘The Flood’.’Product Of A Murderer’ is a fan favourite, and I can see why. It holds one of those ‘twists’ I was on about earlier, so I won’t give too much away. All I will say is that it is a very good song; almost indescribable (hint hint that you should listen to it…!). Nearing the end of the record, we get to ‘Repeating Apologies’, then ‘The Great Hendowski’ which contains some great vocals and screams. ‘I’m A Monster’ is like the grand finale to the screaming part of ‘The Flood’ with so much screaming in under two minutes, it’ll blow your socks off. To bring ‘The Flood’ to a close is ‘When You Can’t Sleep At Night’, a slow, sad acoustic song with just clean vocals, putting the icing on the perfect cake.
To finish, I think ‘The Flood’ is definitely not a disappointment. With Shayley Bourget’s clean vocals complementing Austin Carlile’s unclean vocals and vice-versa, it is an amazing rollercoaster of different styles, tempos, dynamics and textures. Not forgetting the talents of Phil Manansala (lead guitar), Alan Ashby (rhythm guitar), and Valentino Arteaga (drums), who, without them, ‘The Flood’ would not have been the same. I would recommend Of Mice & Men to fans of Attack! Attack!, Bring Me The Horizon, The Dead Lay Waiting and Motionless In White.
*****
Jasmine Ritchie
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ARCANA KINGS Here We Go (Curtain Call Records)
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BEYOND UNBROKEN Dance With The Dead (FiXT)
REVENGIN Decadent Feeling (Wormholedeath)
Featured Albums w/c 11 November 2024
09:00-12:00 The Best of 2003-2023 (Melodic Rock)
12:00-13:00 The Best of 2003-2023 (Melodic Hard Rock)
14:00-16:00 The Best of 2003-2023 (Singer Songwriter)
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