Breathless - Return to Pangea (2015)

Notice anything different? Return to Pangea is an album which is far more likely to be taken seriously, void of any overt 'thrash-this' 'thrash-that' nonsense and potentially even teasing us with a genuinely interesting concept. Now, I doubt the sophomore album by Breathless could possibly be something as enthralling as a tale about Earth's landmasses being crushed together once more, but I'm very willing to be proven wrong, and for at least part of this album they're rattling their sabers about just such a apocalyptic scenario. More importantly, Return to Pangea is an improvement over its predecessor in nearly every discernible category, with a richer and more focused selection of riffs that channel some of that potent Teutonic influence circa Destruction into some genuine, melodic thrash which at times feels a lot like modern Artillery, albeit less wildly proficient and possessing distinctly different vocals.

The power of the guitars alone is enough to thrust this past the debut in terms of quality, where they had seemed a little too punchy and processed on Thrashumancy, they're really cleaned up here and there is a better mix of the rhythms and occasional lead flights. The structure of the riffs carries a slightly less surgical feel to it, and more of a bright, 'feel good' style with lots of bluesy little tails and fills in between the Stützer Brothers-like finesse. There is no shortage of variation here, the songs are each stuffed with a good number of progressions, and while they're not always so memorable, they at least rock consistently and the choices feel pretty sound. This is not going to live up to the technical European thrash masterpieces of the later 80s, not by any stretch, but the amount of effort these Spaniards have put into this is at least vastly superior to most of their pizza thrash peers who are more or less cloning the crossover and denim & leather thrash of years past without the level of charm and songwriting needed to pull it off...no, I'd put this more in a class with modern bands like After All and Vektor who really took the spirit of the old school and plugged it into contemporary recording standards which don't sound entirely too derivative to even bother about.

Props to the level of production they added to Eduardo Moreno's vocals, taking that blunt and ugly charisma he exhibited on the debut and then throwing in reverbs and echos here or there which highly his higher pitched screams, reminiscent of Schmier...maybe Schmier's deformed cousin who'd clout you over the head, stuff you in the trash can out back of the high school cafeteria and then go and spend your lunch money on dope. Something like this never happened to me, I promise. The drums and bass sound more flavorful and peppy because they've got something to actually celebrate here, a few riffing progressions that are worth a damn surrounded by others that are at least on the winning side of average. The leads aren't exactly substantial, but they're far better than they were on the first album and actually imbue a little fire and emotion into the tracks. It's not perfect, and there is plenty of room to grow yet, but Return to Pangea is basically exactly how you want to re-assess your band's trajectory and come out the better for it. The cover art may seem a little too death metal and chaotic for the music itself (reminded me of Danes Invocator), but really if you're into bands like Headhunter, Destruction, and Artillery in their 21st century forms, or Greek acts like Suicidal Angels and Angelus Apatrida, then this is worth your time.

Verdict: Win [7.5/10]

https://www.facebook.com/BreathlessAttack

Breathless - Thrashumancy (2011)

Another record that seeks to enamor itself to a particular audience before a single note is heard, Thrashumancy instantly claims our attention with its vivid artwork and inane portmanteau title...but perhaps not so inane if your past decade consisted of the lauding over pizza thrash, or 're-thrash' acts who fit their vintage hi-tops, tear their jeans and have moms who can sew a whole lotta patches. Because, let's face it, it isn't a real battle jacket if your mom doesn't help you sew it. Well, fortunate for us, Breathless play 'real' thrash metal, of the garden variety, of course, without much ambition behind it or nuance or that pesky concept of songs that the listener is going to remember afterwards, which to me is rather missing the point...we didn't love thrash metal in the 80s because of it's 'look' or it's 'style' alone, we listened to it because of the bloody songs that stick on the brain 30 years later...not just a lifestyle or a style of clothes we wore to party with a few beers.

To be fair, I'm sure Breathless 'means something' with a lot of the messages besides their songs, and I'm not ready to write it off as just some senseless party thrash entirely. But it just doesn't help that they all feel as if they were drawn from a lottery of their influences. On the musical side of things, they've write in a mold that straddles the border between mid-paced, West Coast American headbanging variety ala Exodus, Forbidden, and Vio-Lence, and the much closer to home German scene, in particular Destruction, whose clinical picking progressions from both the 80s and later Antichrist era seem to provide a major influence to more than half the cuts here, and generally the better individual riffs, because a lot of the slower neck-break parts seem really forgettable and they just don't possess that innate meanness of something off Pleasures of the Flesh or Reign in Blood or Eternal Nightmare, something timeless and violent and raw. Riff construction definitely falls in a space between the more serious, regimental thrash of the longhairs and then the crossover crowd of the 80s, I heard little nods to bands like Crumbsuckers in their prime but these Spaniards go more for the palm mutes than the open chord barrage of most bands in that early NY wave.

The vocals have character, burly and messy and prone to lean into outrageous snarls and sound pretty goofy somewhere between Ron Royce (Coroner), Schmier (Destruction) and Roger Martinez of Vengeance Rising, but I never felt like they were used to full effect, getting more hectic on the verses than the choruses, where they really might have been refined into a sticking point. Bass lines are good and thick, a good fit for the rhythm guitars, which I thought had a punchy but regrettable tone that might have worked better with a lot more edge to them. The drumming is fine but doesn't really catch my ear, especially without high quality riffs that keep me focused. A lot of the album is spent by the veteran thrasher playing 'guess where I've heard that before', and there overt nods, whether conscious or unconscious to anything from Xentrix to The Antichrist to Coroner's No More Color. Lead guitars seem few and far between, rather noncommittal where dissonant frenzies might have been better suited to the more surgical guitar phrases that represent the best on the disc, but even that I could forgive if the songs were good...

And that's simply not the case here. 'Shockingly average' would be a better descriptor. The album is by no means as lamentable as its title had me dreading, and I didn't feel like I had just had a couple of slices of extra cheese and pepperonis smeared across my cheeks, but it's another pretty picture among a sea of them that have been released over the last 5-10 years by bands trying to tap into that nostalgia. The Spaniards don't draw directly from any one source on the whole (just in certain parts), but that would not be a bad thing either if they were so damn good at it that they could properly resurrect nostalgia or even contend with their very inspirations. As it stands, just another walk in the nuclear theme park, potentially impressive to supplicants who were just getting into the music in the 21st century and have exposed themselves only a small amount of the niche, but for experienced thrashers this just isn't going to plug anywhere into the collection that isn't already occupied by some release that is light years ahead of this, and was so even decades back...

Verdict: Indifference [5.25/10]

https://www.facebook.com/BreathlessAttack

The Eyes of a Traitor - Breathless (2010)

I've long been of the school of thought that there are two schools of the metalcore universe: the crafty, volatile and frenzied fare of a Converge, Botch, Coalesce, Drowningman, and the hundreds that followed in their footsteps by fusing post-hardcore and metallic elements into interesting, splayed dynamics; and then the crass and commercialized fodder (Unearth, Killswitch Engage, Black Dahlia Murder) which represents a hybridization of meaty mosh chugging and melodic death elements straight out of Sweden. By this statement, you can probably tell which one I favor, but on occasion there will be a band that flirts with the space betwixt the poles, and I feel like England's The Eyes of a Traitor represents some subtle, middle ground on their sophomore Breathless.

Don't be fooled, there are still many of the trappings of convention in place here, like the very simple chugging sequences and the passionate but typical metalcore ranting howls, but what is more interesting is what the band lays over the bricks: a cement of post-hardcore inflected chords and gleaming melodies. All of this is evident in "The Birth", which has some great ringing notation in the verses and even the plodding mutes of the chorus, proceeding into the bouncy gone melancholic chorus. But come "Come to My Senses", I was pretty sad to encounter the same crappy clean vocals that poison so many artists in this genre, who must feel that they will carry some compulsive, emotional weight. They don't. They suck, and wherever they touch this band's music (which thankfully isn't that often), they instantly spread cancer in their wake. It's a shame, because the guitars and rhythm section work pretty hard here, with a few melodies in tracks like "Talk of the Town" or "Nothing to Offer" that might have sat well on an In Flames or Insomnium album.

I wish the band could pluck out about 40-50% of the riffs here, and re-insert into compositions better fitting a more curious vision. The meaty, bouncing rhythms that are part Meshuggah, part Mnemic never really go anywhere, and the lyrics are almost all very bland, cliched and self-centered in that 1st person perspective, like thousands of throwaway hardcore bands in the 90s who were 'expressing' themselves. I don't mind personal writing, but they never seem to evoke anything beyond the bare minimum of effort and imagination (nor do the song titles). The vocals are also not interesting, with a phoned in level of emotion you can find anywhere in the genre. The production of the album feels a little too processed, but this is not unusual for the style, and at least it gives you the chance to focus on the band's few strengths: the tight, efficient rhythm section and the melodic choices made by the guitars. Other than that, there's really nothing to see here, so move along.

Verdict: Fail [3.75/10]

http://www.myspace.com/theeyesofatraitor

Breathless - Breathless (1985)

By all the Primordial gods of the underverse, do I spy a pair of angry dinosaurs rumbling on the cover of this obscure Belgian record, in the foreground of incendiary comet-fall that will end the existence of all their kind and more? That is at the same time both the lamest and greatest thing I've ever borne witness to, and naturally it causes any expectation of the music to be quite high, or quite low. But damn the Belgians Breathless, because they've got a little old metal record here that neither sucks not tears the walls down. This was another of those bands to dress in tight cougar pants, or red pants with leather jackets, shades, mullets, and you fucking name it. The semi glam consciousness reminds me of their countrymen Crossfire or the excellent Ostrogoth, but it really does not translate into their sound whatsoever.

Essentially, Breathless perform rugged speed metal with a singer, Pascal Remans, who likes to use his voice as a shrill weapon of warfare, sort of like a Lizzy Borden but not as silk-like in his execution, and balancing the higher range with some pretty blunt, melodic vocals that crash into the dirty, bluesy guitar tone. Half of the songs here are quite good, and then the other half rather quick to forsake on the road to nostalgic bliss, but I don't hold any real negative impression of the record, regardless of the occasional, annoying vocal line that seems often uncalled for. The riffs are nothing that special, though there's a nice balance of six and four strings here, and a vibrant tone to the leads that definitely gets you in the mood for music of this period.

I actually think this band works best when its strutting itself at a mid pace, like the barroom grit of "Hells Fever". The leads are great, and it picks up to some solid speed metal, while Remans howls over it like one part goblin set ablaze, and one part mournful ghost creeping about some ruins. "Bring Back Home" is a raging, Judas Priest derivative with insane shrieking vocals that will have you laughing in between horn throwing, but 'with the band' and not against them. I also like the traditional use of the familiar classic guitar line in the band's namesake "Breathless" and the questionably sexy "Devil's Speed on Her Body", with some doom-like bridge riffs above which Remans screams like a spiritual precursor to King Diamond's solo records. There is one other solid speed metal track in "On the Wings of the Dragon".

The band really only comes unhinged on the weak ballad "The Night Crusader", though the lead within is acceptable, but in general, their music does little more than sate the ears temporarily, provoking nothing truly memorable over the course of 34 minutes. Unless you truly endear yourself to Remans Halford-on-crack cries, you may lose interest only after half the record, which would be unfortunate since several of its better tracks arrive late. Breathless might have fared pretty well on the mid-80s Metal Blade or Roadrunner rosters, but they were instead confined to Gigametal/Troglodyte. Oh, who am I kidding, anyone who is on a record label called Troglodyte is pretty fucking awesome without even reaping a few quarters.

Verdict: Indifference [6.75/10]