I was quite content with Abstract Deviation‘s last album, Layers. Even with all its flaws, it was a fun listen and it was something just a bit out of the norm: djent with progressive, electronica elements, and female-fronted. This time is now gone.

First major change: the singer. No more female voice. I’ll admit that she wasn’t the best singer out there, but it was something uncommon among djent bands. The new [male] singer, despite his good voice, doesn’t bring out that “uncommon” element, and makes the band sound much more familiar than it should be. Familiar like when you say “I think I heard that before” but you didn’t.

On the instrumental side of things, the “progressive” and “electronic” adjectives are much more difficult to come upon. Most of the time, it now sounds like any other djent wannabe band, and at times it even sounds like Disturbed or Godsmack… I’ll let you judge whether it’s a good thing or not. To put it simply: The chug is strong with this one.

My only relief is that it’s less than 15 minutes long.