Reviews

Silent Treatment

The Bled

Released: Sep 25, 2007
Label: Vagrant Records
Reviewed by: Tim Creter
2 comments

Not unlike the last releases of great bands like Snapcase and Vision of Disorder, The Bled play a style of post-hardcore that is bombast and melodic yet without a real sense of dynamics. The music is more a focus on emotion and purging rather than an actual collection of songs. As such, Silent Treatment works as a strong, one-sided musical explosion of an album. The urgency, the energy, the rock: it's all here. On the sonic side, the album has a vocal and bass drum heavy mix. This is great, but it unfortunately causes the guitars to be buried underneath everything else. This is a talented band who are coming into their own, and this album will know doubt ensure their longevity.

As an equal parts punk-metal-hardcore-rock band, the musicianship here is cross-over in every sense of hyphenated scenes and sounds. For fans of The Bled, your album of the year has arrived. As the fans know, the band has taken their time after conquering live venues to conquer the studio with this release. For those unfamiliar, you will not be blown away. This is because for the punk, hardcore kid, or metal head who sticks only to their bands and their kind of music, this album will do nothing for them. Having a cross-over sound ultimately only works as a kind of peace treaty. It does not ensure a new fan, especially a fan of heavy music. Honestly, Silent Treatment sounds like if Converge had recorded a pop album. Despite the buzz saw riffs, the vocal talent, and the bitch-slapping pace of the whole album there is something intangibly safe about the whole thing. It seems to be more about teen angst than something musically creative. There is a predictable element at work here that appeals to the fan base but not to the objective ear. Decent stuff, though, boys. But don't go declaring "masterpiece" yet. As noted above, this really is The Bled at their best and apparently, at their heaviest. And if it works, it works.