Album Reviews

Album: Mouth of Swords
Artist: The Safety Fire
Release Date: September 2, 2013
Label: Inside Out Music/Century Media Records
Genre: Progressive Metal/Mathcore/Experimental Metal

Before I start my review, my first one on this site, I would like to thank you for reading. Hopefully this is a site I continue working on, because I am known to stop things that I start.

The Safety Fire is a band that I have only vaguely heard of before this. Mouth of Swords is the band’s second studio album (the first being last year’s Grind the Ocean). My first impression of the album, originating from the opening track “Mouth of Swords,” is that the band is in ways similar to The Fall of Troy, a band I am quite partial to. The quick guitar sweeps into the higher register and an unusually melodic singing style. And when I say unusual, I mean for this genre, which could have just as easily been aggressive and atonal screaming, much in the style of The Dillinger Escape Plan. This anachronistic singing continues into the second track “Glass Crush,” but this time, the singing seems to fit considerably less. I leaves me wanting a more abrasive singing style, especially when the crash cymbals of the drums take dominance of the track. This is another complaint of mine, the drums are far too loud. I myself am a drummer, and I love being able to actually hear what the drums are doing, besides keeping a beat, but in this track especially, they start becoming annoying as the crash and hi-hat sounds blast into your eardrum. The only excuse a band could have for turning up the volume on the drum track would be if the drummer is doing something technically impressive, but he’s not in these tracks here.

The next track is “Yellowism,” a track that’s guitar work is immediately and interestingly dissonant. The vocalist here really shows his upper range and it’s nice to hear that range, something of a Led Zeppelin or Mars Volta shout. In this track, the range makes up for the lack of gravel in the singers voice. This is a great prog song. It’s got an interesting series of guitar riffs, drum fills and beats (some are a bit weak in context with the other instruments), a powerful singer, and good production. A post-track interlude fades right into the next song “Beware the Leopard (Jagwar),” which is electrified by a very crunchy and powerful bass. This track features very much anticipated “growls” from Between the Buried and Me vocalist Tommy Giles Rogers Jr., whose addition to the song is extremely well-placed. It hits you with the power channeled by the fast guitar work and a finally rewarding drum track. The bridge shows off the drums awesomely, yet in an extremely restrained and focused way. The climax of the song where Rogers and McWeeney (the vocalist) sing together is very rewarding after an extremely energetic track.

“Red Hatchet” starts off with an instrumental part that could have been made by the best of prog metal musicians. But then the vocalist comes in, and he comes in with an abrasive shout, the one I’ve been waiting for, yet, it wasn’t particularly worth the wait. It actually becomes a bit annoying. When he comes in, also, the instruments become chaotic in a very bad way. Simply put, TOO MUCH IS GOING ON! Which is not something I usually say, being a fan of bands like The Mars Volta and The Dillinger Escape Plan. The song’s two abrupt switches to a soft melodic part (bridge and outro) sound corny after something that can’t be considered great by any means. Maybe too much wasn’t going on, but the problem is, it SOUNDED like too much was going on.

Next up is “Wise Hands,” a song that starts off much gentler than the other ones on the album. The song is sung very well and a relatively steady guitar riff makes this track a welcome aside from the rest of the album (particularly the last track). I actually enjoy the drum work here, it’s doing a lot, as much as he could have done without doing too much. But he was at the maximum, anything more and it would have been a little ridiculous. My complaint in this song is its placement in the album. If a band has a soft song on a heavy album, it shouldn’t be placed right in the middle, and even if they do, it shouldn’t be one relatively short track between two very heavy songs. The next track “The Ghosts That Wait for Spring” is heavy, with guitars shooting around like lasers. This song keeps some of the abrasive vocals from “Red Hatchet,” but this song’s instrumental parts are much more well-composed. The distinct sections of the track give it a redeeming progressive quality that modern prog fans will enjoy. The song moves from one place to another in a powerful way. The song moves, and that’s an impressive quality for a band and is what attracts progressive fans to the genre and is what detracts them from much of today’s radio pop music.

The song changes to “I am Time, The Destroyer,” which starts off solemnly. Quiet and powerful. I almost wished that it kept that tender strength, but the quietness worked more as bookends in this song. The song then erupts into a very noisy and quick song that loses all meaning by scaring us with this unwarranted loudness. If the band wanted us to care about this particular song, they have failed.

Lastly is the longer track “Old Souls,” which doesn’t waste any time putting us into the song. It sounds like I missed half of the track when I start the song and we’re already in the middle of one of the earlier tracks. After the initial shock wears off, the song moves interestingly to different tones. Yet, the song is composed in a relatively conventional way. A clear-cut verse-refrain-verse-refrain-bridge kind of song. The instruments make that good kind of chaos that a progressive rock fan would enjoy. A lot is going on without too much going on. This is constructed very well, it all fits, for one of the only times on the album. I almost wish the song would last longer so I could see where it would go next, but maybe that just wouldn’t work. This is a pop song disguised with a progressive metal singer, prominent guitar riffs, and a drummer that works his magic all over the cymbals he has.

I would’ve liked to hear more bass in these songs. I think a good progressive band should always have a competent bass player whose track is meaningful to the composition. The singer’s voice is hit-or-miss when it comes to matching the song and his screaming is extremely sub-par. When the voice does match the song, it’s usually a good sign that the song will be enjoyable, almost like the icing on the cake. It could be good or it could be bad, and the presentation of the cake kind of depends on it. The guitarists are the standout feature on this album. Thoroughly intelligent work is created by their riffs, and even if one of the band’s songs are horrible, they will always have the guitars to fall back on. Lastly, I was fighting the drummer throughout this album. I didn’t know whether or not what he was doing was enough or too much. My final opinion on the drums is that he is a good player, and he wants the limelight a little too much in some songs, but the guy can play and he shows off well, just maybe at inappropriate times.

Best tracks: “Beware the Leopard (Jagwar);” “Old Souls”
Not so great tracks: “Red Hatchet;” “I am Time, The Destroyer”

FINAL RATING: 6/10