Metal Underground.com

Spiral Trance blends the style of metal that emerged around the dawn of the new millennium with occasional unexpected rhythms and light progressive instrumentation to give way to a variation of modern metal. With a sound that hearkens to acts like Drowning Pool, Disturbed, and Tool, but with the added sensibility of an act like Metal Church, Spiral Trance have made strides toward crafting their own sound.

The first track on the album, “This Time,” opens with unexpected clean piano playing atop waves of ambient distorted guitar and unfolds into a full song. Unfortunately, this will be the most we hear of the piano for awhile on this album, outside of sweetener tracks behind the main rhythm section. Keeping to modern metal style while incorporating way more double-kick drum parts than you’ve heard in a nu-metal recording, “All in Due Time” and “Dead Set” deliver a punch on the whole. No one instrument really shines throughout most of the songs and the bass guitar could use a lot of boosting in the mix, as could the vocals. Most noticeably, the vocals lack intelligibility and most of the time lack in weight. The vocalist sounds like Godsmack’s Sully Erna with a better range, but a much less full-bodied delivery.

Throughout the album there are gang vocal parts which contribute much in a live setting and provide good mosh support and excitement on recording, too. The guitar playing is heavy-handed, but melodic in many sections. Tracks like “Man Up,” “Lard Ass,” “Offering,” and “The Me You See” are fun but ultimately lack on the lyrical side, opting for cheesy “fuck you” or “jackass” lines where clever lyrical writing could have been. The drumming on the album is, on the whole, three steps above modern metal drumming – full of life, well thought out, and heavy as hell with a lot of double-kick drum hits. “Answer to Self” provides a nice new element – a blend of Testament-style thrash in the verses and a Killswitch Engage-type clean chorus with crowd chants on top of it.

Bluesy guitar solos, guitar harmonies, occasional synth programming, strong guitars, competent drumming, and a presentation that’s readily accessible to metal mainstreamers and outsiders, Spiral Trance have made an attempt at improving modern metal. “All In Due Time” is for metalheads into the accessible, cuss-laden, new generation of metal post-2000, only with a more traditional feel despite the modern production. There’s a good amount of improvement the band needs to really stick out, but this album shows good potential.