Source - Left Alone
GOI Music
Melodeath
9 songs (36:30)
Release year: 2003
Source, GOI Music
Reviewed by Jay

With the onslaught of young melodeath bands, many get lost in the shuffle. Source is one such band. Recommended by a reader, I checked out their latest full length offering entitled Left Alone. While this band clearly draws their influence from the greats in this genre, there is nothing, special or unique about this band. They do give a kickass melodic death attack with some force behind it though. Their attack reminds me of early Soilwork without keyboards and At the Gates combined. They certainly have the aspects of both bands especially the drumming, which is surely in Adrian Erlandsson’s style.

The title track grinds with the best of them offering a no-frills track that is as brutal as it is skillful. Many of the tracks on this album follow the same formula, which gets tiresome after repeated listens. This album rated a lot higher on first listen and slowly went down in my estimation as I delved deeper into it seeing as most of the songs resembled each other more than I would have liked to see. "Angel Dust" has a pretty awesome Soilwork inspired riff that could have come from The Chainheart Machine sessions. However the drumming is not up to Henry Ranta’s high standards and the chorus riff is derivative and boring. This band has potential as these songs clearly demonstrate but they cannot simply follow. They must become proactive in their pursuit of originality. While it may be hard to do this in their current genre, many others such as Skyfire, Omnium Gatherum, The Wake and Within Y manage to be able to find interesting and fresh takes on the Swedish sound.

"Awake" opens the album with eye-opening chords and a straight-ahead speed attack. This is a great opener since it promises that the rest of the album will be filled with goodies. This deception is revealed upon subsequent listens. Most of the album sounds good however the guitars are indistinct in several places and the bass is non-existent as per norm. The cymbals have a great crash to them though and that is something that often gets lost in albums like these. While they don’t have Katatonia’s cymbal sound, it still shines through on many occasions. This band can do great things one day if they decide to break the yoke of At the Gates induced bondage.

Killing Songs :
Awake, Angel Dust
Jay quoted 70 / 100
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