Our Last Enemy

Fallen Empires

Riot! Entertainment/Warner Music

Release date: out now

Review by Craig McGuinness

OUR LAST ENEMY is a young Industrial Metal band from Sydney, known locally for their recent high profile supports of STATIC- X and HANZEL UND GRETYL. Fallen Empires is their debut album. Take note because these guys mean to impress and that they do.

Interestingly, OUR LAST ENEMY travelled to the US and engaged Christian Olde Wolbers to produce Fallen Empires. Famous for his involvement with FEAR FACTORY and GOD FORBID (among others) his enlistment was a savvy choice for an aspirant Industrial Metal band. Olde Wolbers’ presence adds a professionalism and sheen that really benefits the album. On a purely technical level, Fallen Empires is a highly polished extremely proficient debut. It's impressive to encounter a new Australian band achieving an undeniably world standard level of quality straight off the bat; in a locally sparse genre to boot.  Quite an accomplishment.

As an Industrial Metal band OUR LAST ENEMY steer more towards the Metal than the Industrial. In so doing their approach favours FEAR FACTORY rather than, say, MINISTRY. Furthermore it's a very American type of Metal that's in evidence. Mosh-pit friendly, it's a bit Metal Core, a bit modern Death Metal, without totally embracing the conventions of either. As far as the Industrial content, it takes a very secondary role. Pretty much relegated to keyboard accompaniments', the odd atmospheric aside and some minor peculiarities in the song structures. The lyrics aren't particularly Industrial either.

Despite being such a polished and professional album, Fallen Empires is still OUR LAST ENEMY's first and as such it's not as perfect as it seems. The most obvious and primary flaw is the song writing. On a record of this quality, debut or not, one expects (for want of a better term) a 'hit single' as such and frankly there isn't one to be found. Without that memorable defining song, this album probably won't be the breakthrough the band was aiming for. This is where their inexperience shows, yet it's not something that won't improve with practice and can't be rectified with subsequent releases. The heavier songs such as 10,000 Headless Horses and Carrion seem to hit the mark most accurately while the comparatively slower songs fail to retain interest and seem (whether they were or not) to have been the product of extended jams rather than deliberate song writing.

There's a peculiar carnivalesque quality to proceedings at times. For example, Ants in the Palm, that while having potential, doesn't really seem to be convincing at this stage. A very minor criticism is the MARILYN MANSON influence (a personal hate) detectable in the slower 'spoken word' passages that mar an otherwise excellent vocal performance. In general the songs, unencumbered by any stand out tracks, tread a middle ground - without the Metal ferocity of say STRAPPING YOUNG LAD or the Industrial intensity of ANAAL NATHRAKH. Not to say OUR LAST ENEMY isn’t good, just that they've a little way to go yet in establishing a unique identity.

So is Fallen Empires a good investment? Certainly. When OUR LAST ENEMY get their Metal groove on things really rock. Besides that, this band has big things ahead of them and it's a cool thing to get on board early and follow a band's progression. Mark my words; it'll be a great ride.

Our Last Enemy

http://www.myspace.com/ourlastenemy

Riot! Entertainment

http://www.riotact.com.au