With only three years of existence under their belt, San Diego’s HATETIMESNINE have issued “Shadows”, a twelve song collection of steady metal rockers the way they oughta be played: jammed to the brim with highly impressive dual guitar work coming from Jeff Poremba and Tracy Swider, along with the super charged double-bass drumming of Mikey Pannone, perfect low end rumbling from bassist Shane Monaghan, and passionate, deeply felt vocals from vocalist Travs Neal. The album was produced by Swider himself and immediately showcases the band’s incredibly well honed heavy progressive/thrash sound with the stalwart tracks “In Darkness”, “The Process Hate”, and the epic “Leading The Fare”, which is highlighted by Swider’s incredible lead guitar solo work that easily rivals that of any of hard rock’s best players today. The band mutantly goes from sounding furious and pissed off, along the likes of Pantera and Dry Kill Logic, to the all-out complex compositional structuring of King’s X, Watchtower and Dream Theater, loaded with more odd time signatures and arpeggios than even the most gifted jazz instrumentalists throws at their listeners. There’s something extremely admirable about an act that flies in the face of current musical trends and HATETIMESNINE is proof positive that solid musicianship and carefully crafted songs will always win out in the end over the formulaic, cut-and-dried approach that’s being offered up by just about every other band out there today.
ROCKET REVIEW:
HATETIMESNINE “Shadows” (CD/LP)
(Self-Released/2008)
1. Into Hate
2. The Process hate
3. In Darkness
4. Sin And Purity
5. Convergence
6. Leading The Fear
7. Divine Deception
8. Memories Lost
9. WhiteNoize Lullaby
10. Halo Of The Sun
11. A Shadow Always
12. Sever The Ties
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