The Warriors – Genuine Sense of Outrage
Victory Records (8/7/07)
Hardcore
For any fans of the genre, The Warriors are offering up pure hardcore bliss. Genuine Sense of Outrage is stripped of the metal influence or death-metal-esque vocals littering today’s so-called “hardcore” landscape. Think Hatebreed circa 1997 (Satisfaction Is the Death of Desire) or Remembering Never (Women and Children Die First). In fact, the only slim deviations from the typical hardcore sound comes in moments on “The Stone Grinds” with the slight melodic surges in guitar or the pseudo-rap on “Mankind Screams” and “Life Grows Cold”. Everything else is blatant and in-your-face hardcore.
This is a turgid album, as the band does a hell of a job packing as much sick hardcore into each song as possible (13 tracks clocking in at just over half an hour). The infectious title track, with the mosh-pit breakdown chant of “this is a genuine sense of outrage†joins the breakneck drumming on “New Sun Rising”, the out-of-leftfield mellower moments on “Silence is Bliss” and crisp, angry vocals that at times seem to channel Billy Graziadei of Biohazard. And unlike some other bands, The Warriors do a great job at varying up the songs and vocals enough to keep the tracks from blending together. Tracks like “Nothing Lasts” or “Odium Vice” are just as strong as opener “The Ruthless Sweep”. To be honest, the first listen of this disc was done without a play list, and I assumed the band was getting ready to wrap up around “New Sun Rising” (the seventh track). Instead, it was only half done.
Everything has a sense of urgency; this album seems to have come out of nowhere and impresses completely. It’ll be hard to ignore come year-end lists. But forget album-of-the-year shortlists. Songs like “Destroying Cenodoxus”, “Nothing Lasts” and “Your Time Is Near” could easily fit on any best-of hardcore collection.
Genuine Sense of Outrage is The Warriors third album (though its first under the Victory label). The group’s sound should appeal to a wide range of music fans—there’s just enough punk and metal influence in there , mixed with just the right amount of groove (there’s also talk of the band touring with DMX). And keep an ear open for a special vocal appearance from none other than Motörhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister (a great performance, too).
In a year already full of notable metal releases, The Warriors shock us all and put out one of the strongest, most powerful hardcore album of the decade. Fans of the genre, or metal in general, will love this album. Everyone else could learn a thing or two…
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