GIDEON’s brand of music is one that manages to appeal to a wide scope of metal and hardcore fans whilst maintaining the integrity of the hardcore genre and having a brand that is universally accessible and distinctly GIDEON. “Calloused” is the balance between the more metalcore sounding “Costs” and the sharply hardcore sounding “Milestone” whilst still being all eye-blackeningly brutal every step of the way and introducing a level of aggressive expression previously unvisited by the band. I just wish there was more focus on the message of faith that helped them get to this point.
-When I first started becoming seriously addicted to Christian metal, I scoured the net for anything that I could find. One of the many things I ended up downloading was a sampler from Facedown Records which just happened to contain a track from GIDEON’s first release, Costs. The song was either “Virtue” or “False Profits”. I know I had both of those from samplers at one stage, but what came first, I don’t know. Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that as soon as I had the means, I bought Costs and have never looked back. This album is still high on my list of all time favourites.
Between now and then, GIDEON released their sophomore album, Milestone and now I’m taking the time to review their latest effort with Facedown Records, Calloused. Life is good. I’ll go on record to say that Costs is better than Milestone , but not by much, so how does Calloused compare?
Not too long ago, GIDEON released the first (and title) track from the album on YouTube. The song “Calloused” hinted at what McWhorter and the boys has been up to between tours – which I was fortunate enough to experience when they played in Sydney earlier this year. The song, “Calloused”, carried the expected GIDEON passionate aggression with new elements that added to their already established sound-brand. I really love the guitar whine you first here at the 1:10(ish) mark.
So if you’ve heard the above track, you know how the album starts. It’s straight into the business of being heavy. The pace of album pretty much matches this from end to end, but for the small instrumental track (7), “The Pulse”. The instrumentation of the album relies on the big sounding solid beats and chug-tatsic riffages. The guitars manage to bounce together with synchronised brutality and other times one would be laying down the rhythm whilst the other breaks bones with carefully placed break-downs. The end result to all this is always finding myself bobbing along to the relentless beat. GIDEON have really mastered the timing in a way that allows the music to stay heavy but should also make the material more accessible for new fans.
Vocally, Daniel McWhorter is at the absolute top of his game. Whatever he sings about, there’s a level of vehemence in every syllable. Like his lungs have pushed the meaning of his words through his beating heart before the words explode from his snarling lips into bleeding ears. You can tell he has dug deep for each track and this adds an almost incomparable passion to the album.
The only gripe I have with Calloused is the lyrical theme of the work. As with my commentary on COLOSSUS’s Badlands, I found Calloused to be significantly indirect in any faith-based messages. What I mainly take away when I listen to the album are positive messages of self-ability, but no real direction to God in the sense of His strength being our strengths and His grace being why we’re able to stand firm through life’s trials and opposition. Whilst Calloused seems to have a strong self-focus, it’s not a bad messages to send to kids who are likely struggling through hard times and need a lift, but not really an album that is strong on highlighting the band’s faith.
To illustrate the point above; the song “World of Hurt”, for example, talks passionately about a girl who is struggling with thoughts of suicide even though outwardly she is picture perfect. But that’s it! There’s no solution being offered beyond this in this song. It just puzzled me I guess, especially when previous songs like “Gutcheck” from Costs are so strongly based on working through trials and struggles through our faith and not on our own strengths. Also not really expected when you think about how faith focussed bands from Facedown Records normally are.
Food for thought anyway.
-When I first started becoming seriously addicted to Christian metal, I scoured the net for anything that I could find. One of the many things I ended up downloading was a sampler from Facedown Records which just happened to contain a track from GIDEON’s first release, Costs. The song was either “Virtue” or “False Profits”. I know I had both of those from samplers at one stage, but what came first, I don’t know. Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that as soon as I had the means, I bought Costs and have never looked back. This album is still high on my list of all time favourites.
Between now and then, GIDEON released their sophomore album, Milestone and now I’m taking the time to review their latest effort with Facedown Records, Calloused. Life is good. I’ll go on record to say that Costs is better than Milestone , but not by much, so how does Calloused compare?
Not too long ago, GIDEON released the first (and title) track from the album on YouTube. The song “Calloused” hinted at what McWhorter and the boys has been up to between tours – which I was fortunate enough to experience when they played in Sydney earlier this year. The song, “Calloused”, carried the expected GIDEON passionate aggression with new elements that added to their already established sound-brand. I really love the guitar whine you first here at the 1:10(ish) mark.
So if you’ve heard the above track, you know how the album starts. It’s straight into the business of being heavy. The pace of album pretty much matches this from end to end, but for the small instrumental track (7), “The Pulse”. The instrumentation of the album relies on the big sounding solid beats and chug-tatsic riffages. The guitars manage to bounce together with synchronised brutality and other times one would be laying down the rhythm whilst the other breaks bones with carefully placed break-downs. The end result to all this is always finding myself bobbing along to the relentless beat. GIDEON have really mastered the timing in a way that allows the music to stay heavy but should also make the material more accessible for new fans.
Vocally, Daniel McWhorter is at the absolute top of his game. Whatever he sings about, there’s a level of vehemence in every syllable. Like his lungs have pushed the meaning of his words through his beating heart before the words explode from his snarling lips into bleeding ears. You can tell he has dug deep for each track and this adds an almost incomparable passion to the album.
The only gripe I have with Calloused is the lyrical theme of the work. As with my commentary on COLOSSUS’s Badlands, I found Calloused to be significantly indirect in any faith-based messages. What I mainly take away when I listen to the album are positive messages of self-ability, but no real direction to God in the sense of His strength being our strengths and His grace being why we’re able to stand firm through life’s trials and opposition. Whilst Calloused seems to have a strong self-focus, it’s not a bad messages to send to kids who are likely struggling through hard times and need a lift, but not really an album that is strong on highlighting the band’s faith.
To illustrate the point above; the song “World of Hurt”, for example, talks passionately about a girl who is struggling with thoughts of suicide even though outwardly she is picture perfect. But that’s it! There’s no solution being offered beyond this in this song. It just puzzled me I guess, especially when previous songs like “Gutcheck” from Costs are so strongly based on working through trials and struggles through our faith and not on our own strengths. Also not really expected when you think about how faith focussed bands from Facedown Records normally are.
Food for thought anyway.