Album Review
Verse - AgressionVerse - Aggression

Bridge Nine is a record label that I have a lot of time for at the moment, the label have recently signed a lot of big bands with the most recent signing being long time running punk rockers New Found Glory, the labels roaster of bands is pretty exciting and their latest set of releases is even better with albums coming out from New Found Glory and H20 recently and now the new album from Verse are just about to be released.

Verse are a five piece hardcore band from America who have released two albums previously and are just about to unleash their third full length studio album 'Aggression' up on the world. You may be wondering how aggressive an album called 'Aggression' actually is, well if you have heard the bands previous material then you will be pleasantly surprised to learn that 'Aggression' is a lot more mature and a lot more aggressive than the bands earlier stuff.

'Aggression' opens with 'The New Fury' and the song is a monster of a track which starts off with a quiet riff before exploding into pure madness, with guitar riffs coming in thick and fast and frontman Sean Murphy screaming "They've got themselves a new spin on the story, twisted for one-sided glory", the riffs throughout the whole song are huge sounding and the overall song has so much power, energy and passion.

The songs throughout the album are all short and sweet with the majority of the 12 tracks running for just over 1 or 2 minutes, this is where Verse are a lot different from your average hardcore band, most hardcore bands have songs that run for a long time and everything sounds the same throughout and you either love or hate the vocals, but with Verse the songs are so short but have so much going on that you never get bored, and frontman Sean Murphy’s vocals are quite shouty and angry but at the same time you can clearly hear his lyrics, unlike with most hardcore bands.

'Old Guards, New Methods' is a fast and furious track from the beginning, the guitar riffs are thick and plenty, the drumming is a full on assault of the drum kit which surely must be battered by the end of this 2 minutes and 31 seconds of pure hecticness. Sean Murphy’s vocals are fast and aggressive and fit in well with the bands angry music.

'Signals' is a great song, it only runs for 1 minute and 22 seconds but Sean Murphy gets more lyrics across in that time than your average band would get across in a 5 minute song, this is pure brutal music at its best. As soon as 'Signals' finishes the band go straight into 'Scream' a song that follows on nicely and to start with sounds like the same song until musically it chills down a bit before becoming heavy again which then fades to a more chilled out soundscape outro.

The main highlight on the album is 'Story Of A Free Man' the track is split into 3 parts 'The end Of Innocence', 'The Cold Return' and 'Serenity', and tells a story about a man who has been sent to war, the 3 parts are quite different from each other but are full of pure aggression and works really well with frontman Sean Murphy screaming "I'm walking away from this" over and over again during the final chapter of the story.

One of the main highlights on the album is 'Blind Salvation', the song comes straight after the epic 3 part song 'Story Of A Free Man' and is such a short aggressive song that runs for less than a minute but shows perfectly how music in the hardcore scene should be executed.

Overall 'Aggression' is the album of Verse's career so far and is also a very important album for the hardcore scene, an album that should help the scene change for the better, Verse are totally worth checking out so do yourself a favour and get down to your local record shop and pick up a copy of 'Aggression', and take time to read the lyrics as Verse are so talented when it comes to writing lyrics.

3.5/5

Review by Trigger
 Band Members

Zak drummond
Sean Murphy
Eric Lepine
Shawn costa
Christopher Berg
 Track Listing
1. Mesopotamia
2. Animal
3. Lie
4. Coward
5. Cruel Melody
6. The Mark
7. I Have A Need
8. 4 Walls
9. Stop A Bullet
10. One Of Yours
11. New Hunger
12. I Am Where It Takes Me
13. Iodine Sky
14. Kill The Queen (Bonus Track)
15. Fall Below (Bonus Track)
16. Mesopotamia (Remix) (Bonus Track)
17. Lie (Remix) (Bonus Track)
 Band Related Links
Verse Myspace
Verse Official Site
 Review Score Code
- Top Cheese
- Brilliant
- Pretty damn good
- Ok I guess
- What Was That?