Chronicles of Hate - The Birth of Hate

Chronicles of Hate's The Birth of Hate could be construed to have checked most of the right boxes to jump on the heap of average melodic death metal albums. They are also approximately twenty years too late to their chosen genre's golden years. In truth, the band on their website claim "the intent is to merge the sound of death metal's old school with the groove and violence of most modern metalcore"*. To me, this sounds a lot like melodic death metal. This simple summary could be a more than adequate ultimatum on their debut release too. It's important, however, to not fall victim to the falsehood that just because something has been done before - and done ten thousand times before - it is necessarily worthless to try again. Something can be said regarding the age and maturity of a genre and how refinement in extreme metal, especially in genres such as black metal and death metal, has resulted in exceptionally well-crafted modern takes on genres which are often perceived as being overinflated. Unfortunately, Chronicles of Hate do not do much, if anything at all, to raise themselves above or beyond the status quo. The Birth of Hate proves to be merely a serviceable record for passerby listening.

Initial impressions of The Birth of Hate are positive. The album starts off with a moody intro track before falling headlong into "Devastation... Rise!". The production quality appears on point. The guitar partnership of Riccardo D' Angelo and Roberto Simonetti is tight with a full bodied tone. The album is recorded live, apparently, and this helps the performances feel natural and not mechanical. "The Better Way" follows, and is more aggressive and hard-hitting. Opening with a violent guitar tremolo melody from the left guitar, it is one of the tracks on the album which stands out, in my opinion. During the breakdown sections, it is easy to hear Mirko Pinoli standing out as he pummels accent notes out of his bass and into the mix. "Bet on Tragedy" begins with a slower, heavy, groovy riff that adds some variety to the record even at this early point. The song becomes the catchiest of the album with a streamlined verse which is more melodic than the previous opening tracks. "Bet on Tragedy" for me, is the album highlight. Lyrically, it also is the most commanding, expanding on the concept that world leaders view war as a game, and ignore the value of the human lives that fight and die. The band put together a music video for the song with, what looks like, edited scenes from Call of Duty or some other video game with the lyrics overlaid; for me, I'll do without the video.

"The Better Way" truly brings vocalist Francesco Macchi into the spotlight, where he will stay for the rest of the album. Macchi's vocals are quite searing, especially towards the end of the track, where he is unrestrained and animalistic, holding one vocal syllable for a full eleven seconds. He shifts between a hardcore style of vocals, lower growled death metal vocals, and some higher range screeches and snarls. Macchi makes great use of these different voices to lend passion and emotion to songs which could easily sound tired and expressionless without solid leadership in his thematic role.  It's not that the rest of the band are not acceptable musicians, they just don't stand out the way Macchi makes himself stand out. Part of this is the live production. Solos are performed in-take, being panned left or right (mostly left) with the rest of the rhythm tracks. Instead of sounding like stand-out solos, they come across as simply leads. A lead such as that which closes out "Away From Reality" would sound so much better center panned, with some minor effects added in post, with both rhythm tracks underneath.

 The album begins to slip for me at "The Beast Within." The main riff which the song returns to several times just does me in; it jumps back and forth between two or three notes for what seems forever before finding a place to rest in a been-there heard-it-before filler riff. Then it does this three or four more times throughout the song. It also emphasizes one of the album's biggest flaws, in my opinion. The material has very little dynamic movement. Songs are always all guns blazing, regardless of which speed they are going at. There isn't a single point, for example, where session drummer Antonion Inserillo and Pinoli have moments to themselves, or where either guitarist is singularly highlighted (a five second clean guitar intro to "The Beast Within" doesn't count either). "Hope Kills" starts with a riff which sounds similar to other riffs that are heard in earlier songs... having either of the guitarists perform it on it's own would add some compositional and arrangement variety to the second side of the album. This scar of monodynamism needs to be addressed in future material for Chronicles of Hate to move beyond formative.

Final track, "Away from Reality" was the biggest surprise for me. It's elevated initial melodicism was not as exceptional as that found on something like The Jester Race or Natural Born Chaos, however it did sound like something you'd find on a sub-par track from Clayman. I'd like to see more of this by Chronicles of Hate, if not as intricate. Some carefully chosen locations of heightened melodic movement would help the band craft  melodic death metal which is less stagnant, more memorable, and dynamic as a song like "Bet On Tragedy" proved the band can do well. The album art for this release is tame. It doesn't stand out at all and wouldn't exactly draw my interest if the album sat on racks with other releases, hell even if the CD was a few bucks in a used bin I don't think the artwork would catch my eye. The melodic death metal genre is so stuffed, that a band like Chronicles of Hate need to separate themselves either by doing something original or by writing perfect songs; neither of which they do on The Birth Of Hate, which is, at least, not entirely worthless thanks to the performance of Macchi.

* https://chroniclesofhate.wixsite.com/chroniclesofhate