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Rating: When you talk about fate. Just a year ago, during a Scottish holiday, I bought a series of CDs for just over five pounds at an HMV: they were (apart from something by Neurosis and Mogwai) all emo records, a genre very popular in England and especially in the USA. Although I was quite distant from this genre, I wanted to gain a little knowledge, just to broaden my horizons. During that stay, among many, I bought Funeral For A Friend (great purchase), Silverstein and Underoath (both so-so), Poison The Well (never liked them), and From Autumn To Ashes (also difficult at the time). Last week, I picked up the latter again and put them on headphones: I had to completely change my mind. Maybe it's because over the year I've listened to some hardcore and (alas) even metalcore, or maybe it was the gray Albion nostalgia; the fact is, I liked the album. Clearly, I don't love it, but among the grooves of the CD, I found powerful yet sweet tracks, full of tears of rage and pain, I felt chills experienced with completely different genres.
The album in question, "Too Bad You're Beautiful", starts off at full speed with the raucous screams of "The Royal Crown vs Blue Duchess", which intertwine with melodic vocals in a fast, violent, and hyper-technical framework that gives no respite and leaves you bewildered (unpleasantly, at least as far as I'm concerned). There are so many changes of rhythm, convergences and sound digressions, lacerating attacks, noise in short, making you feel in the grip of a storm, with the only refuge being the beautiful and intimate break three-quarters down the track, which flows into the final part in a scream that is undoubtedly more melodically appreciable.
Hypothetically skipping the song just described and moving on to "Cherry Kiss", the impact is different. There is still a lot of speed and power, the technical riffs are woven over the powerful screams of one of the singers, but the melodic presence is greater, and you can feel it once again in the break, which cuts the song in half and makes it grow in rhythm and emotional intensity. At the end of the track, I felt that maybe the album had the cards to convince me and I continued listening, which reserved a new surprise for me.
"Chloroform Perfume", a beautiful track entirely in clean, is a stunning sentimental climax that goes from an arpeggiated guitar to a peak of truly excellent craftsmanship. Pay attention to the lyrics: obligatorily emo in themes, perhaps somewhat adolescent at times, yet they can still strike and tear you with simple yet so cynical and cruel verses that they seem ripped from the diary of someone who has just been abandoned by the love of their life (a bit like the album's concept). Then there's the notable "Mercury Rising", almost an outro to the former, another resonance chamber for the suffering expressed previously.
Moving to the sixth "Take Her To The Music Store", you are immediately struck by the bittersweet start in pure "soundtrack-song-for-depressed-American-teenager-movie" style. After the first few seconds, however, the rhythm changes brutally, bringing us back to the good emocore heard so far, made up of enveloping and solid, incisive, and pounding guitar lines. Again, the melodic break is noteworthy, a pause between two very different yet effectively continuous parts of the song.
Going through the decent "The Switch", well done especially for the alternations between types of vocals and riffs, you arrive at another strong piece of the album, "Eulogy For An Angel". Although the arrangements may now sound familiar, the track works great, thanks to its beautiful melodic interludes where screams and clean vocals collaborate, creating an excellent balance (you can even hear some growl!!).
The finale is entrusted to the exceptional "Short Stories With Tragic Endings", characterized by the introduction of a violin to make an already late-autumn atmosphere even colder, and a female voice, which joins the two previously described, dueting with both (alternatively) or interpreting entire verses. Certainly the most pathos-laden song, where the tension increases as the minutes pass and the rage imbued with sadness becomes increasingly tangible. The track advances at this pace, reaching the most complete catharsis with the outro entrusted solely to the female voice and a general underlying melancholy now ruling the scene. The track is really well done; it deserves a full listen just to appreciate its complexity and general sharp coldness.
It doesn't matter much if we're talking about emo, it hardly matters to call it a genre for losers and teenagers. "Too Bad You're Beautiful" can pleasantly strike anyone, everyone can find at least one track that will surely win them over. It happened to me, and I invite you as well on this autumn journey into the late-adolescent melancholy of From Autumn To Ashes.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
03 Chloroform Perfume (04:29)
The end result of...so many meetings
At late night diners with no one eating
We sit in corners and we sip burnt coffee
We count the tiles upon the ceiling
Skip this pretense and cut straight to dying
Don't beg me to keep your eyes from cryin'
You...said...so much
Without...ever parting...your lips
It's past three AM and I'm still far from...sleep
And this is a habit that I can't break
And my only company
I'm skippin' stones
And the street lights flicker like this
Match in my hand
The street lights flicker like this
Match in my hand
And the street lights flicker like this
Match in my hand
Beggin' to strike
Beggin' to strike
And I keep repeating, but
This payphone tele is stopped receivin'
Flat out of change now
I'm sure you won't accept the charges
It's all the same cause by the morning, I'll be
Half-way to...Colorado or some place like that
You...said...so much
Without...ever parting...your lips
It's past three AM and I'm still far from...sleep
And this is a habit that I can't break
And my only company
Is skippin' stones down a dark, suburban street
She keeps on asking, "Do you think it hurts
Much to die?"
"Well, it's hurting so much more to stay alive now."
She's gonna find out how much it hurts to die...
She laced her perfume up with death
I feel it in my lungs
So I'll pull in the deepest breath
And drop my head
04 Mercury Rising (00:49)
Every breath that I exhale is a sigh -
every breath that I exhale is a sigh of exhaustion.
[repeating throughout]
How sad - this is what your life has
been reduced to - a single room apartment containing no more than a mattress.
The strings have been removed from the blinds and all the outlets have been
painted over. The television screen is streaked with blood smeared from your
knuckles as you were trying to punch it out but you underestimated its
strength, or maybe you just weren't trying hard enough. Startled by a knock
at the door you rise for the first time in two days to answer, but you can
only greet the visitor with one short statement. Hello my first name is
distance and I really don't care if I never wake up again. Hello my name is
distance and I really don't care if I never wake up again. Hello I really
don't care if I never wake up again. I really don't care if I never wake up
again.
05 Capeside Rock (04:04)
The sound
Of my breath
Flutters past your ear
Tearing down fear
Grasp your heart strings by their frayed ends
To choke down the feeling left inside
The sands of time
Slide down your cheek
In the form of
Liquified dreams
Each one stands for
More than the next
YOU-GIVE-YOUR-SELF
TO-ALL-BUT-YOU
TAKE-ALL-YOU-HAD
AND-GIVE-WHAT'S-LEFT
How could you have been so blind
The shallow waters that you come upon
show you how empty your life truly is
you look into the vast nothingness to see
something that is
not there
You try to discern
Where to go from here
You try to make sense
Of this confusion you have inside
And how you can get there
[This van is on a one way trip we'll rock it straight to hell our crue is motley and our theaters filled with pain]
Across The Creek[Across the creek]
And into your home [your home]
'Cause She don't want you[she don't want you]
Any other way
But by a force unkown
Deep inside you
Your veins tied in knots
Bind your blistering hands
To keep you in this world forsaken
As you leave your wilting sould behind
06 Take Her to the Music Store (05:18)
(you break my heart into a 1000 pieces and you say its because i deserve better?)
Emotionless grey skies
bleed somber dreams of sorrow
Blackened unseen heart
tears a virgins godlike innocence
from its palace
Paint sarcastic smiles upon new wounds
Tears of misery stain scar filled minds
Hatred new like tomorrow flows from bitter memories
Purity now embraced by sinful ideals why
Lifeless tomb rests weary with prowling peering eyes
Silence falls upon deaf ears covered by night
Alone in thought, shaking
Biting tongues of lead at unfit moments
Screaming disbelief with no faith in sight
(and her disgust has no borders, no limits to strive for,
she bends and breaks to rules set by the weak)
She's finally seen she's a beautiful girl with a smile
so grand she could stop all the world
Stolen her skin he sews her mouth shut, nothing to him, her screams just die out
As she cries out her voice dies out
As she cries out her voice dies out
Love once inside her heart, lay in my hands
(so beautiful, she cries, so beautiful)
Was it asked for?
Was it implied?
What could have been done?
Inside her mind dies.
07 The Switch (04:16)
Darkness chokes my emotions
Your breath numbs my soul
Stand with me, by my side
Take my hand and lead the way
Out from the shadows and into the real world
Show me how to live a life owned by regret
My blood runs cold, lifeless in shame
Now is the time, to right the wrong
Inside my veins, poison words lie
Within a mind as guilty as yours
take what is left inside of me
I've no use for it
Stained with thoughts uncaring, open and let me in
(it spun my head when i thought you were talking to me,
i guess i'm just a fool for thinking your thinking of me,
and now, I press my fist to the pillows wishing it was your teeth)
Show your world, deceit
Let me live as you, Need not to feel
Emotions rain down
Drowned by innocence, thoughts escape me
Harsh words spit blindly and open paths of life
Take all that is me, a lifeless somber soul
Curse the day you wake as solace sets in
Darkness chokes my emotions
Your breath numbs my soul
Stand with me, by my side
Take my hand, and lead the way
Out from the shadows and into my world
(My soul is not for you to own)
I will not live life to see your face anymore.
08 Reflections (07:30)
I felt you slip away
Far away from me
Further from me
You seem to drift far away
I caught myself wishing you back, as i fight to catch you
Anger wells inside me
I see me, frowning, in your eyes
(i see the fear in you where noone should ever be,
i find myself striving to catch you from..
this will hurt me less and less everytime until i feel nothing)
I see my reflection and the pain scripted across my face, set in stone
Anger wells inside of me
I see me, frowning in your eyes
Far away from me
Further from me
You seem to drift far away
I caught myself wishing you back as i strive for you
(she said "its not that i dont love you anymore,
but it would be much more accurate to say that i never loved you in the first place)
I put the fear in you where noone should ever be
Nothing to me
Everything to you
Nothing to me
Everything to you.
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Other reviews
By Divodark
Calling it just an album would be offensive—rather, it’s a MASTERPIECE.
If you manage to listen to it properly, you’ll fall in love immediately.
