UNEARTH - "WATCHERS OF RULE" ("Halves stand divided fall... The storms come... The Watchers rule.")

UNEARTH - "WATCHERS OF RULE"
("CENTURY MEDIA RECORDS"; CD)
(Running time: 11 songs in 35:06 minutes.)
(Note: I have the regular CD release version of this album, I think that there's also a limited edition in a digi-book style artwork and also with some extra stuff released, hm, and I could imagine that also a LP release of this album should be out or maybe coming soon - anyhow, so you know now that this very review of mine is "just" on the regular album CD release version.)

Review: Here it is, the brandnew UNEARTH album "WATCHERS OF RULE", released (at least over here in Germany) pretty recently, so it's clear to say that this is through and through really a brandnew release. Okay, anyway, back to the topic or better: straight and right into the action, so here we go. The last UNEARTH album that I was back then really into was their breakthrough album and so far masterpiece "THE ONCOMING STORM" back then somewhat like a decade ago or so, after this - as great as this album clearly was (and still is) - I lost them out of my focus and the band became pretty uninteresting to me over all the years since then. Nowadays in 2014 I don't know if it's me who developed or changed (at least my taste) or if it is UNEARTH as a band that developed (and maybe changed as well) but anyhow, pfff, who cares, it's not important after all because what's important is simply the fact that they are back, and how they are back, hell yeahr, with "WATCHERS OF RULE" they put themselves back on the map and this better and stronger than before - and I mean better and stronger than ever before, yes, ever. This album simply is incredible, it demonstrates how damn fucking unbelievable GREAT Metalcore and/or Deathcore really (even still today) can be - if it is just done by skilled musicians with a lot of own, fresh, and just fascinating and grapping ideas that deliver one hell of a totally outstanding songwriting and take it all to the extreme but still keep playing real songs, songs that are like treasure-boxes, full of golden shining treasures and gems and surprises if you are willing to invest a little bit of time to work yourself through the lock and into the treausre-box. "WATCHERS OF RULE" is from start to finish demanding and challenging, it's a proggy high skilled interlaced extreme trip filled with tricky rhythm architectures, full of weird (in every positive sense of that term/word) twists and turns in the arrangements of the compositions, mercyless lightning-fast changes of/in the pace of the songs, eruptive dissonances that melt together in greatest sweet-flowing harmonies, and filled with phenomenal energy and dynamics non stopp and not one song sounds familiar like another, surely you get that this is all just one band, UNEARTH, but every song as a single piece of art of its very own shines bright as a lighted star - and together they create a sheer phenomenal cope of bright shining beautiful yet sheer massive and stunning bright shining stars, and they do it in a totally unique way and on such a high skilled level like only very few other bands can or could do so. They deliver non stop a very creative and just fantastic and brilliant guitar work full of totally furious and mad raging heavy and brutal, harsh and aggressive riffs as well as totally symphonic leads and really singing stand-alone solos, mercyless lead singing somewhere between harsh shoutings, guttural grunts and screams with some clean sung passages and some spoken word parts and all totally to the point and always in the way of a absolutely top delivery with tons of charisma in it, and the rhythm section is "just" a perfect working diverse raging massive machinery totally on the top of the game, and they melt all this together in the forms of eleven very different but all outstanding multi-layered, emotional, grapping, exciting, atmospheric, fresh, and challenging as well as demanding and anyhow incredible thrilling monsters of songs that other bands would kill or die for to do just one of them once in a lifetime. Also from my point of view UNEARTH stand pretty much alone and stick out of the Metalcore and Deathcore (and Modern Metal and Technical - Death - Metal) crowd, maybe sort of the very often and too often copied but never reached original in between the countless legions of more or less cheap imitations. A phenomenal beast of a band and album, stunning, shocking, breath-taking... fascinating! On top of it we get also very, very strong, thoughtful and passionate lyrics, a gorgeous artwork (this artwork alone would deserve a vinyl release, not to talk about the music... again), and a widescreen bombing-through all out assault production sound, and this makes it all to the complete package - and this fucking rules. With "WATCHERS OF RULE" UNEARTH delivered one of the biggest surprises and also one of the very best albums of this also music-wise anyhow very, very strong year of 2014 and I will now close this review with highly, highly recommending this very album to you, it's a statement of its own, and it's a totally stand-alone album, shining bright high up in the sky above the rest so go and get it!!! /// Andy

(Rating: 10 of 10 points)

(Band site: https://www.facebook.com/unearthofficial?fref=ts - Copy the link into headline of a new browser-tab and then just go there.)