Trivium

Vinyl Records and Rare LPs:

Ember To Inferno
New Import - 5BAMLP001
Sealed, Latest Press Of The 2016 Gatefold Reissue. Which Was First Time Their Debut Was Ever Available On Vinyl. "In The Alternative Metal Field, There Are Plenty Of Bands Offering A Heaven/Hell And Melody/Brutality Sort Of Contrast -- Bands That Include, Among Many Others, Hopesfall, From Autumn To Ashes, And The Postman Syndrome. One Minute, They're Being Brutally Ferocious; The Next Minute, They Lighten The Load And Become More Melodic. And That Is Exactly The Type Of Approach That Trivium Favors On Ember To Inferno. Throughout This Cd, The Florida Trio's 2003 Lineup -- Matt Heafy On Lead Vocals And Guitar, Brent Young On Bass, And Travis Smith On Drums -- Fluctuates Between Metalcore Ferocity And Something More Forgiving. Typically, A Trivium Song Will Go From Metalcore Harshness -- Suffocating Density, Sledgehammer Cruelty, Screaming Vocals -- To A More Melodic Style Of Power Metal/fantasy Metal. It's As Though You're Getting Brick Bath One Minute, And Iron Maiden Or Queensrÿche The Next; There's Enough Of The Hardcore Element To Make The Disc Relevant To 21st Century Alt-Metal, Which Prevents Trivium From Sounding Retro, But There's Enough Power Metal To Give The Listener Some Breathing Room. In Other Words, Trivium Fluctuates Between Using A Nasty, Flesh-tearing Bullwhip On Their Listeners, And Employing A Soft, Leather Flogger That Has A Milder Sort Of Sting. It's An Appealing Approach -- At Least If You Hold Metal Core And Power Metal/Fantasy Metal In Equally High Regard -- But Not A Unique One. Again, Many Other Alt-metal And Metalcore Bands Were Doing This Type Of Thing When Ember To Inferno Was Recorded In 2003; Some Did It Better, And Some Not As Well. After A Few Tracks, Ember To Inferno Begins To Sound Predictable And Formulaic; You Know That The Hammer-To-The-Skull Assault Will Inevitably Follow A Melodic Passage, And Vice-versa. Nonetheless, Headbangers Will Find Ember To Inferno To Be A Likable And Competent, If Less Than Distinctive, Example Of Alt-metal's Good Cop/Bad Cop Juxtaposition." AMG Review By Alex Henderson. more

Shogun
New - LP - RR7985-3
Sealed 2023 gatefold original pressed on translucent red vinyl. Custom hype sticker on shrink. "Trivium never asked to be described as "the next Metallica" by a hyperbolic British magazine or two, but because they tried to make the best of the opportunity instead of wilting away with apologetic shouts of "We're not worthy!," they've taken a hell of a lot of guff from radical heavy metal fans, already stirred up over the group's signing to the closest approximation to corporatism in their world: Roadrunner Records (who actually dare work with non-metal bands -- curse them!). Admittedly, the youthful Floridian quartet (whose confidence has been frequently misconstrued as arrogance) didn't help matters when the band followed its impressive sophomore album, Ascendancy, with an undisguised bid for wider commercial appeal via its inconsistent third album, The Crusade. Thus came something of a backlash even among their supporters, bringing, in turn, the stylistic retreat toward more uncompromising metallic terrain embodied by the group's fourth album, Shogun. On this outing, Trivium elevate their new millennium thrash to -- by their standards -- largely unprecedented heights of intensity and complexity, stacking riff upon riff (really good ones, too) into densely structured highlights such as "Down from the Sky," "Throes of Perdition," and the especially devastating "Kirisute Gomen" (which supposedly means "Pardon me while I cut off your head off" in Japanese). Corey Beaulieu and Matt Heafy's shred-intensive guitar solos also pepper every track, flying every which way like vengeful hornets, and the latter's always varied vocalizing once again prizes Hetfield-ian growls and guttural screams over more sparsely distributed (and therefore more impactful) melodic singing. Certain cuts may feel like they're jammed with a few too many different hard/soft/harder personalities for some listeners' tastes (e.g. "Torn Between Scylla and Charybdis," "Into the Mouth of Hell We March"), but most headbangers are bound to appreciate these very contradictions, which the band extrapolates to a monumental climax on the multifaceted 11-plus-minute album-closing title track. As for the lyrics: if these song titles didn't make it obvious already, Heafy's penchant for untowardly bookish vocabulary and obscure mythological references remains intact (see also "Of Prometheus and the Crucifix" and "Like Callisto to a Star in Heaven"), and will probably delight as many metalheads as it irritates, but at least he's no longer forcing unrelated words together as though he were simply reading the dictionary every night (which certainly seemed to be the case on The Crusade's confusing "Entrance of the Conflagration," for example). And yes, Trivium still show no qualms or remorse about emulating both the sounds and epic scope of vintage Metallica, but what's so wrong with that? After all, Metallica tried to do the same thing on their own 2008 return to form, Death Magnetic. In short: Shogun is easily Trivium's most challenging and ambitious album yet, and even though it isn't likely to spawn any hit singles, it was clearly the album Trivium had to make in order to get unduly prejudiced metalheads off their backs and finally silence undue suspicions over their abundant talent and devotion to heavy metal." All Music Guide - Eduardo Rivadavia more