Exit Wounds
Return Fire
Faultline


Melbourne - one of the best grind and metal scenes in Aussie-land, helping to produce such terrorising bands as The Day Everything Became Nothing, The Berzerker and Destroyer 666. Are Exit Wounds the next big name in Australian metal history? Not quite.

Exit Wounds play metalcore...Oh don't get me wrong, they are decent at what they play, but I can step out of my front door right now and expect to see at least two kids with dyed black hair, gauged ears and jeans, wearing black t-shirts that advertise bands featuring guys with dyed black hair, gauged ears and jeans, who play the same garden variety metalcore as Exit Wounds.

But let's face it - you've already read a thousand reviews trashing metalcore and its legions of sub-music-sub-fashion fans. I'm not going to trash metalcore and I'm not going to be unfair to Exit Wounds: I know there are great metalcore bands out there like Converge, The Locust, The Dillinger Escape Plan and those who stayed true to the essential definition of the genre - a fusion of hardcore and metal. These are the bands that are doing something different, doing something innovative and, while I may not be completely taken by them and what they do, I do respect them for being leaders of modern metalcore, pushing it to its limits.

Exit Wounds don't do these things, which is sad because while their hearts really are in it, the music is cookie-cutter, the production is cookie-cutter and the theme is boring and long since tired out. There is nothing outstanding about Exit Wounds and, if lined up against any other of the thousands of bands they are succeeding in emulating, hoping for anything distinct is a lost cause.

However this is all well and perfect if you are a die hard 'fan' of this style of generic-core, as you really won't be let down. But for everyone else who is essentially a fan of music and progression, who doesn't want to hear one-dimensional sound in a multi dimensional world, avoid at all costs. This is being fair.

Myles Merritt