Misery-Fifteen years of aggression

Self-produced
2008



Misery hail from Long Island, New York and were formed in the early 90's and is now stronger than ever in the year 2009. The album was produced by Life Of Agony guitarist Joey Z. After looking at the cover at the band name my immediate hope was "please don't let this be as typical as I fear it will be". Unfortunately my hopes didn't deter the inevitable. Misery play a loud, but thoroughly limited style of metal with a few hardcore splashes. I hear some Pantera, BLS, Biohazard and Pro-pain only far more basic than any of those bands which should tell you something of their lack of originality. The first thing that struck me upon sliding this disc in my stereo was that it's very loud. That's more volume than heaviness as a few minutes reveals this band to be more bark than bite. Vocalist John Lo Casto gives a good effort and he a strong set of pipes, but he just doesn't have enough back-up or strong enough material to be totally convincing. Still the vocals are the strongest part of Misery. The guitars are by the book and simple with limited variation and a distinct lack of emotion. The drums took me back to ninth grade typing class because they just sounded a mess of thin clicking that relies very little on rhythm. They try to convey a heavy handed attempt at a powerful mid-90's style of metal, but they just can't pull it off. Something tells me these guys might sound better live with some room to move around in and an audience to feed off of. That still doesn't alter the fact that Misery try to sound like they are fire and they come across like a few scattered sparks and a lot of smoke. You have undoubtedly heard this kind of fist pumping material done by more talented bands.



www.myspace.com/miseryny