Artist: Zero Hour
Label: Sensory Records
Release: 2005
The album is an excellent follow-up! It even builds on both of its predecessors. After a short intro comes a violently bombastic, almost-not-quite “thrash riff” explosion, and Fred Marshall’s vocal salvos slot right into it like a glove. Fred is the guy who replaced the otherwise excellent Erik Rosvold in the band. What at first seemed hard to believe, Fred pulled off with ease: he didn’t just fill the gap, he took it up a level. He stepped into Erik’s shoes without any trouble and simply brought even more vocal daring to Zero Hour, which of course made the band even stronger. The riff assault, harmonized vocals and cannon-fire rhythm paint an opening picture that puts the track in the neighborhood of Nevermore. Zero Hour instantly build a heavy atmosphere full of depression and boundless pain! They’re angry, enraged and show no mercy. After a good two minutes, though, the track morphs into a completely different face and confirms, no detours, that we’re dealing with a band from Florida. The atmosphere that opens up in this part and the “licky” bass lines make it clear that Zero Hour are neighbors of Death, the brilliant band led by the prematurely departed “mastermind” Chuck Schuldiner.
Zero Hour are true Floridians from head to toe. They’re wrapped in a depressive shroud! The playing is marked by the impressive genius and the locomotive of the band, guitarist Jasun Troy. The riffs are venomously sharp, Troy is full of outstanding ideas that are stacked together splendidly, and the songs are packed with rhythmic twists, yet completely soaked in chopping riffs. These are shamelessly layered over with fantastic arpeggios, played crystal clear, that hit like a bolt from the blue and crash into a massive wall of “riffs” just when you least expect it. The bass line is all lovely “licks”, fretless bass is in the mix too and takes the lead especially in the calmer parts, while the “licks” themselves lean toward the school of Steve DiGiorgio. Unbelievable, but true! In terms of “feel,” Zero Hour sometimes carry the listener off to Control Denied’s “A Fagile Art Of Exsistence” (1999). Of course, we’re in Florida after all. Which is also why keyboards are totally out of the question!
Fred Marshall’s vocals are excellent. First he channels the phenomenon that is the Nevermore vocalist, then he surprises on Destiny Is Sorrow with a vocal that pulls toward Jacob’s Dream or even Kamelot, while the lines he uses recall James Rivera’s style (Helstar), e.g. on Brain Surgery or in the pre-chorus of Losing Control. Zero Hour wind into semitone lines, and that brings them close to the fury of early Fates Warning, or even “school speed metal” of the Destiny’s End type! The track is drenched in outstanding production! The bass line sounds so alive it’s like someone scraped a coin across the strings, with a great “echo” effect that gives the sound a piercing depth! The instruments are crystal-clear and separate from each other, while at the same time Zero Hour spew real incinerating fire in their frothing liveliness! In all its electrified explosiveness and wrecking-ball tendencies, the band blows past its own rowdy limit in untamed metal grinding on Twice The Pain!!!
That said, Zero Hour are true “progressive metal” with not the tiniest speck of symphonic leaning in common, so, if we draw a clear line, they’d win over “thrash metal” fans way sooner than Dream Theater fans. Speaking of the latter, Jasun Troy in his polish easily reaches Petrucci. The rhythms are broken up and flow like it’s a joke through inventive transitional switches, which are intricately amplified, and their flawless delivery proves the band’s exceptional tightness. The three-minute instrumental Somnecrophobia is a real little school of that perfection, while the title track is, in every superlative, the creative peak of the record. A real mini EP that takes your breath away with complex arrangements, raw attacks, meditative passages and that fantastic tightness I already mentioned. A high-atmosphere album without a single weak spot is wrapped in hopelessness and blackness that dig in right under your skin. This is an album for real headbangers! The real ones, who’ve got enough guts to handle the fire of Florida’s “Bay Area” fury! After three quarters of an hour of listening, Zero Hour convincingly wear you out like an ox at the plow! A fragile mind, trapped in the kingdom of the dark side. A slave to fear, paranoid, wandering lost in the emptiness of the meaning of its own existence. Where’s the point of my existing, why am I here, what do they want from me? Everything’s written for doom anyway. “A Fragile Mind” is a true metal extravaganza! “It’s perfect dark!”
Lineup
Fred Marshall – vocals
Jasun Tipton – guitar
Troy Tipton – bass guitar
Mike Guy – drums
Production
Dino Alden & Zero Hour
Track list
1. Intro (0:06)
2. There For Me (4:37)
3. Destiny Is Sorrow (8:00)
4. Brain Surgery (3:12)
5. Losing Control (3:45)
6. Twice The Pain (4:20)
7. Somnecrophobia (3:09)
8. A Fragile Mind (11:33)
9. Intrinsic (5:23)
Album length: 44:05
