Thrash Meta(l)
Describing a band as competent is always a little disheartening like I'm reviewing a dentist or a plumber. You need those people to be competent; to get the job done properly but bands should be exciting - they're always forgiven for ramshackle production or dodgy artwork if there are enough hair-raising moments – a face melting solo here and brick shithouse riff there. Re-thrash or whatever you want to call it rarely provides those thrills given the artistic cul-de-sac it represents. You have heard this done before the exciting way not the merely competent way.
Residents of that cul-de-sac, Trainwreck Architect, pound out ten tracks of studious crossover on their first full-length record Traits of the Sick. Starting with an acoustic guitar and melody driven intro - Comatose Era - before dropping into the fastlane on The Culprit which squeals and chugs along while singer Simon Ouellet, erm squeals and spits out his non-conformist mantra. There are a couple of nice gear changes in the song and brevity is certainly their friend.
Die Like A Legend finds the band employing some Anthrax style compact crunch as the vocals waver a little. Gang vocals bolster the shrieking on The Door Slams Shut but it's a forgettable rant of a song. Rabid Psychotic Relapse sees the band take a different approach and quite bizarrely this song is an Alice in Chains pastiche from the drug theme to Ouellet's aping of Layne Staley's out of it drawl down to the grungey riffs. Risible. As Killers Breathe fares a little better as guitarists Raza Ali Khan and Renaud Baril locate the metal - duelling and weaving guitar lines in the search of the epic as does the angry, groove infected effort The Narcissist and rabid closer Feed Them Bullets with its harsher vocal style.
So, there's nothing original about Trainwreck Architect on Traits of the Sick as they wring the last drops of blood out of the battered thrash corpse. That said, they can obviously play and consistently pack their arrangements with variety over the ten tracks. I suppose you would tap your toe and smile as you spot influences at a live show but you might also conclude, as BB King once did, that "the thrill is gone".