Just a quick review for a nice, short EP as I plough through a ridiculous pile of annoyingly good releases! I picked on Arizona’s The Hunter, The Gatherer partly as it’s a debut release and one of the main focuses of this page has always been new and up-coming bands.
Arizona are a five-piece from Essex who blast out post-hardcore and, on the strength of this release, blast it with the best of them.
There are only four tracks on here, but as with any good EP, there’s enough to get a good feel for the band. Arizona manage to fit a bit of groove into their sound rather than just bashing you over the head with angry, spat-out lyrics and the bass line really twangs away, holding the rhythm together.
From the opening moments of “Black Hart”, I was gripped. This is a song that would really get a gig crowd going with the kind of tempo ideal for raising fists and banging heads. “The Hunted” is slower and heavier. “The Gathering” introduces a melodic edge to proceedings (but it’s fooling you – this song crushes as much as any of the other three). “The Preacher” really lulls you in gently at the beginning before hitting you with something which manages to blend together the overall styles of all three previous songs. It’s also an “old” track, which means that it has a video – which I’ve included below.
Production quality is high, thanks in part to the efforts of Empress AD’s Alex Loring.
The Hunter, The Gatherer is being self-released by the band on October 20th.
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