75%
Residual Effect—In a World Where Pain is God (2006)
Details
Recorded at Void Studios, Dublin. Engineered and mixed by Mark Galvin and Residual Effect. Mastered by Marty Robison at Ferox Studios. All tracks written, arranged and performed by Residual Effect.
Band
- Michael Higgins—Vocals
- William Caulfield—Guitars
- Andrew McCallistar—Guitars
- Anthony McKee—Bass
- Antony Weston—Drums
Tracks
- Second face
- Porcelain idol
- Morbid theme
- IV
- Withered
- Stronger again
- Pivotal
Review
Having loved their three track demo I felt a certain degree of anticipation and expectation when I fired up this album.
While I’m not entirely in agreement with the theological statement presented in the album title, _In a world where pain is god_ adequately continues the good work where the three track demo left off.
Unfortunately, I didn’t quite live up to the quality of the songwriting on the demo.
“IV” (track 4) is a nylon-strung guitar solo which takes me back to the classic days of thrash where every respectable heavy band nestled a classical-inspired track somewhere on their album: Exodus did it, Sepultura did it, even Metallica did it on the black album.
“Withered” (track 5) kicks off with a head-splitting guitar riff that saws right through you while remaining guitar, bass and drums piledrives that riff into your head, for good measure.
Flippin’ ‘eck! This should have been the album opener. Don’t hide this stuff in the middle order. This is is gold. Put it on display. Flaunt it! This is the kind of music the demo promised me there would be more of. I’d happily allow you your “Second face” and “Porcelain idol” further down the album. But give me this first.
The same goes for “Stronger again” (track 6) and to a lesser extent “Pivotal” (track 7).
Conclusion
The problem with this album, in my opinion is three fold: the songwriting isn’t quite as good (that’s okay, it happens); the vocals drift a little too often into just outright shouting, which at times feels lazy; and the songs are simply in the wrong order on the album.
But those are pedantic niggles on what is otherwise a very impressive debut album British (and for the real pendants: Northern Irish) album.
Review score: 75%