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Rise Of Caligula - Libretto Featured

Monday, 16 June 2008

Editor's rating

7.5

out of 10

Reviewed by:
Chad Coup
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Monday, 16 June 2008
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Music Information

Track Listing:
01. Trust Fund Nihilist
02. February Spent In Cars
03. Stillborn
04. Polar
05. In The Temple Of Thieves
06. Midmorning Disintegration
07. 3/12/06

Artist: Rise Of Caligula
Title: Libretto
Genre: Hardcore
Release Date: 24 June 2008
Record Label: 187 Records
Format: Full-length
Country: United States of America
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Editor review

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful


Overall rating (weighted)		7.5
Musicianship		8.0
Composition		7.0
Experimentation		7.0
Production		8.0
Value		8.0

This is a very pleasant surprise. This CA-based hardcore act plays hardcore and thrash-influenced metal, but it also remains pretty technical and interesting without making those aspects too obvious. Rise Of Caligula's brief, but accomplished, album is one that fans of hardcore, tech, and post rock will get into. It's an apocalyptic-sounding album, but it never gets ahead of itself.

Even though the record is only 20 minutes long, the content is sufficient enough to satisfy and invite listeners back for a few more rounds. The band balances the slow, brooding parts -- which work beautifully -- with the intense, technical shredding parts. The best track is the first one, and it perfectly advertises what to expect in the rest of the album. It starts off unbelievably chaotic and distorted before turning into a slow, atmospheric dirge before picking up with the same level of intensity the song started off with. "Polar," the middle track, is an instrumental sludge experiment that works in perfect counterpoint to the intense follow-up track "In The Temple Of Thieves." "Midmorning Disintegration" has a great riff in the middle that throws back the sound to earlier metal and hardcore bands. The album closer is a beautiful instrumental acoustic melody that closes the album out in a different way than it began.

I'm a fan of the production here. The album art complements the sound perfectly, and the colors have a nice contrast with the graphic layout. The music sounds pretty great for such an indie effort. The drums sound amazing. I love how airy and natural they sound. The cymbals are a little too sizzley for my taste, but they are at least present. Guitar tones have a suitably thick and harsh sound, and the vocals are well-balanced and forceful.

For such a young band, Rise Of Caligula has a pretty good way of making metal. This works in the band's favor; they can grow infinitely because they didn't go too far over the cliff with all of their influences. As I have said in the past, this doesn't feel like a compromise at all. In fact, Rise Of Caligula can probably make four albums of exclusively tech, grind, hardcore, and post rock and get away with it. I wouldn't really want them to. They do well enough on their own and I would like them to expand on their energetic debut with some more cool ideas. If you tire of breakdowns in your hardcore, or excessive scale runs in your tech, get this record.

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