We Are Killing Ourselves
The Road of Awareness

A band with a happy name, portuguese band We are Killing Ourselves or as I like to write their name, WAKO. They have released their second album called The Road of Awareness which sounds like a noble title, and possible an album that might bring on a revelation. I wonder which kind though, maybe that albums with boring cover art doesn’t have to be dull? Maybe that bands with unhappy names may make happy music? The talk around the band is that their kind of music is the so-called groove metal which is a fast growing genre indeed and it is ever tougher for a band to make themselves seen and heard in that genre. The look of the album can hardly be contributing to any interest of this band, I think the name is a rather sad story as well but those things are nothing that we here at Hallowed make much fuzz about anyway because it is the music that matters to us.

And it is as has been said by people that it is groove metal which means that it is an extreme kind of metal with a groovy touch of catchiness, and that is something that can be said to be true about WAKO as well. Their music is somewhat slower than most groove metal out there and their vocalist has a bit more of a crow-like quality than most singers in the genre. The album is a bit darker than what the genre is regularly about but there are still the odd melodic guitar line that contrast to the crunchy chugging riffs that dominate the soundscape of WAKO. The production of the album is genre typical, nothing that stand out in general sound quality from the rest of the genre bands. There is something of a variation on the album that has ten tracks of which most are quite long, it plays for almost 55 minutes if you play all ten tracks.

I think this album has certain qualities, when the tempo goes up and a bit more of a melodic side takes precedent it becomes quite good. The overall sound is also quite good and the album is in general good enough to not make you vomit all over your shoes. The songs are quite easily accessible thanks to the clear sound and that makes it easy to take to or reject the music of WAKO. I think that first of all is 55 minutes too much for this kind of album and I also think that this very much comes down to a singer that is frankly very bad. The vocals sort of ruin much of this album, but the slower tempo in some songs is another factor that is detrimental to this album and add to that the sharp competition within the groove metal genre and you come to realise that WAKO doesn’t really have that much to offer with their second album.

It is an album that has both positives and negatives but when the tempo falls it is like being on a paint drying convention, and frankly that is not my idea of a good time. Moreover, it feels as though they do not quite reach the kind of standard one could wish and hope for. Sure WAKO aren’t bad, they are just not good enough to stand out in the fierce competition and that is what makes this rating that I give.

I have no idea what the road of awareness looks like, but I am fairly certain that WAKO hasn’t really found it and shown it to us with their album with that name. There are some good stuff on this album but as a whole it just does not measure up to the standards that have been established within the groove metal genre, it is an album that will just drown in the competition’s offerings.