Riverside, California’s Create Avoid are about to release their new album, Heart Remains, on Pure Noise Records. With ten tracks totaling up to just under 30 minutes, is this an album that will create new fans for the band, or one you should avoid entirely?

The first two songs on the album, titled “Tyranny” and “Gotham,” are fist-pumping, foot-stomping, slap yo’ momma’ jomma hardcore at its finest – from the quick tribal drum intro that leads you directly into the big breakdowns and bouncy guitars in “Tyranny”, to the ultimate hardcore drumming, bass thumping, old-school “picking up change” style in “Gotham.” Create Avoid’s sound is firmly rooted in hardcore, but bathed in metalcore tendencies and beat-down style. Both tracks employ gang vocals which are a hardcore must, as well as absolutely nasty grooves that add much needed change-ups in the songs. Vocalist Mike Alsaybar does a great job carrying the load for the band. His beastly growls and shouts are mean and well done in all aspects.

“Rat Race” and “The Author” are definite standout tracks that should garner much attention. The meaty guitars and deafening bass are followed by blasting drums and Alsaybar’s disgusting vocals. The band adds some cool melodic overtones throughout both songs that compliments them tremendously. These two tracks alone add some serious metalcore muscle to the album, that’s for sure.

If you’re looking for a more old-school meets nu-school feel, then “Unfamiliar Faces” and “Finding Clarity” are just for you. The ultra hardcore style drumming brings back memories of when Sick Of It All, Madball, and Agnostic Front were regulars in the tape deck; while the thin guitars are fast and loaded with rich melodies that might even get your granny diving off the couch. Now I know that gang vocals are a staple of hardcore bands, but I feel that they are used a little too much throughout the entirety of the disc.

There are a couple of drawbacks to the album as a whole, though; the first of which being that there is little to no deviation from song to song. Casual fans of this style may find that, without any real significant changes from one track to another, the album tends to blend together and feel like a blur. Secondly, it’s really hard to separate this band from the masses of others that carry the same torch that they do, creating that “been there, done that” feeling. Frankly, Create Avoid are a really good band that certainly have a very promising future ahead of them. But, in the words of the avant-garde idiot savant J. Pensinger, “I like it, but I don’t love it.”

3.5/5