This album rocks harder than anything I’ve enjoyed lately, local or international.
From humble beginnings on these oceanic islands we are generally proud to call home, comes a rock album so much better than most of the smack you hear on those monthly Metal Hammer compilations, which I’m only sometimes proud to admit, is one of my sources for finding new bands these days.
If there is one band worthy of a write-up in an international serial magazine this month, it is Primacy. And Beastwars, of course, but they were just in Metal Hammer last month.
Now, I don’t make this comparison lightly. To some of you Beastwars is just a word, a band name, but I split my life into the time before I heard that first album and the person I am today.
I sit before you today and say that Primacy’s Failure and Sacrifice is worthy of the same praise, albeit for different reasons. Beastwars introduced me to sludge and doom, where Primacy there’s something for every rock and metal fan, a mesh of those heavy sounds of which rockers have been lamenting the loss and waiting eagerly for the return.
Mixed in with the usual Deftones buzz, there are Machine Head moments, tributes worthy of A Perfect Circle or Tool, a bit of Lamb of God and just a smattering of Alice in Chains. And that is all in the epically monumental track Shadeblack.
In my eyes, or more appropriately ears, Jason McIver will never escape that Deftones vibe I hear whenever he lends his Midas-touch voice to anything musical. That will never be a bad thing, as like McIver, the Deftones continue to go from strength to strength.
Where the Jason McIver Collective is a more folksy, acoustic vehicle for Jason’s voice, Primacy has the power of five sets of influences, each heavier than the last and the ability to consolidate this into a fluid, distinctive sound that is worthy of a place in the annals of this nation’s greatest albums is a testament to how great this band really is.
To the band: Get out there, boys. Make a full length. Show those media gatekeepers what real music is.
Failure and Sacrifice is available from iTunes, Spotify and Google Play, with Wicked Ways and Devils Cut from the Demos album available from the Primacy Bandcamp Page.
Primacy are 5-piece alternative metal band from West Auckland. They incorporate a groove metal base with other elements of hard rock, progressive metal and a twist of blues flavour.
Primacy were formed in 2014 after the split of well know local bands The Blacklight Configuration, Overhaile and Heathen Eyes – the timing was right, the songs were right and the team was right, Primacy came together as a collective around guitarist Adrian Brausch's new and unused material from his former band Overhaile.
Their first EP Failure and Sacrifice was released in 2016, and followed by a mini-EP in 2017 III.