Well, the old adage goes “if you want something done right, do it yourself”. It’s a shame that no one expanded on this and added: “It’s at least ten times better when you do it with heavy riffs”.

Arrays is a one man effort with the emphasis being placed on recording on a budget. No flashy studio wizardry here, just good old Kiwi number eight wire mentality and hard graft using a simple home studio set up. From experience, I know that this can be a perilous task and can quickly evolve into sleepless nights adjusting compressors and searching for the perfect delay. Without vision and focus, you will start to resemble Tom Hanks marooned on a deserted island.

Getting straight into it with the lead track Centre of the Earth, I can tell that time has been spent in the right areas and great song writing has been married with a focused production effort. The guitar layers are sounding large and spacious, the rhythms are locking in and the vocals are present and clear with the right amount of weight and treatment.

I have heard worse “professional” recordings, I like the edge that these tracks have and the rawness that they possess. It’s refreshing to hear something that hasn’t had the life polished out of it.

My personal favourite track on the Motives EP is track 2 Grindstone, It’s a sinister sounding track with an addicting groove. The interplay between the guitar rhythm and the vocals in the verse attracts interest and is a nice point of difference. It’s a well arranged track where each section of the song is adding something different and the song contains a powerfully simple message.

All five tracks are good and the EP flows nicely from one track to the next, the vocal melodies are catchy are getting embedded in my mind after my third listen through. It is a solid effort, well tracked, mixed and mastered and sounds huge considering the relatively low cost set up.  

Good song writing aside - Arrays' strength is that it resides within a genre where you can get away with programmed drums and amp simulation as it is commonplace and still lends itself to the mix, in comparison, a country rock band is screwed if they want to sound epic on a budget...    

Within reason, I have always felt that production is subjective and we have become far too conditioned to a “polished” product. The devil really is in the detail and when it comes to good music, heart and soul always trumps splashing the cash.

 

_{Review by Jessie James.}

Tweet  

Fallstate - Single Review: Epilogue
03 Oct 2017 // by rebelsoundradio
Let’s address the elephant in the room straight away. It’s proclaimed on a daily basis that New Zealand has no new “decent” rock music.
Read More...

Medusa Glare - Single Review: Take the Fall
06 Jan 2017 // by rebelsoundradio
Take the Fall is the third single from Hamilton Rocker's Medusa Glare and it takes me straight to a riff soaked, crunchy, grooving happy place. It’s a slice of pure classic rock sprinkled with funk and lashings of (dare I say it) soul.
Read More...

Coridian - Single Review: Blind Faith
07 Nov 2016 // by rebelsoundradio
Coridian are a high energy, solid original act from Auckland that blend together a vast array of modern rock. Having played with them several times previously it was a pleasure to be able to sit down and work my way through this review of their latest offering – Blind Faith.
Read More...

Tempist Fujit - EP Review: No More Time
24 May 2016 // by rebelsoundradio
Despite the problematic division of labour, word on the street is that two pieces are a thing again. If this trend continues I foresee the next big thing being a union to represent the great masses of displaced musicians roaming the wilderness like a pack of bloodthirsty hyenas.
Read More...