September 9, 2003 • Abacus Recordings
Anything tagged as "avant-garde metal" really should just be a warning sign to me at this point. Maybe it's just that I've never really been a fan of this sort of music in the first place; still, there's almost nothing about Wonderland that really appeals to me.
The album is basically a textbook example of avant-garde metal—heavy and angular mathcore-esque guitar lines, some unconventional instrumentation (music boxes and xylophones and things like that), and a mix of screams and dramatic singing. It's high on technicality for sure; the music is all over the place with dissonant melodies and odd time signatures, and the song structures are equally abstract.
What I hate about this album is that it's so thoroughly balanced between bad and good. There are some really awesome sections, like parts of the ending of "Love Through Tapeworm Hooks", but it's all sandwiched by this bizarreness that doesn't fit together at all. A lot of it feels like it was just being weird for the sake of being weird. Listening to it is like going through a buffet where every other pan is full of garbage (and that's not the kind of buffet you go back to).
Personally, I blame the vocals; I don't know how many people do vocals, but the lower-pitched screaming parts are just horrid. The guy has no idea how to control pitch and it sounds comical (in a very bad way). Without him, it might have been a passable album, but it ruins the music so much that it's barely worth trying in the first place.
It's definitely the sort of thing I would have enjoyed perhaps back when I was in high school and anything weird like this would pique my interest. Today, though, it just sounds kind of... well, stupid. If you don't mind some atrocious singing and screaming, try it out, but I'd stay away.
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