I hate to be the bearer of bad news but after giving a in depth listen into This City Needs a Hero’s new full length, Wasteland I can’t say there is anything particularly special about it. The record has its moments musically but much of the album sounds the same. The trend of the record seems to be clean vocals to rough scratchy vocals and an unnecessary synth being played over a breakdown. In fact the synth may be my biggest complaint with the whole record. It comes up in parts that by no means need any help from an electronic sound.
Another problem I have with the record is that it covers a couple of different genres that shouldn’t be placed together. When Linkin Park became irrelevant I thought that nu-metal had finally died out for good, however This City Needs a Hero have managed to bring back a dead genre that didn’t need to be resuscitated.
As far as guitar riffs go, it isn’t a bad record. Not to say they’re inspirational genre defining works on the guitar but it is definitely the highlight of the album. The bad thing about the guitar work is the placement of them within the music. For example the last song, Vindication goes from a break down to an acoustic guitar part that to be quite honest doesn’t sound like it was mixed that well.
Really it’s not a wonderful record; it has some cool riffs but was definitely made for those who are more into rap rock and nu-metal. I however was not entirely impressed with the record. However I encourage you to not listen to me and make your own decision. You can listen to a few of the tracks off of Wasteland at www.myspace.com/thiscityneedsahero.
