No Quarter Given’s debut album The Embodiment Begins fits
firmly into the heavy metal camp, although the band describe
themselves as having a blend of thrash and hardcore
incorporated into their music. Every band at the moment seems to want to
incorporate an instrumental
opening to albums, and No Quarter Given are no different,
as title track ‘The Embodiment Begins’ kicks things with a minute of slow melodic
guitar before the onslaught that is ‘Program Divinity’
hits. This has the band grabbing you by the throat with the
fast pummelling drums and vocalist Hawk’s growls, which, for
a lot of the time, are reminiscent of Lamb Of God’s Randy
Blythe.
The album stays more or less along the same lines throughout,
‘Dystopia’ and ‘The Sedition’ do have some noticeable
breakdowns and the band throw in some great The Haunted
style riffs on ‘Rusted Knives’, and some In Flames
influenced guitar at the start of ‘Ascenion Level’. However
they don't vary their sound too much from what has come
before. In fact the album is consistent, there are no peaks
or troughs, every song is as good as the last, this does
however mean that there are no songs that manage to really
grab your attention.
Although the band slot in some great guitar solos on many of
the songs, some of the guitar work does sound that bit
overpowered by the in your face drumming and there's that
nagging feeling that you have heard most
of it many times before. That said, The Embodiment Begins
is a solid debut effort that will, without doubt, win No
Quarter Given some new fans and set things up nicely for the
Cornish band.
Darren Brushneen