DISTURBED - ASYLUM

Disturbed

Asylum

Reprise Records - 2010

http://www.disturbed1.com

Disturbed's 5th studio album kicks things off with a slow mood setting instrumental called "Remnants". In all honesty, I thought it was a waste of time as it did nothing to add to the overall quality of the album.

However, that instrumental leads directly into the album's title track and that is just a balls out fantastic rocker.

The chorus of "The Infection" didn't flow well but otherwise the song was pretty cool. "The Warrior" was decent as well.

The album's lead single release "Another Way To Die" was interesting song. Since I haven't really heard the song before it was surprising to me how slow it started out. Whenever I caught a portion of the track on the radio, it was after it was in the midst of the more aggressive sounding part of the song. The pacing of the opening verse came off as a bit forced to me.

Disturbed's lyrics took a turn for the serious on a few songs. "Never Again" was about the Holocaust. The song was fast paced but amazingly well crafted.

The lyrics for "My Child" dealt with the feelings brought on by the birth of a first child. Since the songwriting credits are listed as the band as a whole, I'm not sure if the lyrics are by singer David Draiman or not. If they aren't, he does a great job of making them his own through his vocal performance.

The song "Innocence" deals with those who would destroy that very thing in the young. It's a hard driving song that I consider one of the best on the disc.

I heard the song "The Animal" via this board's Videos of the Week forum. I hated the video and wasn't crazy about the song either. It just didn't sound like the band for the most part. That opinion didn't change after listening to the song again. I didn't much care for "Crucified" either.

The song "Serpentine" was okay. It started off decently for me but kind of lost its way as the song wound to its conclusion.

On some songs where Draiman changes up his usual vocal sound, the quality of the song felt lacking. However, on "Sacrifice" I really enjoyed the deeper sound he brought to the performance.

It isn't listed on the album's tracklisting, but the disc contains a 13th track. It's a cover of U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For". I wasn't crazy about the over the top metallic guitar solo in the song but otherwise it was okay. It doesn't change my usual opinion that if I wanted to listen to the song I'd listen to the far superior original track but at least it doesn't turn my stomach as some covers tend to do.

While I have a hard time rating this album above the band's other 4 albums, overall I think the band's streak of winningly good to great albums is intact. They are one of the few metal bands I have become a fan of in the last 10-15 years and they have always repaid my fandom with one metallic anthem after another.

GRADE: B PLUS

▶ Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by RJhog (Admin) on December 18, 2010 at 8:16am

I don't think I could give this album a B plus, but it's not awful. I really like their first album, and the second one was pretty good. I thought their previous one was pretty decent too. Because of Draiman's unusual vocal style, many of their songs tend to sound too much alike. Believe it or not, I liked the album's intro. My first thought was that they were changing up their style just a bit, but then the songs kicked in and it sounded pretty much the same again. This album was just featured in NMC a couple of weeks ago and it got a couple of bites.

Good review TR...