Hell or Highwater
Begin Again

Northern Pike, I wonder if they swim in highwater or in hell’s burning waters. From The Neverending story comes the character Atreyu, not known as a pike fisherman but that hasn’t stopped an american metalcore band from taking that name. The singer from that band is the man behind this band called Hell or Highwater and they apparently begin again, with their debut album. How about that? Not the best name for a debut album and while I am on some not the best stuff for a debut album, look at the cover art. So, it doesn’t look good from the outside but the inside is another thing altogether.

It is modern rock, a bit dirty, energetic, quite powerful and solid. It has catchy choruses, and fortunately the singer is not that normal american rock singer who tend to have a horrible voice, this singer is good. So not all american rock is as bad as Nickelback. The album is a fairly varied one and it has fourteen tracks of which three are bonus tracks and one is a remix of a track already passed on the albums original tracks which are eleven. It plays for around fifty two minutes if you count the bonus tracks and a reasonable forty minutes if you don’t. The playing time is sensible, but what about the songs as the production and sound is high class. It is modern yet a bit dirty and uncivilised.

And it is good, maybe not as good as being bitten by a large pike fish but still a very entertaining album to listen to. It is modern and fresh yet solid and dirty rocking stuff. Let me say that it is well recommended for those into punkish and catchy modern heavy rock music. Sure, all is not brilliant as the album could have been more varied and the hits could have been stronger, the cover art could have looked better and why is the title Begin Again when it is a debut? Nevertheless, looking for slight flaws is part of being a critic and to be honest this criticism only applies if you consume rock music for over eight hours a day and hear hundreds of bands a month. If you don’t fit this description then this will be brilliant for you.

There are a few very strong tracks on the album (all are really good but some more worthy of mention than others) like the seventh track Go Alone which is a favourite on the album but I also thing the second track Hail Mary and the fourth track Tragedy are worthy of a mention as well. This leads me to deduce the deduction that it is a great album well worthy of your attention if you like energetic rock music with some attitude. A likeable album this is, that is the only logical conclusion I can draw after giving this album a dozen or so spins.

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