The EP from Michigan metal band From Blue To Gray will leave you wondering why you haven’t heard of them before now.
From Blue To Gray is a formidable metal band from Mount Pleasant, Michigan who plays with the technical precision of a scalpel and devastation of a nuclear weapon. Think of the music of Unearth, Kreator, Mor Pincipium Est, Forbidden, Decapitated, The Absence and you’ll have a feel for sonic landscape this band inhabits.
The musical and physical magnitude of their live performance is mesmerizing. Their on-stage prowess is matched equally in the studio, something you will discover upon listening to Into The Sun, their EP released in June of 2012. The EP features six songs of relentless and dynamic music. The production quality is high and allows the band to showcase their musical craftsmanship with clarity.
Into The Sun opens with “Augmented,” an instrumental that starts out with an unusual arpeggio sequence that builds into an intricate chord progression. The feeling of this intro is expansive and rolls into the venomous “Terrible Among The Fierce” with its cascading riffs weaving a tumultuous fabric of sound. It is here that you experience the vocal onslaught of Dale Fewless combined with the brilliant playing of Jordan Myers (bass), Dan Graham (drums), Dave Jaber (guitar), and Tim Drexler (guitar).
“Waiting…” expresses the futility we all can feel in life at one time or another. This song exudes the power of metal to transform feelings of helplessness into cathartic screams of resistance. The structure incorporates riffs that bridge into expansive progressions. It creates the feeling of being launched down a runway and then caught just before the crash. The dynamics of coarse and clean vocals work well here.
“Taste of Betrayal” paints a picture that is in one aspect black and in another bright. It constructs a tapestry of melodic death phrasing framed in wide-open power chords laced with grace notes. The contrasts played within this song are a stand-out feature.
“Blur The Lines” juxtaposes many interchanging and heavy riffs with an almost folk metal chorus. Imaging listening to legends unfold by the campfire in the middle of a thunderstorm. The solo is equally schizophrenic in meter and scale.
From Blue to Gray wraps up Into The Sun with “Get Up and Kill,” a great tune to end the album on. It is a tune of epic proportions clocking in at 10:30. The assault is unmerciful and as it twists, cuts, and purifies. The bass bridge does a great job of building tension. The rest of the band jumps in and rises into a hellish fury that falls away briefly and then roars to a climatic finish.
The songwriting and performance From Blue To Gray has captured on Into The Sun is thoroughly impressive. If you enjoy metal music that delivers a wonderful amalgam of heavy riffs, flourishing rhythms, and dynamic vocals, then check these guys out.
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