SW1TCH are what you could call collectors as they take the best of what's out there and roll it all up into their own expressive fireball of heavy modern metal. The groups influences shine through clearly on this demo, with explosive guitar driven crunches similar to something like Slipknot would dream up and verbal wails that can take on sounds that range from anywhere between Korn's Jonathan Davis and Layne Staley of Alice In Chains, there's definitely been some time spent on their craft as the abundance of talent here shows.
Vocally there's a wide array of tones and styles used, including passionately charged emotional choruses, fearful whispers, crushing screams, soulful croons and that's just for starters. Precise and skilled with a sweeping range, its hard to not be mesmerized by the words as they wind out with a weathered bitterness or a skull crushing verbal explosion. Guitars are chunky and downtuned with rich distortion, slicing out energetic riffs from a modern metal standpoint and contrasting them with vibrant effect coated wrenches. Bass also leans toward the downtuned faction and casts out roomy grooves that are a bit percussive, yet still have enough meat to them to give a solid rumble and keep the subwoofers in shape. The basslines chosen more or less tend to loom beneath the surface, constantly brooding, but there are also a few choice moments when some slick slap and pop is tossed in to make things even all the more impressive. Drums hit hard with tightly tuned snare work and lock tight rolls that hit rapidly with an almost robotic precision. Incredibly compact, the drums easily bump the heat of the music to boiling proportions and inject the songs with a violent dosage of adrenaline. Perhaps what brings out this intensity even more though is the added percussion of vocalist Ben which rounds out the sound and can give things an almost ethnic flair as its used with keen placement and a variety of more tribal sounding components. This in turn gives drummer Chad more attention to concentrate on his groove heavy contributions. Some sampling is also incorporated, bringing out massive 808 styled hits and a few random electronic noises adding a Spineshank styled tinge and giving the band another weapon to attack with, which overall caps off a very balanced auditory arsenal.
To put it bluntly, SW1TCH are definitely a very bright up and comer. They take amazingly hooky choruses that are overblown with a skill that follows in the footsteps of Faith No More and melodic excursions that can bring to mind acts like Alice In Chains and place them all in an overwhelming harsh new metal wasteland of aggression and sickness. Not everything is perfect though, there's only one thing that holds this band back, and that is the directly identifiable nature of their influences. It's hard to tell if things are being emulated or ripped off, but its undeniable that listeners will notice the similarities, largely in the vocal aspect included here. It's not hard to tell what they sound like and a lot of people could write them off as a mere clone, when they are in fact anything but. Despite this though, the band is immensely talented and do have what it takes to make mind blowing music and as they evolve and come more into their own, nothing will be able to stop them. SW1TCH are easily one of the most ravenous, outright sonically crushing bands to pick up instruments in quite some time. Their music is fresh and their songwriting skill is top notch, overflowing with clever usage of dynamics and raw energy. As this group expands and refines their style over time, you can be sure that their subsequent CD's will be something from which you'll never want to switch.
(4 / 5)
