Pure punk energy collides with snarling hardcore and indie tendencies on "The Romance Of Helen Trent", the latest offering from The Killing Tree, a fastly rising Chicago, IL based group which features members of Rise Against and Baxter fame within its ranks.

Metallic and antagonistic, the bands sound is a heavy hybrid of dynamic melodies and thunderous hardcore influenced stompings that almost always showcase a keen song writing style. Bringing to mind traces of At The Drive-In in a knife fight with say the likes of Strife, a diverse range of musical intensity is conveyed on sharply focused scale. The songs are often catchy and vicious and avoid the snags of quirky timing structures and drawn out breakdowns to instead pummel right through. Sure there are still a few indie styled excursions present which find discordant riffs striking an uneasy alliance with heartfelt vocals, but they seem to be far and few between as the intensity of the material is often set to borderline fury on the bulk of tracks included.

Surprisingly heavy and yet overtly competent the band have crafted together an interesting blend of styles as shades of noise, metalcore, indie and punk are all cleverly mixed together in such a way that a certain commercial accessibility is kept staunchly prevalent. And yet despite their strides into welcoming song structures, it is their concentrated attack that sets the tracks off and instantly bowls the listener over. In fact, with enough bite present to leave multiple stitches required, their overall avoidance of the wishy-washy cliches currently diluting the genre should easily set them apart from their peers. Room to grow and bursting with potential, The Killing Tree are a band to watch and could easily overshadow many of today's current "buzz" acts if their roots spread out and grow in the right directions.