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The Autumn Offering

Daytona Beach based metalcore outfit The Autumn Offering have always been a bit of a hit and miss act to my ears, with the band’s continual line-up changes and their struggle to truly embrace one direction and sound for any more than one album an inconsistency that hindered any true progression they could hope to achieve. But despite this, The Autumn Offering has managed to stick together long enough to oversee the release of four full-length releases, with their self-titled effort a rather quick follow-up to 2009’s patchy ‘Requiem’. As with every new release from the band, the line-up has again been reshuffled, with Silent Civilian/Scum Of The Earth lead/rhythm guitarist Jesse Nunn and former Instinct Of Aggression bassist Carl Bensley joining vocalist Matt McChesney, lead/rhythm guitarist Tommy Church and drummer Brian Sculley on The Autumn Offering’s latest effort. Although the change of members has helped influence the direction taken on each of their albums in the past, The Autumn Offering have remained, for the most part a metalcore act. This time around the band has taken a slightly different tact, embracing the melodic death metal side of their sound to bolster their metalcore foundation. And as you expect, like most that have tried to make the same leap, The Autumn Offering’s latest effort comes across as a good idea, but misses with its limited scope on the song writing front.

After the obligatory introductory piece (‘Cotton Shooter’), the album gets underway with ‘Synapse’. While fast paced and heavy, the song isn’t anything too revolutionary or groundbreaking as a whole, and McChesney’s vocal efforts seem to take away rather than add to the whole experience with his efforts to keep in with the heavy handed feel of the song itself. The single/promotional video clip ‘Born Dead’ does stand out a little more with the inclusion of some harmonic lead work and the slight hint of melody within the choruses, but the song still falls foul of the pitfalls of the former track. It isn’t until ‘Exhale The Locusts’ that the band finally provides something substantial on the album, and surprisingly enough, it’s a song that’s more metalcore than melodic death metal. Perhaps it’s because the band aren’t trying too hard to be different, or maybe they’re more familiar with what they can do rather than can’t, but either way, the song is one of the few winners found on the album. From here, it’s a real mixed bag of an effort, with the brutal punch of ‘Viral’, the more melodically inclined ‘Death Mask’ and the slightly more adventurous ‘Myriad Black’ standing out amongst the pack. In the end, ‘The Autumn Offering’ is OK, but hardly the kind of release that’s about to stand out amongst similar releases from within the metalcore/melodic death metal scene.