Search - Death Angel :: Frolic Through the Park

Good, Experimental without going overboard

Zander Haberstaft | Miami, Florida | 09/04/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Being one of the youngest bands in Thrash Metal history, D.A. hit the studio to record their second album after the well recieved "Ultra Violence". At this time they barely old enough to vote but certainly could compose a more complex song than some of their peers (i.e. Forbidden, Heathen, Vio-lence).



The production is slightly better on this release than on the previous effort. The songs have more change-ups, bridges, and interludes than "Ultra Violence". The guitars aren't as harsh as in the previous release but still maintain a signature Thrash sound. The vocals are more in the background than being upfront -which I don't consider a bad thing because this guy ain't the best singer. Worse, he gets more annoyning on ACT 3.



The drums are heavily muted in the final production. They blend in very well with the rest of the music but the drummer has little control of his feet and the bass drum "explosion" beats always sound rushed. Same goes for the quad beats. He also tries to get "beyond his experience" by playing things are too complicated for his ability. The drumming could be a lot worse, but at least it doesn't get in the way and make the band sound worse. The only thing that could have helped him was to keep it a little bit more controlled and simpler.



The bassist always maintains a position in the front of this band, which is a rare feat. for Thrash (minus Realm, Sadus). The bass lines are cool and really make the album in the end sound different.



The guitarists riffs are classy, with just enough muted open E chords to satisfy the usual Thrash listen. The guitars are also highly controlled but playful enough to keep interest maintained throughout the whole album.



You have slow, more commercial songs, (Bored) and you have your medium-fast speed antics (Road Mutants, 3rd Floor). Even though I would consider this is the best Death Angel album, I would check out "Ultra Violence" first if you are new to the band. For you're not-so-average-complex Thrash, this is the album to check out. 4 1/2 Stars

(Best songs: 3rd Floor, Road Mutants, Guilty of Innocence, Why You Do This.)



"

Probably my most favorite album ever ...

Fritz | Spokane, WA | 08/08/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Death Angel is a band I got into not too recently (maybe about two months or so ago). And while I had maintained that my favorite band was Circle of Dust ever since I was a wee chap, in the short span of these two months, the more I listened to Death Angel, be it Act III and its diversity, the Ultra Violence and its brutality, or this one, Frolic Through the Park and its rather even mix of both, the more and more I grew to love them. Now, all I can say is that this amazing band has worked their way to the top of my favorite list, all in the short span of time I've been listening to them. Before throwing in my two cents worth, I could see that on average, this cd garnered on average about two stars, which seems rather disheartening, as for me, there wasn't a single bad song on the whole album. The opener `Third Floor' starts things off with a rather creepy intro that leaps into instrumental flurry, and ... Mark Osgueda's line of `Trapped by iron bars ...' and so on. From this moment on, the album is listenable all the way through. Death Angel had a knack for playing rather brutal thrash, but incorporating in things that showed excellent songwriting from Cavestany. Death Angel always had this thing where the guitar would be played at frenetic pace, yet at the same time, it was catchy, you were able to walk away with the song stuck in your head, it had this blip thing that Cavestany would do ... it's rather hard to describe, but it's what makes Death Angel sound unlike any other thrash band out there. Of course, it helps to have a vocalist as distinguished as Mark Osgueda. I LOVE Mark Osgueda's voice, he evokes such passion into everything he sings, and the dude's range is absolutely incredible. There are times when Osgueda shrieks with the pitch of a frightened little girl, but he returns to his raw-rock-and-roll-"whoooaaa!" type voice. Honestly, I think I would place Osgueda as my favorite male vocalist in a thrash band, and maybe just about my favorite period. Often seen as the band's `weakest link', I find him to be their strongest (after Cavestany, who practically writes all the songs). Not hindering things any is the fact that the band is still very young on this cd, yet the musicianship is absolutely phenomenal, and on-par with their older thrash contemporaries, and they all just so happen to be Philippines, and they also all just so happen to be related. Very strange circumstances that fate brought these guys together to this music. Death Angel's is actually what other thrash bands should have strived for: the standard ferocity, and yet not incorporating all that much melody, the ability to make songs stick in your head with good songwriting and proper arrangement of where to put unique guitar parts and sounds and singing and shrieks. They also experimented with other styles on this cd, and did it all well. While not as much genre-bending goes on on this cd as on Act III, (which I find to be perfect, with the funk and stuff being a bit over-incorporated for me on Act III), Frolic does have an excellent punk+metal mixture on "Why You Do This" and something that the old Red Hot Chili Peppers might play on "Open Up". Another thing I love about Death Angel is everyone gets the opportunity to show off their musical chops, from Dennis Pepa on bass on the beginning of "Road Mutants" (I love the way the bass kind of gets slapped, then the guitars and drums immediately join in intensely doing the exact same thing), to the incredibly young and talented drummer Andy Galeon throughout the whole thing. My favorite song of all on this album would have to be "Guilty of Innocence", as it bears the whole super-heavy-yet-catchy thing I've been talking about, with Osgueda kind of soaring in the vocal department on this one, and the part in the middle where Dennis Pepa does the fast bassline by himself, the drums join in with the clicky guitar and things get going again at a faster tempo than before, super heavy, super catchy. Coming in at a close second for me is the previously unreleased "Devil's Metal", containing the same formula as above. In all actuality I find it to be a shame that Death Angel's classic stuff isn't revered as the true treasures they actually are. But this is my favorite album ever recorded by any band, kudos to the guys in Death Angel on this one."