Well, it seems as if metalcore has made its way to the UK, and as far as some are concerned (or at the very least, this particular writer), they can keep it. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Who here has read the often-revered work of Oscar Wilde? Come now, don’t be shy…he wrote the famous (and in its time, infamous) novel THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY. Yeah, yeah, Dorian Gray was among the Victorian-era characters tapped by Alan Moore in THE LEAGUE OF ECTRAORDINARY GENTLEMAN and entirely bastardized in Stephen Norrington’s infernal film adaptation, but aside from all that, THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY is a great book about eternal youth and the depths of decadence—which gets bastardized once more as the basis for the title track on Bury Tomorrow’s latest album, PORTRAITS.

Harrumph…and after Avenged Sevenfold already ruined good ol’ Hunter S. with that insipid song “Bat Country”…

Bury Tomorrow, a metalcore band who’ve managed to make a couple of ripples in the UK music scene with their initial EP, recently released their debut album, PORTRAITS, via the newly formed Artery Recordings (an imprint of Razor & Tie Entertainment). While they’re admittedly not the worst band in the genre you’re liable to listen to, they’re not particularly great. Bury Tomorrow is largely indicative of all that contemporary, run-of-the-mill faux metal you see boldly represented on the T-shirts of 14-year-old fat kids heading in and out of your local Hot Topic (trying desperately to recall whether Hot Topic is one of our sponsors…oh well…), and PORTRAITS makes for a perfect example. The major difference between Bury Tomorrow and any given Hot Topic talent is that this band remains far less popular and, ergo, makes far less money.

Relatively all the tracks on PORTRAITS utilize the musical stylings of not merely one but rather two vocalists. You have Jason Cameron (doubling on guitar as well), who gives his listening audience the all-too-typical death-metal screams and grunts. Then you have lead vocalist Danni Winter-Bates going for a far more melodic but ultimately just as uninspired sound, which seems to strike a dull little chord somewhere between Chester Bennington of Linkin Puke and that damn Dave Mathews Band (try sitting through the oh-so-sappy track entitled “Relief,” which kind of makes you want to kick a bunny). All of this culminates into a sound that one can only refer to as “crapcore” (coining the term now).

From its unpersuasive metal-fusion sound to its pseudointellectual title, Bury Tomorrow and PORTRAITS can be easily written off with the rest of the redundant rubbish that today’s all-too-angsty adolescents find oh so convincing. It may make for some interesting listening whilst arguing with your parents about how they can never understand you, wallowing in your own self-pity on the bus ride to the mall, and sitting in homeroom, thinking about how lame middle school is.

For those of you still willing to give this group a shot, music, videos, tour dates and merch can be found on their MySpace page. Additional info on the band can be found at Artery’s official website.

*1/2

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