The Godly Work of Art

Being on a big label is not a sin. It isn't even a crime or a felony. Plenty of nice bands have released good music on well-known labels, and some have even found their definitive sound, style and audience after signing themselves onto some of the companies in the big league.

On the other hand, this does not work the other way around, either. Being on a famous label does not guarantee success, nor does it mean that the band sounds good and interesting or that they have exceptionally original ideas. Actually, while many bands may even sell considerable numbers of their albums after finally getting a lucrative contract, some of them never manage to make an album worth anything musically.

That's one of things people forget when they bash a band for selling out once the poor guys sign to a big league company. A big label simply means more money for the production, distribution and advertizing, maybe some support in other forms and perhaps more touring. While the environment may make the creative process easier, it does not guarantee the existence of a vision or ideas, but it does not preclude them, either. Only in the case of creative disagreements and subsequent dabbling in the band's creations can a label truly rescue or destroy a band.

While Spinefarm may not be the biggest record company on Earth, they are still quite well-known, and, due to their catalogue of bands, somewhat influential within a handful of genres. But even they make mistakes, and if The Godly Work of Art is anything to judge by, Arise was one of those blunders.

Arise has been listed as death/thrash in the MA, but TGWoA does not quite meet the criteria. Soundwise, and from the songwriting perspective, they are more melodeath than actual death metal, and the thrash part can be found in the background of the guitar soloes more than anywhere else; thrash and death metal never had any need for abundant lead guitars, and they abound on The Godly Work of Art, instead of a hundred serious riffs. The margins between the genres are not that wide, and the partially Spinefarm-influenced problem in Scandinavia, that of death and thrash bands turning into melodeath even without realizing it themselves, is evident here. The production is pretty much the standard melodic death fare, with a hint of hollowness that would fit an industrial metal band; it may be fitting for Arise, however, with their biomechanical and futuristic themes.

The guitar work is solid, but unfortunately rather uninspired. There isn't a single really memorable riff on the album, and the songwriting itself is lukewarm. The bass is probably somewhere there, the drums are drums without anything special about them. Thrash and death need not be catchy, but being able to tell the songs apart would be nice. The vocals are the last nail in the coffin, coarse, not quite core-like screaming without a purpose.

The final proof of the misguided combination of performance and production is the last track, the cover of Metallica's Motorbreath. It would never have become a well-known song with this quality. Even it does not stick to the memory or make an impression among the other run-of-the-mill songs. And that's pretty much it.

In the end, what The Godly Work of Art amounts to is an album of standard modern metal, with a high level of technical proficiency, without anything original or any kind of creative vision, and a production that reeks of standardization. The last point may be the main influence of the label; perhaps, somewhere, someone decided to give the new guys some help, and gave them an experienced and trusted producer. The said producer was perhaps having a Monday all week, and instead of finding what was essential (or, perhaps, salvageable) in the songs, opted for a standardized melodic death template, or just threw the stuff together with the settings left on the soundboard by the melodeath band that was in the studio the day before.

There is nothing on this album to tell it apart from a thousand others just like it, and it is sort of teflon-coated piece of work in the sense that nothing on it sticks to the listener. Fundamentally, The Godly Work of Art is A Boring Work of Art. Leave it in the bargain bin, and if you find it in the full-price shelf, point your finger at a random staff member of the store, say "HaHa!" in your best Nelson imitation, leave the premises, and never go back to the establishment.