Pastime

Create Avoid is a hardcore act out of Riverside, California and their latest EP, Past Time, was released May 22nd of this year and I had my chance to check it out. The EP is a short 13+ minutes containing 4 tracks. So how did it sound?

Create Avoid puts the hard in hardcore with growling vocals, angst driven lyrics, punishing drums, and hard massively aggressive guitars. The band has no lack of skill when it comes to putting together their music, but I was a bit disappointed with the production of the EP.

There is a loss of clarity in the albums sound as instruments begin to fall all over one another when the band begins to play. It’s a bit of a shame seeing as how the guitar work on the album is so fantastic. Unfortunately the drums, guitar and bass tend to do battle with one another for supremacy over any one track. The only consistency comes in at vocals. That goes in the plus column. I cover a lot of hardcore here at Shakefire and time and time again I’m lost without a lyric sheet to determine what’s what in that department. Hardcore music, unless the band is bold enough to be experimental with new sounds not familiar with the genre, tend to sound very similar, and without a good bead on the lyrics what else have I got to critique but the way the band sounds. Fortunately singer Mike Alsaybar’s words are not entirely lost as the vocals find an even and clear path to be heard. This is clearly a writer who is pissed at the world and in the hardcore universe that’s a commodity.

If you’re a hardcore fan your going to really enjoy Pastime for its fantastic guitar sound, aggressive drums, and vocal style that mixes bar room chants with the staple hardcore growls familiar with the genre. Unfortunately, like I said, it doesn’t have the best production behind it. Hopefully we’ll see a re-issue of the album digitally mastered or something further down the line. Until then Pastime is well worth dropping a fiver on. Enjoy.