E Town Concrete - Made for War CD Review

Over time, E-Town Concrete have begun to resemble a blade of grass blowing to and fro in the wind. When the wind blows, the piece of grass can’t help but sway with the direction it is pointed. As the musical breezes have blown, so has E-Town Concrete’s blade of grass. They started out as a hardcore band when they were relatively unknown, when they just sprouted out of the ground. As their fanbase grew, their music started to blow in another direction—that of rap-rock. Riding the crest of the rap-rock breeze with their major label release, The Renaissance, E-Town Concrete garnered as many detractors as they did fans before they fell back under the radar. The next musical breeze to blow their way was the heavy metal revival wind which they let themselves get caught up in on Made for War, their newest release

Gone are the rap-rock songs (except for “Do You Know What It’s Like?” and “All That You Have is Still Not Enough”). Gone are the Latin influences. Gone is the diversity. In place of these missing pieces is nothing more than generic heavy metal songs. It would appear that they were trying to get back to the intensity of their roots while still remaining commercially viable. In doing so, they created watered down metal (even nu-metal-ish) songs instead of coming out and rocking your face off. There are some decent songs on here, such as “Made for War”, which retains some of their previously prevalent rap elements, and “Wide Awake”, probably the heaviest song on the disc, but other than these sparse few songs Made for War is a disappointment.

The songs on here feel very dated. If this cd had hit at the beginning of 2004 or in 2003 instead of the close of this year, it might have sounded a little more fresh, but after having listened to gems by Unearth and Machine Head, and even having heard moderately good cds by Dry Kill Logic and Flaw, Made for War just feels like an also ran effort. The couple of rap-rock songs are pretty laughable and feel very mid to late 90’s. Pass over this cd and use your Christmas money on something more deserving of your time.