Music Existence Because of Music, We Exist
New Disorder is an everyman’s hard rock / alternative metal band from Rome, Italy. Their latest album, Straight to the Pain, dropped September 18th in North America and sports a standard length of raw, heartfelt rock which, while unlikely to turn heads at first listen, offers a solid headbanging experience underlined by an admirable work ethic and sense of youthful drive.
After a foreboding intro track, the album starts into one of its main standout tracks “Never Too Late to Die”. With bouncing rhythm and chugging guitars, the stage is set immediately for the vanilla hard rock sound which is showcased throughout the album. A hearty vocal growl opens the album, but quickly yields to a mildly nasal mid-high warble, the latter being the prevailing vocal style utilized on each track, lending more of a hard rock feel to the overall product. Both this track and the next, “A Senseless Tragedy (Bloodstreams)”, carry relatively memorable choruses which have the potential to stick in the head of the listener after repeated plays. Most other tracks, however, tend to blend into one another quite easily. For the most part, the album is composed of a chord change every four beats, a single cymbal ridden steadily on every count, and a half-time chug-a-thon any time things get too melodic. This is the main formula for the album, save for rare moments in which the continuity is broken up with mixed result. One can expect to be ambushed in the title track when guest vocalist Eleonara Buono’s operatic belt jars the listener to attention. While quite beautiful alone, the addition of a sudden classical female vocal in an otherwise grungy composition proves mostly to be a disconcerting juxtaposition.
A more welcome change of pace comes a bit later from the clean guitar noodling and vocal crooning of “Lost in London”. The momentary removal of the dirty guitars and clamoring drums allows vocalist Francesco Lattes to finally break through the mix for an enjoyable respite. The fact that a high point in the album comes from this removal of its core features, however, exposes a regrettable reality of this record: the production is distractingly substandard. While far from seated in the St. Anger stratum of detrimental sound design, Straight to the Pain’s boomy bass guitar, sparsely edited guitar work, and generally singular vocal tracking are unfortunately negative facets of the same working-class character which provides New Disorder with much of their charm. Undoubtedly, a more polished recording would allow the band’s level-headed approach to songwriting to connect more widely with their audience.
One can be certain that many listeners, upon first glance, will write off New Disorder for being run-of-the-mill, and justifiably so. There is very little on Straight to the Pain which cannot be found by tuning any radio to the local hard rock station. However, one should never forget that there is still great value in the safety of the anticipated. At any given concert or festival, after the last song of the local 9-piece, painted up, avant-garde “shock rock” act fronted by a drug-addled male/female vocal duo which mistakes ghoulish shrieking into each others’ faces for sexual energy (every city has one), the now listless audience will be begging for a band such as New Disorder with enough acuity about them to know that sometimes all that concert goers need to have a good time is some chunky riffing and a melody they can take home.
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