Unity TX “Somewhere, In Between…”
Unity TX are back! Armed with their sophomore album Somewhere, In Between…, they are angry and primed to tell you about it.
Feeling that the industry, and often their peers, don’t get them, that frustration and fuck-you-world attitude is poured throughout this album like lava from an erupting volcano. It’s wild and running free, taking no prisoners in its path.
Opening dual salvo Sabotage and Heinous are dangerous, violent and confronting hybrids of rap metal. Not the radio friendly Limp Bizkit, this is the music your parents warned you about. Snarling rap lines with crushing metal riffs laced with an attitude that comes from being overlooked and lied to by those they trusted.
Unity TX, vocalist Jay Webster, guitarist Brandon Castaneda and drummer Johnathan Flores, continue to grab you by throat and rage in Lucid, spitting lines to bouncing riffs.
It’s not all metal, Body Roc, which sounds like calling someone out and being prepared to back it up, and Ready 2 Die Part 2, are straight up ghetto rap.
The metal rap crossover is littered with bands that usually land on one side of the divide however subtle but here Unity TX balance that knife edge with a surgical blade themselves.
Paranoia is as heavy as any hardcore or deathcore track you’ll hear this year and who hasn’t at some point had to deal with a partner who hysterically pushes them away?
They are unapologetically themselves on this album, so it may not be for more sensitive souls, however if you’re wanting to deal with real life, then this is the place as Fuck Tha World slow grooves make way to bouncing head banging greatness and more f-bombs than an army could muster. Webster screaming ‘I don’t give a damn what you think about me!’ Well, who hasn’t been smeared as a bad guy? This song is for you.
This is an aggressive two finger, face punch, kick in the balls soundtrack you’ve probably always wanted to hear in your collection but no one really has the guts to do so.
Enjoy Tha Show continues to mess with my spellcheck but with deep heavy riffs, arrogant lyrics and when the song starts to switch it is like being on the rapids with no life jacket. Just hang on for your life.
In trying to really land something similar, the nearest I can get is the early days of hardcore and rap crossover, the days of Biohazard and Cypress Hill merging, that street level fight to survive day to day attitude expressing itself in music.
STFU, Inside Out and Come And Go just as likely to do five shots with you as it is to create violent mosh pits.
Finishing with a similar chaotic pit inducing breakdown in Crash N Burn, Unity TX won’t be challenging the radio charts however they will be challenging your ability to not play this loud and often.
Album number two may be the bands realisation of the two-faced industry however they may have just put themselves in a category of one. One hell of an album, one focussed drive to do it their way and one serious contender for the unapologetic album of the year.
Album Review By Iain McCallum
SOMEWHERE, IN BETWEEN… – DUE OUT MARCH 13
https://lnk.to/UnityTX_Music
