True Love : " Heaven's Too Good For Us"

This hard core band from Detroit is pretty straight forward in their approach to hard-core. The vocals are barked like most band's of this ilk. The only edge they have aside from the straight one is the fact they know how to write songs. I could just be in an angry hard-core mood, but the second song is pretty fucking good. The third song "Out in the Streets" is a little more run of the mill with the obligatory gang vocal chiming in. "Kill For That" finds the uniformity beginning to set in.They speed things up into a tighter chug for the 39 second"Midnight People" which never gets a chance to turn into a song. "Young to Die " is moodier but still pretty quick to dismiss itself.

The best under a minute song from these guys is "Where it Ends". "Chained Melody" plays by the rules of conventional hard core and doesn't do anything you haven't heard before a hundred times since the mid-80s. You can hear the rock influence on "the One and Only" it gives the song more of a hook in the riffing. "Meant to Take" is heavier and eventually finds a groove, but I would not say it's the album's most thoughtfully written song. There is a metallic edge to many of these riffs and the attack of "Stay True" is no exception. It reminds me of some of the cross-hardcore I used to listen to in 80s. The vocals are little more varied.

Overall this is very solid for what it is, however it is a little too straight forward for me. There is a very urban feel to the album and I like the metallic drive combined with the thought they put into the riffs rather than just one, two, three, go... style of hardcore. I'll give this a 7.5, since I don't see my self returning to this album more than once or twice.