I Killed The Prom Queen

Music For The Recently Deceased

[3/5] You’d almost expect I Killed The Prom Queen to hail from Southern California, where it sounds like they got their start opening for similarly minded bands like Bleeding Through and Atreyu at local shows. But the heavy, double-bass-reliant quintet is actually from Australia, and their music is the sonic opposite of one of those cuddly koala bears you’re surely imagining when you think of their homeland. Thrashing guitars, guttural yelps iced with the occasional melodic vocal chorus and a penchant for verbose song titles like “Slain Upon My Faithful Sword” has IKTPQ faithfully tracking Every Time I Die down their eardrum-shattering path to stardom, but unfortunately, these Aussies never even glance beyond that road in an attempt to find their own direction. Music For The Recently Deceased is a solid second album, but it’d be better if you didn’t have to play the “this song sounds like” game the whole way through. (METAL BLADE; metalblade.com) Emily Zemler