Vanna

The Honest Hearts EP

An exercise in firsts for Boston metalcore extremists Vanna, The Honest Hearts boasts the band's inaugural release with former Seeker Destroyer vocalist Davey Muise, a fresh home on Artery recordings and some new music after more than a year of zilch. Despite the onslaught of changes, there is a decided lack of anything truly different from the band.

The negative: Surely Vanna are working on a full-length now, but re-recording two songs—“Dead Language” and “Trashmouth” from 2006's The Search Party Never Came and 2009's A New Hope respectively—means this feels like something closer to “single” than “EP.” That's a nominal three tracks to get a feel for Muise's working relationship with his new cohorts, hardly enough to truly distinguish what his ultimate impact is. Moreover, while clean vocalist/guitarist Evan Pharmakis is always on-key and pens creative melodies, he's a touch too operatic, rendering some of the band's viciousness flaccid.

The positive: Maximizing this opportunity, Muise does grasp on to each number, wringing every scream, grunt, wail and growl he possibly can, honing in on his own specialities and keeping well away from predecessor Chris Preece's shoes. From what can be gleaned of his influence, Muise seems to push the band into a wonderfully regressive point whereby they abandon the overused (and just plain wimpy) melodic influence in favor of exercising their atrophied, Converge-inspired hardcore muscle. It generates some impressively oppressive riffs and palpitating drums but then again, there's not enough here to claim renewed vigor.

Even though two-fifths of The Honest Hearts features old material, Muise & Co. seem inspired by one another, creating a dichotomously explosive and melodic experience. While songs are far from definitive, there is enough spark to foreshadow great future accomplishments from a band struggling to keep up with high initial expectations from their early career.

Artery http://www.arteryrecordings.com

“Trashmouth”