Circuit For The Blackout

This Hamilton, ON-based quintet showed up a little bit too late for the party. Their hardly inventive brand of screamo sounds tired in 2009, adding to a genre that has unearthed countless Silverstein and Hawthorne Heights lameitators. Their self-titled debut has plenty of chug-a-chug breakdowns and Pro-Tools tricks but they're lacking the rawness and sincerity that made the first (and even second) wave of screamo so powerful. The best moments of the album are when Circuit For The Blackout stray from the screaming-for-dollars formula. In a song like "The Last Time," the band sneak in a country-influenced shuffle beat and acoustic guitar to close out an otherwise forgettable album. This album hints that CFTB have the potential to rise above the limitations of their genre to create some really compelling music but on their sophomore effort, the band will need to make some braver choices.