Sloth
Dead Generation
Hollywood
Following in the footsteps of what bands from Deftones to Tool have been doing for ages now, here comes Sloth. This particular foursome has a couple of independent releases under their collective belt, and has been doing the rounds for some years now, eventually earning a record deal with the mighty Hollywood Records. Sloth’s shtick is the occasional use of, er, bouzouki in their music – no doubt due to the band members’ Greek ancestry. But other than that, there’s nothing here that hasn’t been done better before. It seems as if Sloth themselves realize this: Dead Generation isn’t as much an attempt to build on what’s come before as it’s an attempt to shoehorn as many modern rock conventions as possible into one polite little package, designed for mass consumption. The bombastic “You Can’t Look Away” may be a particularly blatant attempt to get on the radio (more reminiscent of Whitesnake than anything else), but on the whole, Sloth are very good at polishing all the edges off their music to please record execs and Warped crowds alike. The “Whole Lotta Love”-styled breakdown in “Broken Crutch” is rather unfortunate, but other than that, this one glides by without any discernible false notes. It’s all very tidy. If you’re looking for the next System of a Down, look elsewhere. But if you’re out for something that’s tailor made to suit the tastes of well-off 14-year olds trained to develop superficial identity crises, then Sloth are your men.
Hollywood Records: http://www.hollywoodrecords.com/
