SOUND BITES

It's hard work flying under the radar; for over a decade, He Is Legend have carved themselves a consistently interesting musical path, garnering accolades from the heavy music community while releasing adventurous, thrilling albums. Their previous, 2014's Heavy Fruit , felt like a culmination of all their desires and resulted in a high water mark for the band that would prove to be a tough act to follow. Still, with little promotional consideration thanks to their deal with tiny imprint Tragic Hero, they failed to see the proportionate financial return on their artistic investments. So, in the wake of the conclusion of their record deal, He Is Legend decided to go to the source, launching a successful crowdfunding campaign for few ; not only was it heartening to feel direct support from the fan level, He Is Legend also found themselves a distribution offer from Spinefarm (parent label Universal), so it certainly seems as though they're better equipped for a breakthrough...

In this day and age, five years is more than enough time for a band to be forgotten, especially a fringe band that never found wide reaching success. It's a testament, then, to the talents of He Is Legend that the half decade gap between albums has only seemed to strengthen their momentum. After releasing a trio of criminally underrated albums from 2004 to 2009, the band went away for a while, and took their time with album four. To say Heavy Fruit benefits from the extra time and care is kind of like saying water is a pretty good way to stay hydrated. This album finds He Is Legend willing to take a song pretty much anywhere it needs to go to succeed, even if it's in multiple directions at once. Opening track No Visitors zigs and zags through tempos and styles but never dulls its attack, while Something, Something, Something Witchy tips its hat to Pink Floyd and Dillinger Escape Plan pretty much equally while also boasting perhaps the album's most potent chorus. Their ...