Overall Score: 6/10
Riffs: 7/10
Repeat Listen Value: 6/10
Originality: 5/10
Pros: Promising signs from an up and coming new band
Cons: Haven’t got the balance between influences and originality quite right yet
Irish alt-metal / metalcore crew Jet Fuel Chemistry are a new band to come across the Rock Sins radar. Having been together for three years, they’re about to drop their new EP Sign Of The Times. Is it a release that can rise above the pack in a UK scene that is awash with bands of this style?
Is it evident from the first listen that Jet Fuel Chemistry are a band who make no attempt to hide their influences. There are elements of While She Sleeps (particularly You Are We and So What? era) elements all over the EP, both in the riff work and overall approach. The opening War feels like a mix of While She Sleeps and That’s The Spirit era Bring Me The Horizon. There are gang vocals throughout and electro-style vocal effects in the verses before cranking up the heavier elements in the final third of the track.
Second track Sleep has some really enjoyable clean vocals from vocalist Dan to kick things off, and is probably the most complete sounding of the five songs on Sign Of The Times. The EP’s title track begins with a very effective soundbite from Greta Thunberg, played over a clipped riff, before the track kicks in fully. The song is fine, but perhaps also the most generic of the EP, with only the post-chorus riff at the two and a half minute mark that makes any lasting impression.
Sign Of The Times’ penultimate track Fever has a Nothing More vibe to it with its frenetic riff work and the bordering on djent / tech-metal guitar style that Nothing More adopt so well at times without ever fully crossing into full tech-metal territory. There is also more than a touch of Jonny Hawkins vocal delivery from Dan on Fever, which is a nice change of pace from the previous three tracks. Closing track Use Your Eyes returns to the vocal combined with samples approach used by bands like Bring Me The Horizon and Scream Blue Murder before letting rip properly on the chorus – offering the best melodies of the EP. The vocal bridge and subsequent breakdown are also among the high points of the EP, with Use Your Eyes finishing the EP off on a real high note.
Jet Fuel Chemistry have a lot of promise as a band. This release suffers a little from sounding a bit too much like its component parts in places; It is very easy to go “That’s a While She Sleeps bit, that’s a Bring Me The Horizon bit and so on”. If you put that to one side, it’s an enjoyable release that is definitely worth checking out. In the parts of Sign Of The Times where Jet Fuel Chemistry take their influences and meld it more into something of their own – they shine. They just need to learn to do that more on their next release.
Jet Fuel Chemistry’s new EP, Sign Of The Times, is released on the 7th of August 2020.