Attila - Villain
Set to the tune of aggressive, in-your-face, unfiltered ghettocore, Attila is definitely an acquired taste and not for everyone.
Atlanta deathcore band Attila are no stranger to controversy. They are in a word, offensive. Not that it bothers them in the slightest. Front man Chris Fronzak is a giant heat magnet, and the band’s music doesn’t apologize for who they are and what they like. Their sound is a hailstorm of chugga chugga riffs, heavy breakdowns, glass shattering screams, and scattered hip hop infusion. Perhaps the ultimate test for a band like Attila then, is to see how it stacks up in the ears of someone who enjoys metalcore, but one who prefers to keep the party boy extravagance out of the picture.
Attila seem to sing about only a few things; women, sex, drugs and partying. Rock n’ roll yes, and distinctly unPC. You have to give points to the band who in this day and age, are unafraid to make the brokeNCYDE version of Motley Crue’s “Girls Girls Girls” music video. This band is also very horny. As songs like “New Addiction” show with its porn audio overlays that make GNR’s “Rocket Queen” sound positively classy. Some songs are just plain awful, and the incessant “bree bree” type vocal screaming becomes quite tedious.
It is however, not all bad, in fact, if you strip some of the layers away you can see that Attila are more than competent musicians. The song “Subhuman” is a damn good song, one that relies more on straight-forward metalcore leanings, and it comes away being the album’s best moment. Proof that if they didn’t lean so hard on the ghetto gangsta money-cars-girls thing, that they could be a lot better than they are. The closer “Bad Habits” is another positive offering, it’s just a shame there isn’t more of it on Villain.
There is an audience for Attila, one that connects to their wildly loose tales of sex, strippers and money. Set to the tune of aggressive, in-your-face, unfiltered ghettocore, it is definitely an acquired taste and not for everyone. They didn’t quite get over the line this time, but there’s some good under the surface. I like offensive, and I like that Attila are offensive. It’s just too bad they aren’t better at it.
(self-released)