Sort By Title - Independent Process

Sort By Title
Independent Process
Independent Release

‘Independent Process’ is the debut E.P. effort from new outfit Sort By Title, who have been coined as ‘Sweden’s answer to Suicide Silence’. Given my general dislike for Suicide Silence, and the whole metalcore genre in general, I wasn’t expecting to be blown away by Sort By Title’s first offering. But having said that, I was willing to give the young four piece act a chance, and let their music do the talking before passing judgement.
All I can say is that even after giving the E.P. several listens, I’m not entirely amazed by Sort By Title’s offering, but I’m not completely disappointed either. Instead, ‘Independent Process’ is the kind of effort that is O.K., but not the sort of release you’d consider an essential purchase.
The opening track ‘Into The Depths’ is one of the E.P.’s stronger tracks, with the band (Comprising of vocalist Adam Hennings, guitarist Christoffer ‘Ciffe’ Tönnäng, bassist Robin ‘Rimbo’ Lindberg and drummer Marcus ‘Mackan’ Gustafsson) delivering a thumping and groove based mid-paced metallic number that seems to be rooted in the tried and true metalcore mould, but with a touch of European melodic death metal thrown in to make things just that more interesting. It works for the most part, and the occasional vocal line from Martina Sandström (Of pop punk/rock outfit Timeless) certainly helps to break up the monotony of the track’s fairly straight forward aggression. Overall, this song isn’t all that bad.
The follow-up track ‘Betrayed By The Sun’ is a solid song, with the use of atmospheric breaks within the songs aggressive metalcore sound allowing the song to breathe (Not to mention keep the listener a little more interested), while ‘Revelation Sign’ (The first song to be given the promotional video treatment) is one of the songs that best illustrated the band’s ability to take the metalcore sound and add a distinctly melodic death metal feel over the top to create something different.
On ‘Insanity’, the keyboards are given a bit more of a push, and when combined with the level of aggression the band put into the song, comes across as something like a mix of Mnemic or Chimaira in places. It’s another solid effort, but seems to lack a little something to really make it jump out at you in the way it should. And while it may have seemed like a good idea at the time, the brief breakdown in the middle (Which sounds like industrialised keyboards and some brief spoken words from Sandström) just isn’t anywhere near as effective as I had hoped.
Finishing up the E.P. is ‘Stuck On A Curb’, which is by far the most straight-forward sounding metalcore number, and as such is quite different from the rest of the E.P. Featuring guest vocal contributions from Fred Hunger (Who is the front man of hardcore outfit I Am Hunger), ‘Stuck On A Curb’ is a good tune, but just seems out of place on the E.P. in some ways, and provides a confused close to the E.P.
‘Independent Process’ isn’t the most mind-blowing effort I’ve ever come across, but it’s far from the worst. In the end, Sort By Title are an interesting outfit, but one that haven’t quite found their true calling in terms of sound and song writing.
It’ll be interesting to see where the band go from here, but in the meantime, the band do have a bit of work to do before they can look forward to a real future in the music scene.

For more information on Sort By Title, check out – http://www.myspace.com/sortbytitle.

© Justin Donnelly.