I remember hearing about Oceans Ate Alaska and their inhuman drummer, and when Disparity released I figured it was about as good a time as any to find out what the buzz really was. Disparity was really interesting all around, but whether that fully translated into quality was lost on me.
If I was rating on uniqueness alone, this record would get 11/10 with no challenge. This album boasts an impressively distinct metalcore sound that possibly has never been ventured into before by other bands, mixing various unconventional musical textures and undoubtedly insane and weird creative choices to produce a seriously wicked soundscape that could belong in an asylum.
They get really close to insanity with their songwriting in this record. It's a fine line between creative genius and pretentious subversion, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are people on the latter side. Being as objective as possible though, I have reason to believe their intentful divergent songwriting is more former than latter, and quite intriguing digging deeper into it.
I can see how integral Chris Turner is to their sound. His drumming establishes such a massive foundational integrity to every song, and what he does massively changes the outcome. A great example is Plague Speech: the main verse is done twice, once at the start and once after the breakdown. The change in the underlying drum pattern completely changes the feel and energy of the section, despite the vocals being delivered exactly the same.
The record spans an immense range of diverse sounds, albeit all still with a core element of heaviness. Juggling between ambient usage, dissonant design, melodic passages, violent chug-kick pairings and a menacing assortment of unclean vocals, they capture a variety of unconventional modern metal soundscapes in a single record. An amazing facet of their writing is, despite not being conventionally catchy or hooky in any way, the songs will somehow find a home in your consciousness. Lines from Paradigm and Plague Speech have become earworms and I'm confused to how it even did so.
James' vocal range is astounding. He cycles through so many difficult unclean techniques during the tracklist's runtime, and at such a high quality of execution, it's quite inhuman to comprehend. Sat beside robotic drumming and wildly unconventional writing, the resulting output is eye-openingly innovative every step of the way, and definitely in uncharted musical territory.
The main gripe I have with this record is, with the constant amount of curve-balls they throw at you, especially on first listens, it can get quite mentally taxing to try and absorb what's happening, and can take away from the immersiveness of the listening experience. It's not a bad thing by far, it does show their immense musical creativity and technicality, but it does make it quite hard to get into. At the very most, all I'm saying is that it is the opposite of a gateway record, nothing against the quality.
Disparity lost me many times before I could finally get a grip on the intricate complexities and unconventional choices at every corner of this record. Even now, I feel far from comfortable with navigating the soundscapes, but I can definitely tell that it is full of innovation and I can appreciate their contribution to redefining and refining metalcore with this.
Rating: 5/10