Adelitas Way - Album Review
If the Sick Puppies are a band headed in the right direction, I don’t think Adelitas Way even has a map. Their eponymous first album is exactly what I feared might happen with this entire “light metal” movement. This five-piece from Las Vegas wallows in overwrought emotional choruses, melodramatic guitar hooks, and unimaginative songwriting.
For starters, I can’t figure out why this band is a five-piece. There’s nothing that goes on here that requires the extra body. No true flying guitar solos, no blisteringly fast rhythms that need someone to keep the pace, no creative trading or interplay of guitar lines.
“Invincible” is the album’s signature track, and for what it’s worth, is a decent song. It moves, it hammers, it does all the right things. The subsequent drop-off after that is sudden and precipitous. “Scream” turns into a tired exercise in radio-friendly pop-metal, and unfortunately, that’s the pace car for everything that comes to follow.
“Dirty Little Things” is a decent piece, but the issue here is that I’ve heard this song a thousand times before, with a thousand different names, by a thousand different bands. Even so, “Dirty Little Things” is one of the last reputable things to be heard on the album. It launches into a string of exhausted pop-radio anthems and juvenile sing-along ballads, beginning with “Last Stand” and ending with “Brother.” Before too long, it all begins to blend together. There’s no variation, no twists, no changes. The songs are composed of the same basic construction and tempo, without the benefit of a mold-breaker.
Avoid this one.
D.M
Music Editor
D.M is the Music Editor for Bloodygoodhorror.com. He tries to avoid bands with bodily functions in the name and generally has a keen grasp of what he thinks sounds good and what doesn't. He also really enjoys reading, at least in part, and perhaps not surprisingly, because it's quiet. He's on a mission to convince his wife they need a badger as a household pet. It's not going well.