The Passing is the latest offering from the thrash/speed metal band Betrayal. This is a challenging format for a band of Christians to carry out successfully. Combining screaming guitars, pounding drums, and harsh yelling vocals in a manner that glorifies God is not easily accomplished. Yet, in this release, I feel Betrayal does it quite well.
Technically, the guitar work is amazing in its variety. Rather than relying on the standard thrashing riffs repeating throughout each song, Marcus N. Colon and Rob McCue prove that they know their instruments. When the song calls for it, they are quite capable of being melodious, as well as creating the "wall of sound" typically associated with this genre. The bassist, Jeff Lain, does a good job of keeping up with the changing rhythms. Leading those changes, drummer Jeff Mason carefully sets a tempo and then is able to convey the intensity of each song by varying the pattern of the beats throughout the song.
What can be the most challenging aspect of this form of music is the vocals. The volume of the music requires the words to be more shouted than sung. This can lead to making every lyric sound the same, both contextually and emotionally. Lead vocalist Chris Ackerman manages to add enough variety to convey different messages. Guiding the whole project as producer is Caesar, who seems to have held the whole project to a consistently good level of quality.
The message is bleak but still positive. The tendency with this type of music is for bands to use minor chords, with a lot of yelling about how bad everything is. Betrayal adds to that some of the positives of Christianity. Still, with song titles like "Carnival of Madness," "Forest of Horrors," and "Race of Hypocrisy," it's clear that this band is out to challenge Christians to improve their surroundings, rather than be complacent. I would not hesitate to give this release to any non-Christian head-bangers, particularly if they do not believe there are any good Christian metal bands.
Other coverage for this album
Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by undeadAfter listening to Betrayal's first album, Renaissance By Death, the first thing that came to my mind when listening to The Passing was that these guys matured in production and in music skill. Gone is the tin can drumming, in is the beefy guitars, and the bass is even audible. However, what Betrayal gained in production, they left behind the very thing that made Renaissance so good for me. What…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by D_ListerTechnically I'd have to say that the second effort by Betrayal is a better album than their first, but on a level of pure enjoyment I simply can't bring myself to say that. Listening to the album the guitar work is better, the drums are amazingly better, and bass is better, the vocals change up from the fast spoken style they started to full singing now. Yet Renaissance By Death gets more spins…Heaven's Metal #43Reviewed by Doug Van PeltBetrayal has improved quite a bit since its debut--"RENAISSANCE BY DEATH"--last year. This album finds 'em matured in the songwriting and current in today's scene. Most of the tunes are heavy-duty doses of intensity--a la The Crucified. It's almost a regular all-star jam, since there's several guest vocalists here. One tune sounds uncannily like Precious Death--musically and vocally. This comes…Similar sounding releases
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2002In Remembrance Of Me
2001The Passing Of Time
1991Renaissance by Death
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