United We Stand (EP)
Pavement Entertainment, 2017
REVIEW BY: Pete Crigler
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 09/16/2017
Flaw, a nu-metal band from the early 2000s, started a quasi-successful reunion in 2015 before dwindling down to two original members. On this new EP, they are just trying to keep their name alive. Three studio songs and a couple of live tracks are all that you get here. Everything just comes across as okay.
“I’ll Carry You” is a good melodic song that rises above some of the other nu-metal wannabes and actually sounds pretty damn good. It’s definitely the highlight of the album. “Fall Into This,” on the other hand, is quite bland and doesn’t do anything. It just kind of sits there and stays – no excitement, no nothing. “My Style” is the blandest of them all; the thing sounds like it was recorded in a rehearsal hall, very flat and not very exciting either. Flaw was big around 2001-2002 and then fell off very quickly. This is a band that now sounds like Five Finger Death Punch, and who really wants to sound like that now?
The guitar work on the live tracks sounds really good, but that’s about it. There is not much to recommend here unless you’re looking for something that beats you over the head relentlessly with metal. The revision of the band’s first big single “Payback” sounds a bit ridiculous now because the song is incredibly, poorly dated at this point. Hearing it now only lends more credence to that notion.
Overall, there’s not much here. Actually, it seems kind of lame to release this, but I guess they wanted to keep themselves in the public eye so they don’t end up forgotten once again. Apart from one song, there isn’t anything to recommend. This is the type of disc that winds up in the discount bargain bin within three months of its release and frankly, that’s where it belongs.