The Bunny The Bear are a hard band to peg. The music is so sporadic and downright weird, it's almost abrasive to hear the first time through. One moment your listening to electronic music, the next your in a straight hardcore breakdown. Atop this all is half screamed, half growled vocals and falsetto Coheed and Cambria styled singing. "Oh Lord this is absolutely revolting, and at the same time I find it hilarious." This lyric is heard very early on in the album, although revolting is a bit of a harsh word, replace it with weird and you'll get my initial feelings of the album. But that's what the band is going for. They are definitely bringing something new to the table here, and they seem to be doing well for it.
The band has released their sophomore effort The Stomach For It via Victory Records, which continues the odd sound they established with If You Don't Have Anything Nice To Say... I wasn't initially going to review this album because if we want to get technical they really aren't a metal band, but I figured since they had elements of hardcore/metalcore I'd give it a shot anyways.
The album begins with this rather cool orchestral feeling piece that sets a cool atmosphere, with some falsetto singing atop it. It's a pretty fantastic opening, but I'm honestly not a fan of the following song 'Sky'. Largely in part because of the clean vocals. They work great on some songs like 'Soul' where you'll find yourself having great trouble getting the lyrics out of your head, but on songs like 'Sky' and 'Pieces' I find myself wanting to skip the track. I'm reminded very much of Coheed & Cambria, especially on the song 'Breeze' sounds almost exactly like Claudio Sanchez.
The screamed vocals aren't bad either. I really like his guttural vocals, they are solid, and when used are often my favorite part of the track. His shouted vocals aren't bad but I wish he'd either gone with straight gutturals, which might have added more shock value tot he album, or a more developed scream than a shout.
As far as the instruments go, the band places a heavy influence on the electronic portions of the album, which unfortunately tends to drown out the guitars. There is a pretty good solo on the end of 'Breeze' that would have benefited from being just a little louder, but it's not too bad. When the band goes into hardcore mode the guitars essentially go to straight breakdown riffs, with some interesting electronic elements or possibly an interesting lead guitar riff such as the one on 'Lonely'. I can commend the drummer for his talent. He's not incredibly technical, but his ability to transition between various styles of drumming is pretty impressive.
Overall, The Stomach For It is a pretty good album. It definitely takes a few spins to really appreciate, and I can fully understand how someone might be turned off by the sheer sporadic feeling the album has, but if you are a fan of Hardcore music, and Electronic infused rock, you may find something to enjoy here.
If you have Spotify feel free to stream it now!
The Bunny The Bear - The Stomach For It
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