Suicide Silence – No Time to Bleed
Rating: 2.5/5.0 – Excellence offset by core
Label: Century Media
Websites: myspace.com/suicidesilence | suicidesilence.net (last updated 2005)
Suicide Silence is a study of opposites—a dichotomy of sorts. On the one hand, they appear to be a talented band, musically varied, very interesting and capable of building intense grooves. On the other hand, they’re so damn “core” that my brain wants to explode at times. I’ve been interested in hearing them for a while, and happily I have now been able to—thanks to the MySpace promotion.
Fortunately, at the basis deathcore is first and foremost death, and Suicide Silence writes good death metal when they put their mind to it. Between excellent technical riffs, reminiscent a little bit of a band like Psycroptic or Crptopsy, the whole record is littered with amazing riffs and seriously aggressive drums–the stuff that makes the death metal fan in me very excited. Those sections are totally rad and make the metal fan in me all … metalgasmic.
Unfortunately, the core part of deathcore is much too prevalent on this record. So, in every song, the listener is forced to sit through a re-hashed breakdown that he/she has heard 100,000 times before. It’s predictable, it’s boring and it’s so. fucking. overdone. First we had metalcore, with it’s In Flames/At The Gates + breakdowns formula and, according to record execs at all the major metal labels, the next big thing is tech + grind + breakdowns. Apparently some people really dig this stuff.
So basically what I’m saying is this: if I could cut out 15 minutes of breakdowns, this record would be excellent. But every time I 
start really feeling a track, these guys have to break it down. Fortunately, deathcore doesn’t involve hardcore vocals, so at least I’m able to appreciate the other parts a lot more—that is, there’s no talking or attempts at singing to foul up the seriously excellent parts of this album.
There are some serious gems on this record, I’d like to say. The instrumental track, for example, “And Then She Bled” is an excellent track; well-paced, with a really great clip running in the background and some seriously heavy riffing.  The introduction to the track “Something Invisible” also stands out, as well.. only to be offset by crappy groove/breakdown stuff. However, if you’re into Job For A Cowboy and other such flashes in the proverbial pan, I suggest you pick this up. You’ll probably totally eat it up.
