Nex – Nex

Releasedate: 26-09-2008; Label: Rising Records
By: Nina Mende

Prior to their record deal, Nex took their metal extravaganza on the road, honing their craft by rocking every venue that invited them and gaining new fans all over the UK. A quickly recorded demo CD lead the path to support slots with No Comply, Amplifier, Winnebago Deal and Skindred and airplay on Radio 1 (Steve Lamacq/John Peel). It gained the accolade of ‘Demo of the Week’ on Kerrang Radio and won the ‘National Kerrang K-Fest’ competition which resulted in Nex opening up at Danko Jones’ Manchester Academy gig.

Although this is not the newest album (you can find the review about that one here as well), it is also just released in Germany but actually has been out in the UK since July last year. The album is very hard, the metal elements are combined with punk, the music is fast and there is some shouting. The mix between shouting and melodic singing is well balanced though, so I wouldn’t put this album up as a metal album. NEX’s self titled debut album contains 14 regular songs including a bonus song and seven acoustic songs. The acoustic versions are much calmer without the shouting than the regular ones. Also does the voice feel more complete in the acoustic versions, in the regular ones it doesn’t sound as strong. The balance between hard riffs and the shouting and the melodic vocals and music is keeping this album interesting. The songs are deep, some of the songs I felt like I knew them before which is probably because the album is not completely new and I might have heard them before. I didn’t know what to expect as I had this album along with some others in my mailbox but I am positively surprised and will now be listening to their latest album so that I can tell you about this one as well.

Links:
Nex MySpace