Close Your Eyes – Empty Hands and Heavy Hearts

Releasedate: 25-10-2011; Label: Victory Records
By: Sabine van Gameren

Close Your Eyes is a Melodic Hardcore formation from USA. They knew how to surprise people with their debut album “We Will Overcome” and are now back with “Empty Hands and Heavy Hearts”.

The Americans have known how to surprise and with this release they prove themselves once again, Melodic Hardcore on a thin layer next to Punk the band quite eagerly mixes around with the style a bit. Quite heavy guitars combined with the lighter vocals that have enough power in the screams to overcome the high school attitude and have mature sound. The songs on the album are quite varied which keeps entertained quite well, yet the band managed to keep a red thread in their sound that binds it all. Little elements as closing the album with a choir makes it all a bit more outstanding as well.
Whether it is the intense “Paper Thin” or the more powerful song “Wolves” the guys seem to be able to bring their message across quite well. “Empty Hand and Heavy Hearts” is a pleasant release and will perhaps cross some borders here and there. A release that will find fans from Punk to Hardcore listeners, worth to have in your collection.

Line Up:
Shane “BooBoo” Raymond – Vocals
Brett “DayDay” Callaway – Guitar and Vocals
Andrew “Goofy” Rodriguez – Guitar
Sonny “Spider” Vega – Bass
Tim “Gumby” Friesen – Drums

Tracklist: 01. Hope Slips Away (The World Is Ours to Change) 02. Empty Hands 03. Erie 04. Valleys 05. Injustice 06. Paper Thin 07. Wormwood 08. Keep the Lights On 09. Carry You 10. Wolves 11. Scars 12. Heavy Hearts

Links:
Close Your Eyes Facebook