Phinehas – The Fire Itself (2021)

Phinehas is an American metalcore band formed in Los Angeles, California, in 2001. With five studio albums Phinehas is currently showcasing their latest album released in Aug 2021.

Modern day mixing :) Drums sounding larger than life is often the after sought goal to get a full-bodied mix. Not uncommon in metalcore where the aim is to hit you hard and heavy with a massive low-end and maximum energy and punch. It is quite common to use so called one-shots particularly when enhancing the kick and snare drum. One-shot is a single sample that is hitting at full velocity at all times. Making sure every hit comes through even and at same velocity on every hit. This is done to avoid unbalance in the listening experience. Which at the same time contributes to the robotic feel on the drums. One-shots is what the name implies “one” shot meaning, it´s one single hit without randomization or different velocities. While regular samples have multiple layers sampled, velocity range sampled from soft to maximum hits giving the sampled track a more natural feel. This even feel, at times robotic sounding mixes is mostly the reason to the digital and everything mixed to the grid derives from. In essence what´s inhuman and robotic is the optimal scenario for a clean and balanced mix. The more on point everything is adjusted in terms of fixing everything to the grid and using even velocities (max) on drums to avoid any natural dynamics will make a very clear mix. The slightest movement in drums, where you have uneven snare hits against the kick (flams), and where they aren´t landing exactly on the beat will create a sense of business in technical terms. That´s a brief attempt to explain the technical aspect why this is a thing these days. In order to get loud mixes, you need enhancement like samples, to clean it up more, mix everything to the grid and take out the human flow and you have 98% of today’s modern metal bands. I guess I´m pretty old school, I enjoy a lot of the older stuff that sounds unpolished but still managed to create massive sounding albums. With that said I do enjoy a lot of these modern-day metal bands as well. It´s all a part of the ever changing and evolving ways of creating music I guess. 

So, what´s my thoughts about Phinehas – The Fire Itself?  The album opens up with a nice acoustic guitar intro which turns into a pretty generic sounding heavy intro. The heavy kick is immediately highlighting the issue I was describing earlier. A very modern production highlighting all the for mentioned issues. The drums are a on the heavy side in the mix for my taste, they are full and thick which is good but maybe a tad too loud. Especially on double kick patterns or where the kick is quite constant It feels like I´m losing focus on the vocals and guitars. Some automation on those passages would´ve helped a lot. But that is also a very thin line to balance on, if lowering the kick, or sometimes the riding crash cymbals in a groove with just as much as 0,5-1db at any direction can alter the overall feel incredibly much. The overhead cymbals too low on top of a heavy groove will lose its power and drive. Cymbals too loud will drown the vocals etc. But in this case some kick automation should´ve been done. 

I´m not really sure if I can pinpoint the guitar sound being amp sim or not. I get a feel of amp sim at times but at times it sounds real. The intro on “Holy Coward” is a good spot to try and determine that. I would go with that it is real amp and I get a Children of Bodom sound at times. It sounds very much like an ENGL amp. But I could very well be wrong. So let´s just say I don´t know, hehe. 

Overall, some nice grooving riffs with the common scream/clean alternating vocals. Nothing that sticks out. It´s well played and well executed.  I really enjoy the vocalist, he has a versatile voice, using different registers and techniques with the growls. The clean vocals sound really good as well. After a somewhat mediocre opening track I liked the second track being the title track “The Fire Itself” a lot more and that felt like a well-executed metalcore track. However, I would personally not label this as purely Metalcore, it has moments of that but I´d place this more into the melodic metal corner with harsh vocals on top making it melodic deathmetal with touches of core I guess. The album is filled with riffing what I refer to as the modern wave of US melodic death metal. As bands like KSE and friends. Only problem I have is that it lacks the roughness compared to the original being the old school Swedish bands came forth with in the 90´s. This sounds too happy and polished compared to the awesome old school In Flames or Arch Enemy albums. The most serious is largely due to a production aspect. Modern day tight, lifeless versus old unpolished, real amps unpolished, not edited to the grid.

One further issue I have with the overall sound is when you take the title track “The Fire Itself” and a song like “Holy Coward” they represent two different genres to me. Where “Holy Coward” gives me a lot of certain COB vibes whilst the title track is more Metalcore like. “Holy Coward” is more traditional heavy metal driven, with leads and all what comes with that. I´m not saying you can´t mix those but I would´ve aimed for a more fluid combination mixing these different influences and not such distinct different sounding songs. If I would randomly hear the different songs out of context, I don´t think I´d be able to place it as the same band. To me it doesn´t create a coherent sound or red line through the album, instead a bit unorganized sound wise. Still, many of the songs are quite good and well written if one were to just evaluate each song independently. However the impression of incoherent, stays when put together into one album. 

Regardless of the somewhat harsh critique, I do have cherries I´ll take with me. Great vocalist, versatile in use of techniques. Fair share of cool riffs. Favorite song: the title track. If you´re into this genre, I´d definitely consider giving these guys a spin or two. I´m gonna check the rest of their catalogue now.