I have to admit, I have pretty much ignored Trap Them until now.  They just have one of those names that sounds really modern, and until recently I have never really seen them associated with any sort of metal that I like.  There are just so many metal bands these days that it is easy to ignore one of them for what amounts to really superficial reasons.  I only had to hear about 5 minutes of Darker Handcraft to realize that I have been missing out on a really cool band.  Trap Them are not at all what I had expected, reminding me once again that we should never judge a book by its cover.

Trap Them’s sound is pretty simple to describe.  They build their music around a foundation of fast punk inspired rhythms, sort of similar to what Disfear are doing. Things start to get interesting when they combine that simple punk foundation with  a heaping helping of death n’ roll style groove.  There is a massive To Ride, Shoot Straight And Speak The Truth vibe here, but Trap Them manage to create their own identify by maintaining a connection to their hardcore/punk roots.

Darker Handcraft starts off with a nice one two punch in “Day 42: Damage Prose”, and “Day 44: Slumcult & Gather“.  These songs are both aggressive and catchy, giving a very good indication of what the majority of the album will sound like.  Trap Them do mix things up a little bit by favoring one aspect of their sound over the other in a few select songs.  “Day 43: Evictionaries” focuses on a slow pit stomping groove,  while on “Day 35: Saintpeelers“, and “Day 37: Sovereign Through the Pines” we see Trap Them employ a  blistering, almost grindcore attack.  The ability to shift the focus within their sound keeps the tracks from bleeding together, and allows the more balanced songs to really stand out.  Musically, everything is tight, and nothing seems out of place.  The vocals straddle the line between a death growl and a yell, and while they are a bit one dimensional, they are also an extremely good fit for the music.

All things considered, I feel pretty comfortable calling Trap Them a death n’ roll band.  I suspect that more went into the development of their sound than them hearing a couple of old Entombed albums though.  You can certainly tell that these guys came from more of a hardcore/punk background, but the end result is still very similar to what people were calling death n’ roll in the mid 90’s.  I have always like this style of music, and there was never really enough of it released for it to become tired.  Darker Handcraft probably isn’t a great album, but it is a rock-solid release that taps into a style that has largely been forgotten.  This is actually a very similar take on the style to what Black Breath did last year with their album Heavy Breathing, so anybody that likes that album will want to give this one a go. 

TRACK LISTING

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*Comments:

1.  Day 42: Damage Prose
2.  Day 44: Slumcult & Gather
3.  Day 41: Every Walk a Quarantine
4.  Day 43: Evictionaries 
5.  Day 32: All by the Constant Vulse
6.  Day 34: Sordid Earnings
7.  Day 33: The Facts 
8.  Day 35: Saintpeelers 
9.  Day 46: Manic in the Grips 
10.  Day 37: Sovereign Through
       the Pines
11.  Day 47: Drag the Wounds Eternal
12.  Day 36: Scars Align

Total playing time:  31:05

Release Date: March 1, 2011
Label: Prosthetic Records

Trap Them - Darker Handcraft

Reviewer: Garett

June 4, 2011