Changing Tymz – Finish the Race (Album Review)

On today’s platform, we present ‘CHANGING TYMZ’, an American hardrock-metal band. The band consists of Tony Rossi playing drums, Timmy Wysong and Brian Weber playing the guitar and providing backing vocals, Joann E Wolfe providing the main vocals, and Bryan McQuade playing the bass and also providing the backing vocals. Their work often bears them comparison to acts such as Heart, Boston, Megadeth, Black Sabbath, Candlemass, Evanescence, Rush, Queensryche and Dream Theatre. You can read more about their mission statement and artistic philosophy here.

I’m not sure if the bountiful amount of acts mentioned here are done in the name of being precise and expansive when it comes to cataloging music, but there are only so many acts you can cite inspiration and similarity to before it turns into a direct blur before one dips their toes into the music itself. It is stated that they write their music from honest personal views, as well as world perspectives as well as philosophies. It is also claimed that their music will leave you with a positive outlook and train of thought. In this review, we will be analysing their latest release, an album titled ‘Finish the Race’.

Before I get into my analysis of this piece of work, I have to state my case: I come from a background of severe grunge and grit, even though my current produced work deals with newer and more electronic genres. I used to be that girl who swore she was a Riot Grrl in her formative years. As a result, I’m not writing this from a space of prejudice or genre-bias: I understand the genre, and I hope the artists involved in this piece of work also understand this as well. I’m just giving you the honest transcript of what my brain perceives this album as the more I listen to it.

Listen on Youtube Music

The album opens up with a ‘spoken word’ track, titled ‘The Search for Clarity’. The ambient noises are interesting to begin with, and I adore the serious tone given with the strike of the clock, piano trills, and heavy bass. However, the spoken part itself is very badly mastered- almost sounding like an AI-generated nightmare. It sounds like the generic male voice used for voiceovers in AI generated content on Instagram and YouTube. Even if it is a real person doing the narration, the tone and the mastering makes it quite hard for me to really have a pleasant listening experience. I have zero problem with the composition and the instrumentation. In fact, without the narration, it would’ve worked as a decent, poignant work.

As I weave through the album, with tracks like ‘Beyond the Realm’, ‘Enslaved’ and ‘The Fear is Gone’, a grave problem starts to emerge. The main vocals detract from the potential that this body of work has. The instrumentation and composition is top-notch, with fascinating drum patterns emerging throughout the songs. The mastering of each instrument, especially the electric guitars, is decent. The vocals are simply too clean for me to take it as a cohesive hard rock or metal album. Take the second track for example, it starts off with a heavy and seductive guitar track, only for the vocals to change the tone of the whole song. I’m purely imagining the guitar tracks with the nuances of the drum patterns and I think it could definitely have an edge. I especially love the way they push the limits of music with each solo in each song- be it through stretched or elongated notes, or through riffs bearing interesting chords. ‘The Fear is Gone’ has an extremely powerful and enticing call and response sequence between the guitars and the drums, and I appreciate the change in time signature as well.

‘Passion’ simply blew my mind with how much untapped potential Changing Tymz has- the bass, drums, and guitars shine the most in this particular track. When I was extremely fatigued with the structure of the songs being quite similar at this point, the solo and the various polyrhythmic sequences within the drum solo took my attention back. Once again, the only thing holding them back is the tone of the vocalist being way too clean to match the (intended, and good) dirtiness of the backing track. ‘In the Darkness’ did not blow my mind, as I felt like it contained rhythmic cliches that I’ve heard many times in this genre. ‘Changing Times’, however, took me out of my auditory slump with the introductory chords that I did enjoy. The contrast between the 16th notes of the drums and the guitar really did amp me up, but the chorus was quite generic.

‘Shadows’ started with a punchy synthesized sound, elucidated further as a motif. I really, really like the composition of the instrumental of this track. It is genius almost. The varying time signatures between the guitars and the drums give this song a dynamic that it needs, with the synthesizer providing the track with an oomph of excitation. This track is abstractly poignant. I wish they’d release an instrumental of this track, as the instrumentation is utterly perfect. Throughout the album, a small critique I did have with the instrumental was the lack of dynamic variation and panning, making the instruments all sound fairly flat and equal. However, this track had interesting panning and variation. Possibly the best track on the whole album. The solo towards the end seals the deal for me.

Unfortunately, after the high expectations put onto this work through ‘Shadows’, I was not blown away by the tracks afterward titled ‘Foundation’ and ‘Barely Alive’. They contained the same song structure that earlier tracks had- listeners who are not used to metal would be blown away by the syncopation of the drum, but after a while, it doesn’t have an appeal. The same goes with the same structure of inserting a guitar solo. Perhaps, if the vocalist had a bit more of an edge and vocal variation, this could be circumvented.

‘The Light of Day’ then brings some light to my darkness, with oddly, another compositionally genius track. It follows the same reaction I had to Shadow- I like the interplay between various modes of times, attack, sustain, and decay when it comes to the tone of the guitar. There’s glimpses of utter perfection littered throughout this album, which makes me quite upset in a weird way. I wish they had rectified the main problem of the release to make sure the listener gets to experience their superiority at full capacity, with no room for any detraction.

In an interesting turn, I finally see an improvement in the vocalist’s performance in ‘So Far Away’. Her voice finally has a bit of grit, pain, and edge to match the timbre and tone of the song itself. I wish she’d put the same vocal edge to the rest of the tracks. The instrumental, on the other hand, is utterly perfect- it tingles my brain in an oscillatory way, with the way the curled riffs interact with the kicks in the middle of the song.

The final track, Shark Attack (A Grim Attack), ends the album off with a bang with riffs that emanate an exciting rush as if you were on a highway. I think this song would’ve been perfect with a screamo vocalist. The drummer shines the best on this particular track, and the track boasts a very interesting set of dynamics that makes it three dimensional, instead of it being a homogenous blob of audio.

Overall, I have to state the case for ‘Finish the Race’. The potential within this body of work, if harnessed correctly, is almost ethereal. There are glimpses of compositional genius within this album, displayed in songs such as ‘Shadows’ and ‘The Light of Day’. These tracks are genius and set them apart from current hard rock and metal acts, making it where their music can be perceived as competent within these genres but innovative enough to be commercially marketed in this day and age. However, I’m sure they expect this body of work to be analysed as a whole and not just for me to hone in on a couple of songs. They really need to make a decision when it comes to the vocal tone of the vocalist.

I genuinely think it takes away from the ferocity and intensity of most of their songs. It might be a better artistic decision to either keep the songs as instrumentals or to either improve the tone of the vocalist. There needs to be more grit and more energy. She is not necessarily out of tune, but her overly clean tone has made it where most of the tracks are quite unlistenable and this is my honest take. In true punk and rock fashion, you need a slightly gritter or unfathomable tone to help amplify the intensity of the genre and the instruments delivering the genre- or else you WILL lose the edge.

However, I don’t think this problem is unfixable. The compositional structure within these songs are impeccable, and the drummer is extremely competent- I don’t think I’ve heard an underground drummer master the art of switching between time signatures and styles this seamlessly. If the instrumentalists work on musical variability, and add a little bit more dynamics as well as experimentation with the panning, the body of work could definitely be flawless. I’m not saying that to be flattering either, I’m just telling the truth.

I do hope to hear more from Changing Tymz. Any glimpse of talent cannot be ignored, and we must cohesively work to always improve ourselves. The tracks I genuinely recommend from this album are ‘Shadows’, ‘The Light of Day’ and ‘Shark Attack (A Grim Attack)’.

Score/Good: ‘Finish the Race’ is a body of work that shows the untapped potential that Changing Tymz genuinely has. With much improvement, they will succeed as a pioneering act in a new fusion of genres. The body of work is littered with tinges of genius when it comes to drum work and guitar work.

[We rank singles, EPs, and albums on a scale of Poor, Mediocre, Good, Excellent, and Outstanding]

Follow Changing Tymz on:
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Visit their website