The Triangle

Issue date: 11/30/07 Section: Arts & Entertainment

Media Credit: www.victoryrecords.com The easiest way to recreate the "Defined by Struggle" album cover is to simply have a friend take a picture of you hunched over and throw it into sepia. Don't forget the pepto!

Media Credit: www.victoryrecords.com They may be no Faith +1, but Nodes of Ranvier still manages to show the faith in songs like "Purpose In Pain" and "Endless Faith."

Here at The Triangle, record companies send us CDs to review and most of those CDs end up in a bin on Dave, the entertainment editor's desk. That is where I came across Nodes of Ranvier's Defined by Struggle.

On a cursory look at the CD case, I noticed the band was on Victory Records, whose current roster includes The Sleeping, Comeback Kid, Bayside, Thursday, Taking Back Sunday and Hawthorne Heights. I was actually surprised to see these bands listed when I looked at Victory's web site. For some reason, in my mind, I equate Victory Records to mediocre metalcore bands that all sound the same. Maybe I don't have the same discerning ear that the execs at Victory have, or maybe kids today don't like music to sound different and Victory is capitalizing on that.

Anyway, these were the thoughts in my head as I started listening to Defined by Struggle. I also briefly wondered if the band was from Scandinavia since their name and a few song titles sound foreign. "Maybe this is just an American release for this Swedish band and Victory is doing the distribution," I thought to myself. I was sadly disappointed when a search led me to the band's MySpace page and the truth is that the band actually hails from South Dakota.

So after I had preconceived as many notions about the music I was about to hear, I actually listened to Defined by Struggle. It was then that I discovered that Nodes is actually a Christian hardcore band. Now, for the purposes of this review I will try not to let that fact influence my opinion, but for those not interested in listening to music about Jesus, Nodes probably aren't the band for you.

Defined started out pretty much like I thought it would, hard driving guitars with some interspersed pinch harmonics and plentiful generic breakdowns. The second track, "Valjean," is probably my favorite of the album. Ignoring the lyrics and going solely on the music, this song is nothing special. I think I like it most, because to the extent that a lot of songs in this genre sound the same, this one isn't bad. It's generic, but I can still get into the song.

After this track however, I didn't find much I liked. In later tracks like "Endless Faith" and "Purpose In Pain," they added in some unison and low vocals that I just didn't like.

All in all, if you are a fan of metalcore and don't mind Christian lyrics, I would say give Nodes of Ranvier a chance, if for no other reason than they have cool name.

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