CORVUS STONE II

Some bands improve with every effort, while some bands seem to think that they have reached the pinnacle of excellence already. Corvus Stone's debut was incredibly lackluster, seemingly wandering from pretention to botched musicianship in no time at all. In all honesty, when I saw the cover for the second album, simply named "II", I didn't have much hope for it either. Why? Well, this art to me represents an attempt at gaining interest from listeners through sex appeal rather than through great music. Despite all this, I decided to listen to it a few times.

I was correct. Corvus Stone's second effort is incrementally better than their first outing. I actually had hope after the first couple tracks, as some world music influences are apparent here. Yet, the band soon mostly drops these personality earmarks to go off once again into a world of short, meaningless songs; long, grinding tracks; incomplete, immature compositions; and strangely low quality musicianship. The album goes on and on, and I just wanted it to end. In fact, it seems to get worse as it progresses, though this may be my own annoyance with the music, rather than the actual composition.

I would love to know where the band comes up with their track names. It seems like they have a drinking party and then try to come up with the most bizarre names to tag onto songs that literally have nothing to do with the title most of the time. This style is simply not my thing. The tongue-in-cheek, boisterous approach may be something that others enjoy, and I suppose it could be a change of pace. However, I just can't seem to enjoy it. Corvus Stone's "II", however, isn't the worst thing I've heard this year, and it does have some enjoyable tracks in the first half. If you loved the first album, you will love this one, too. That's the highest praise I can give this album.