Fake Heroes - Divide & Rule Review
After the seemingly short period of only 18 months on the music scene and a self funded debut EP in April last year, Fake Heroes hit the ground running with their first full length studio album. After teaming up with Florence based producer, sound engineer and musician Guido Melis in late November 2012, Divide and Rule was released on the independent German label Antstreet records alongside promoters Red Cat Promotions.
The album is described as "solid rock with a hint of classic and Nu-metal" which I'm not sure I totally agree with, but what they do deliver is an amalgamation of songs with a solid sound and impressive vocals. Manuel Gattas English is remarkable to say the least and took me by surprise with his lack of Italian accent. The overall sound is polished and professional backed by Gianni Vespasiani and Del Libeccio on guitar, Francesco Cetrullo on bass and drummer Riccardo Ruiu. The guys clearly have a great chemistry together and who can question it after playing festivals and entering several music competitions in their home land.
Tracks like Anthill and Break The Glass are somewhat reminiscent of A Perfect Circle and I cant help but take note of a similarity to Alterbridge on tracks like FM and Stealing. This makes me consider that they have taken their inspiration mostly from the American post-grunge/alternative rather than the Nu-Metal route even though there are some pretty good metal riffs thrown into the mix particularly on Don't Believe Them. Overall a very catchy album and I couldn't help but grin the whole way through Need of Light. But don't be thrown, there are still a couple of cracking ballads on this album too, especially Between Sounds & Noises
In general this album demonstrates great technical skill and an almost spiritual feeling from this intelligent bunch of musicians. Give it a few listens and I'm sure you'll agree that the future looks quite bright for these five guys from Pescara, Italy. Hopefully they will continue to follow this path rather than move completely into radio friendly soft pop/rock and have an even greater second album.