The Destro: As the Coil Unwinds

Every few years or so, a feisty young band comes along offering a rejection of trends and claiming responsibility for taking heavy metal back to its raw essence. Sometimes it results in success, and sometimes it doesn’t. In the case of the Destro, a pummeling Texan quintet, they strike somewhere in the middle ground. As the Coil Unwinds is written and narrated predominantly in the second person, equal parts convulsive grind and …And Justice for All-era Metallica. Those who’ve been disappointed with Lamb of God’s recent direction should find plenty of brutal satisfaction to be heard here. The fact that they’re signed to Metal Blade says a lot for them in itself, but however uncompromising they’d like you to think they are, they’re not above a metalcore breakdown or throwing in textural surprises on the guitar once in a while a la Meshuggah. Their meaty hooks shouted at full pelt by capable vocalist Eric Daughtry (“River’s bottom! Take me to you!”) may catch on easily, but they certainly haven’t had much thought put into them. Altogether very heavy and generally cohesive, those who aren’t bothered by lowest common denominator metal like this are likely to be unfazed.