Long associated with the emerging djent scene of the early 2010's, Trace Your Steps have taken quite a long time to collect their efforts into a concise release. While the Between You & I EP showed solid composition and ability, their latest batch seems like a mixed bag of Villains-esque (er... Yüth Forever) efforts and countless ideas thrown into a heaping. pile. Just check out "Animal" and it's instantly noticeable how much these guys just loved Freudian Slip. Everything from the melody in the bridge to the closing riffs scream Chugcore Promotions.
The tracks seem to linger longer than they should, with album opener "Tenfold" bringing just about everything we've heard from the entire scene in one song and surpasses five minutes. It's new and fresh but it seems a bit sloppy and all over the place. What about "Sway" which for whatever reason thinks it's necessary to linger past six minutes? "Adolescent Antidepressant" isn't any different, honing in on an entry level riff we've all heard countless times, before finding a comforting chug to fade away into. This almost brings back to mind Wolves' release Gloom from 2015 that almost followed this exact formula step by step, with songs that dragged on forever without reason. You can check out that recap somewhere in the pile of reviews on The Recently Added.
Trace Your Steps will hopefully get there, but they need order, control and a professional in the band to draw a line in the sand when they've touched on just too many ideas in one song. There are solid melodic efforts and ruthless pummeling that are impossible to ignore, but it's a different direction than their prior outing, and develops a separate identity that wasn't expected. If you've been following the band for a while, prepare to be thrown off just a few lanes to the left if you're looking for the same mind bending, punctual aggression.
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