Between The Buried and Me Colors II Review

Between The Buried And Me is a progressive metal band that without a doubt sticks out from other bands in their specific scene or genre. The band have steadily released music since their inception and have almost never disappointed their most loyal fans, regardless of genre or sound change. Below, we’ve explored the newest album from Between The Buried And Me, “Colors II”, which was the sequel to one of the band’s most beloved albums, “Colors”.

Monochrome

“Monochrome” was the beautiful album start that truly set the mood for the rest of the album with its slow intro into a melodic tone from all directions of the band members and by the halfway point in the song, it was transformed into an even more melodic, metal masterpiece.

The Double Helix of Extinction

“The Double Helix of Extinction” was immediately the first song to truly feel like it could have been included on the original “Colors” album. The largest difference between “Colors” and “Colors II” was the clear difference in production. Although most Between The Buried And Me albums have been remastered or remixed since their original release, the difference in production is clear making this possibly one of the oldest sounding BTBAM songs on “Colors II”.

Revolution In Limbo

“Revolution In Limbo” was one of two songs released for the album as singles to promote it and it was certainly the best two songs to pick. “Revolution In Limbo” was one of the best songs to choose to promote the upcoming album as Between The Buried And Me have been known to incorporate longer than average songs on their albums and EPs so with “Revolution In Limbo” being a 9-minute song it was perfect.

Fix The Error

As stated above, two songs were released as singles for the album, one being “Revolution In Limbo”, and the other being this song mentioned here, “Fix The Error”. Not only were both songs individual tracks from the upcoming album but they were also lined up one after the other on the album as they premiered as singles making them the perfect tracks to prelude the sound of Colors II. As mentioned above with song lengths for Between The Buried And Me, while “Revolution In Limbo” was a song that helped showcase BTBAM they also have shorter songs such as the 5 minute “Fix The Error”. While 5 minutes may seem like a slightly beyond average song length, for Between The Buried And Me, it is average song length. Going into our Between The Buried And Me Colors II review, these two songs were the only ones I had heard and after an entire listen I can stay without a doubt they were the perfect songs to reflect the sequels to the BTBAM’s “Colors”. Currently, according to Spotify, “Fix The Error” was the Between The Buried And Me song that had garnered the most plays from “Colors II”, which gave more base to personally rank this song as number one from our Between The Buried And Me “Colors II” review.

Never Seen/Future Shock

“Never Seen/Future Shock” was one of the best examples presented on “Colors II” of Between The Buried And Me separating the same song into several parts while still keeping it on the same track. “Never Seen/Future Shock” finished at a little over 11 minutes making it the second-longest song n the album behind the finishing track, “Human Is Hell (Another One With Love)”.

Stare Into The Abyss

Although while I listened to “Colors II” I wasn’t reminded of the original “Colors” album too often, Stare Into The Abyss was one of a few songs that reminded me very much of “Colors”. Most vocal styles that were presented on “Colors II” were reminiscent of “Colors” but portions of every song bring back some similarities with Colors.

Prehistory

“Prehistory” overall came up as one of the shortest songs on Colors II but was almost two whole minutes longer than the shortest song on the record, “Sgumato” which comes to an end at a total of one minute and nine seconds. While a large portion of Between The Buried And Me’s songs exceed the five, 7, or even 10-minute mark, the band has also been known to use shorter songs as an interlude or notable use of a change in chapters within a set of songs or album as a whole. “Prehistory”, at least for the first half, felt very early metal influenced. Previously in Between The Buried And Me’s music you could hear clear influences from bands such as Metallica, a band that BTBAM has covered on their covers album “The Anatomy Of..”, but here we get more of a melodic side of metal from around that same era as Metallica’s most influential period.

Bad Habits

Within the first few seconds of “Bad Habits” I was reminded, yet again, of an older generation of music with The Eagles and Steve Miller Band cycling throughout my mind while I listened for the first time. This was quickly abandoned for a faster, more aggressive trademark Between The Buried And Me sound. Overall, the entire album is highly reflective of the original “Colors” album from the band, as well as a progression from their previous efforts.

The Future is Behind Us

I have always referred to Between The Buried And Me as modern, progressive metal Rush and once this song had started, my jaw dropped as it was the most Rush-style song that Between The Buried And Me had released. For the song to be released on the band’s most recent album was an even larger shock. Outside of the genre of progressive rock that was Rush, Between The Buried And Me are like them in many ways musically.

Turbulent

Much like “Revolution In Limbo” fading perfectly into the track after it, “Fix The Error”, “The Future is Behind Us” faded perfectly into “Turbulent” making perfect use of old Between The Buried And Me methods mentioned above. Throughout various sections of our Between The Buried And Me “Colors II” review, song length for BTBAM have come up but overall, the band certainly doesn’t try to fit any portion of any song into a larger song or separate them as two, they just do what felt right to tell each album’s story.

Sfumato

As stated above, “Sfumato” was the shortest song on all of “Colors II” but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t as memorable as any other Between The Buried And Me song, it was just more of an instrumental break that wasn’t directly connected to the track before or after it but helped separate the atmosphere between the two.

Human Is Hell (Another One With Love)

Coming in as the longest, and the last song, on the record, was “Human Is Hell (Another One With Love)” at a total of fifteen minutes. The beauty of the longer songs by Between The Buried And Me are the transitions into the next part of the song, which have truly made the songs blend extremely well without being individual tracks. In this method, BTBAM could create an entire album’s worth of story into a single song, in several segments. Overall, for our Between The Buried And Me “Colors II” review,