Album review: Seven Hours After Violet – Seven Hours After Violet

Speaking to Kerrang! last month, Shavo Odadjian explained one of the things he wanted to avoid in his latest project, Seven Hours After Violet. “I just don’t want to seem like I’m regurgitating it and riding my own coat-tails,” he told us. The 'it' in question is, of course, System Of A Down, the band he’s been the bassist of since 1994. The Armenian-Americans cast a shadow longer than Shavo’s iconic plaited beard, and given this is his first non-SOAD project that’s straight-up metal, it’s a highly valid concern.

To say that Seven Hours After Violet have failed in that mission isn’t to say they’ve failed as an enterprise. No-one listening to this self-titled debut’s opening track, Paradise, could say that its jagged riffs, incessant pace and dreamy interludes are unfamiliar. Same with the second track, Alive. It’s no coincidence that both have been singles, to attract listeners wanting to something akin to System, given they haven’t released any new music in four years (and even that was just two tracks, 15 years after their previous album). Meanwhile, it’s fascinating to get a sense of what Shavo brought to that band via these songs.

Those are select moments, though. Elsewhere, the presence of Shavo’s collaborator, Winds Of Plague guitarist/producer Michael ‘Morgoth’ Montoya, is more keenly felt, with Sunrise and Glink’s riffery heavy in an entirely different way to the aforementioned singles: crushing, unwieldy and very much their own kinds of monster. Credit is also due to vocalist Taylor Barber, from Atlanta deathcore outfit Left To Suffer, whose vocal dexterity embellishes the seismic twists and turns.

Overall, then, Seven Hours After Violet’s debut does more than enough to stand firmly on its own, while including just enough flashes, unintentionally though they may be, of System’s style.

Verdict: 3/5

For fans of: System Of A Down, Bad Omens, Korn

Seven Hours After Violet is released on October 11 via Sumerian