3 out of 5

Label: Level Plane

Produced by: Kurt Ballou

Moments of utter genius fuzzed over simply from how damn busy the album is.

Gospel, like a lot of Level Plane releases, succeeds thanks to gusto.  Of course, you also have Kurt Ballou recording things, which generally helps, but his volume-focused approach here actually makes it harder to get a handle on things.  Still, Gospel’s punk-infused hardcore and, uh, prog explorations are undeniably able to amp up a listener, even if the snatches of lyrics that are heard don’t seem to cut too deep, or the riffs that are played with speed and skill don’t break new ground.  What does break new ground is that italicized description above: when Golden Dawn’s back half swells into sudden keyboard flourishes and finger-tapping guitar scales, vocalist Adam Dooling still screaming along, the mad mash-up of hardcore and King Crimson has been born.  But it’s simply not fleshed out enough: moments of this crop up here and there, but the group keeps swinging back to more standard noise-laden punk, preventing those unique grooves from really taking hold.  Ballou’s maximized production has its usual fidelity – all the pitter-patter drum rushes and guitar interplay are clear – but whereas that works for Converge, who have a vocalist and set of players who naturally offer a more dynamic range of tones and sounds, Dooling tends to shout in a single register, and most of the songs, similarly, play out in a sort of medium range of chords that ends up making most tracks fairly interchangeable.

When there’s some patience with a build-up, such as on opener Congratulations…You’ve Hit Bottom, or the instrumental Opium, things are incredibly promising; combined with some of the aforementioned proggy moments – a combination which unfortunately never quite happens on the disc – we could’ve had something great.  Gospel was, perhaps, an album away from getting there, but ’twasn’t meant to be.