Previous RØRY has been on the heavier side of electro pop. As someone who always enjoyed RØRY’s music, especially their live shows, I was always frustrated at how much vocal effect was used – denying us the chance to hear their natural voice. This is generally a source of controversy, with haters claiming that “anyone can be a pop star with this amount of autotune”. However, for anyone who is a fan or has seen RØRY live, they will know that they, in fact, have a strong voice and the effects are more for “artistic taste”. I was excited to see what happened with the new album, to see if there were any changes.
With this in mind, I settled in for some autotune-style voice effects and dirty pop. With the rather dark introduction of [welcome to the bloodletting], “Degradation” hit me in the face with metal riffs, with Rox’s fry screams mixed with their singing melodic metal. Followed by “Swallow’’, with strong language and a strong rap section, it feels like RØRY is really letting loose.
Bringing the energy back down with what felt like a very personal song, “A Cure For Cancer” brings the tone back down – with the more natural singing style, the autotune and effects are back. This quickly transforms back to the metal screaming, interspersed with melodic singing through a heavy level of the RØRY vocal effects.
Previously released “Kids These Days” is a modern take on a tongue-in-cheek nu metal track, fully engrossed in irony, which enjoyably has been missed by a lot of people listening to it.
The majority of the rest of the album is a mix of this modern pop and metal crossover, with songs such as “Dead Girl Walking“; there is almost a melodic metal feel and heavy vocal effects; it feels like Rox has joined Alter Bridge for the second half of the album.
Standing out amongst the rest of the album is a beautiful ballad-esque song called “Hometown” – a beautiful song about a difficult relationship with their home. You can tell that there is a lot of history with Southampton and the feelings are strong throughout, ending on a powerful statement: “Tonight I’m coming back”.
This record has been quite difficult to review. As a fan of the artist both as a person and musically, I feel a weird sense of pride in the honesty and openness that has been brought to this record. There is a lot of power in RØRY’s creativity, bearing their soul and screaming out all the pain in a way that really connects like a painful therapy session. As someone who isn’t a fan of vocal effects generally, I love that this has been added as part of the style and creativity – in fact, it feels like a “screw you” to all the haters.
As an album, I think it is a bit more difficult. As a metalhead, there are definitely some metal bangers that will be on my playlist. However, I fear the culture clash from Degradation, and it’s inevitable mosh pits compared to their existing audience of largely modern, pop fans. As far as songs go, the quality of production and musicality is there, but the extremeness of the style may leave some of the existing fans behind.
