Prey for Sleep

… A Bitter Beginning

Metal alchemy produces mostly unstable results, but Prey for Sleep measures out uncompromising modern mayhem admirably classic within the genre’s table of elements. Hunter Townsend’s vocal evisceration manages an emotive afterimage, while guitarists Jason Powell and Matthew Carey unleash firestorm rhythms in sheets of penitentiary height. Only Dave Swanson’s kick drums punch up low in an otherwise unsinkable mix. Multiple movements of “Death to Reason,” epic at 3:28, shift into overdrive on the succeeding “Bridges Were Meant to Be Burned,” whose precision thrust climaxes on Townsend’s lashing, “You failed, you failed, you failed us all.” The title track kiss-off (“Promise me that you’ll never speak again”) heaves two minutes of scorched earth; “Empires of Blood and Lust” surges next with an unrelenting swarm of barely two minutes. “Reborn,” medieval fate through contemporary surrender, rams home the local quartet’s galloping pummel. Ten fusillades in 25 minutes, … A Bitter Beginning, but a happy ending.

***.5

This article appears in January 18 • 2008.

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San Francisco native Raoul Hernandez crossed the border into Texas on July 2, 1992, and began writing about music for the Chronicle that fall, debuting with an album review of Keith Richards’ Main Offender. By virtue of local show previews – first “Recommendeds,” now calendar picks – his writing’s appeared in almost every issue since 1993.