Extended Plays, or EP's for short, are usually a short little collection of songs that usually stay in the single figures when it comes to the track listings. They're usually a good way to either introduce yourself as a new artist or band and they're also good for filling in the gaps between the recordings of full length albums as it wets the appetite of the fans leaving them excited as they will get a little taster of what to expect from the next album. Sometimes, an artist or a band will take an EP and turn it into album by either re-recording some songs or by taking the existing EP songs and recording a whole bunch of new tracks to meet the requirements needed for a full length album. It's a trend I've seen quite a bit on the music scene lately and one of the latest to do it is a band called BATTALION.

Formed in 2005, BATTALION are a trio of Brazilian Heavy Metal musicians who released a self titled demo in 2007, an EP in 2012 which then became a full length in 2013 and then a new album which is out now but for the purposes of this review, I will be focusing on their debut album "Empire of Dead", which also happens to contain the tracks from their 2007 demo.

It's not uncommon for artists to release album versions of their EP's as I have seen it happen before so it doesn't surprise me in the slightest but the question is, will this debut give me interest to check out their new album which is already out? Let us find out shall we?

Clocking it at around 30 minutes across 8 songs, the album opens up with a heavy and savage fast paced Metal number known as "Invaders" and it pretty much does what it says on the tin as the moment the guitar riffs kick in, they invade your ears with heavy fast paced Metal music. Unfortunately when you hear it you wish it didn't as it sounds a little too heavy and a little too savage for it's own good but then the vocals don't really help either as they sound off to me. I can't explain it properly but the opening song bothers me so in order to really get a better understanding, you'd have to listen to it for yourself to see what I mean.

After this opening song, you hope things improve a little bit throughout the remaining 7 tracks and they do not as the remainder of the songs on this album continue to bother me. I don't know what it is, but they way the guitars and drums have been mixed sounds a little off to me which when combined with the okay-ish vocal performance, makes the melodies sound a little messy and a little hard to enjoy as a result.

I will give it some praise though and say that although the melodies may seem a little too heavy & savage and at times messy, I do appreciate what was done with them as to an extent they can be enjoyable if you focus just on the music alone. The vocals are the main downside for me as they sound really off to me. It's hard really to describe but they sound like they're either trying too hard or forcing themselves to belt out a savage over the top delivery. That's probably not the right way to put it but if you listened to it yourself, you'd probably get what I mean.

Bottom line, the debut album from BATTALION is one that I seem to like and hate at the same time as the musical melodies can be enjoyable to an extent but the okay-ish vocals and the overall sound of the production makes you wish it could have been a little bit better. Give this a listen if you're curious but if you're a little worried about how it sounds, then maybe avoid it for a while.