Everyone knows at least one purist. You know, those people who want their music to be completely devoid of pop influence, of money, or of anything that interferes with the essence of what they feel the music should be. In this day and age, purists are suffering. Bands are fusing genres left and right, trying out things that haven't been done yet, and generally making categorization a very hard and lengthy process.

Crash Addict is what critics would call "Post Hardcore". They have all the elements of a hardcore band: screaming, hard-hitting riffs, double bass pedal on drums, haunting spoken word sections, and a generally dark, loud sound. But they're "Post Hardcore" because they've also enlisted a great singer who can sing a haunting melodic line well enough to make you shiver.

The concept of that sounds challenging to pull off, and it is. Crash Addict has some songs where it works beautifully, such as the powerful, punchy "So Many Years". The singing that dominates this album is of a hyper-melodic, high contrast style, but on "So Many Years", the singer adopts a harder style which meshes better with the music. Couple that with excellent riffs and an AFI-invoking scream-along section, and you have a rockin song post-hardcore song that everyone can enjoy. Unfortunately, not all the songs here are as inspired. Most have one or two awesome features, then feel normal and/or languid for the rest of the piece (See the screamed bridge from "Amongst Friends", the intro from "Falling From the Inside"). But no song is completely average. The vocals are too good for any one song to completely stink.

Crash Addict is a pretty hard-hitting band who's still discovering their sound. This is a good debut, but it leaves a little more to be desired. Some of these songs will rock your face off...and that's ALWAYS a good thing. They just need to mature and grow some more and they'll be awesome.