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Stars Are Falling / Skylines

Blood & Ink Split Series: Vol. 1
2005
Blood & Ink

Stars Are Falling / Skylines - Blood & Ink Split Series: Vol. 1 (Cover Artwork)


Review by: Anchors
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Published on August 26th 2005

Let me make this perfectly clear for everyone. No, your heart isn’t bleeding. No, your eyes aren’t tearing. And no, stars are not falling. What’s actually happening is, 18-year-olds all over the country brought up on a steady diet of Senses Fail and Bleeding Through are starting their own bands. And who’s worse off for it? Anyone in earshot, really.

This album is just like when you’re at the bar with your friends, and you see a gorgeous girl at the other end of the room with a completely hideous friend. Stars Are Falling and Skyline have combined their powers of bad riffs and worse singing on this split CD, to form the musical equivalent of that hideous friend.

All the elements are so perfectly in place, it achieves a level of bad that is so complete, so thorough, you almost want to admire it. Almost. Long, clichéd, nonsensical song titles (“Who Needs London Anyway,” “The True Comedy Of A Self-Righteous Man”), screaming that grates the ears, and singing that cuts directly through them. It’s all a bit overwhelming. It’s rare that a band can streamline their horrible approach quite this well. To be this believable of a carbon copy, these bands must have listened to every bad metalcore band that features an off-key singer, and just memorized each chord, each verse, each bridge, and each, awful, awful lyric.

There’s not even so much as a point to differentiate between Stars Are Falling and Skylines, because the transition between each band's respective half is so seamless, so close, that you’d be hard pressed to tell that they’re different bands at all. Breakdowns reside at the same point in songs, the nerve-trying singing appears in the same sections, and the lyrics are uniform enough between the two bands to think it’s all just the diary of an angsty 15-year-old goth kid from the suburbs. That girl in their Algebra class didn’t return their note, and their parents switched from DirectTV to satellite, and that warrants bad poetry:

A frantic collage of distorted love songs / Play back like conditional closed circuit stranglings / Almost bringing tears to my eyes / Now we’re lost again / We’re lost again / You’ll find me on my knees
What’s amusing about that particular song is that it’s not actually a song at all. The first half of those lyrics belong to Stars Are Falling, with the latter half belonging to Skylines. You’d never know the difference; almost any lyric on this split is interchangeable with any others. It’s like one horrible, cliché mix-n-match. No matter how hard I may try, I simply cannot say enough bad things about this split. I’ll listen to some metalcore, but this, this wouldn’t sell if they got a distribution deal at Dollar General.






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    Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, September 18, 2005 at 3:58 AM (EDT)
    My Score:

    Wow all of u losers have way to much time on your hands to be tearing apart bands that really love to play and preform. Maybe if any of u had any bit of creativity in you u could form a band and attempt to write anything that will become closely as succesful as this ep was. Why dont u guys stop hating on bands and get a fucking life you douche bags.
    All you motherfuckers are gonna pay, You are the ones who are the ball-lickers. We're gonna fuck your mothers while you watch and cry like little bitches.we're gonna make u eat our shit, then shit out our shit, then eat ur shit which is made up of our shit that we made 'em eat. Then you're all fucking next.

    Posted by SilentStorms on 2005-09-02 12:13:07

    Holla at the guy down dere who said new term for screamo - how's about emo-power violence? That sounds weird, but that's what the labels of bands like La Quiete, June Paik, Phoenix Bodies, and Louise Cyphre are calling it. Oh, so yeah, check out foreign 'screamo' too, it's mind boggling.

    Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, September 1, 2005 at 4:27 PM (EDT)

    it's too late. screamo is these bands now. its long gone, they took the word, give it up

    Posted by stevejonestherealbones on 2005-09-01 10:28:56

    well, Screamo is one of the stupidest genre names ever conceived...so maybe you should stop degrading good bands by labeling them as screamo, and leave the shittastic genre name to the fagtastic bands

    - jones the bones

    - stevejones8770@yahoo.com

    Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, August 31, 2005 at 6:28 PM (EDT)

    i'm tired of people labeling bullshit like this screamo.

    can we come up with another term?

    I mean, shit! Screamo is stuff like Saetia, Spirit of Versailles, Joshua Fit For Battle, Hot Cross, and Yaphet Kotto.

    word.

    Posted by Anchors on 2005-08-31 11:07:35


    From what I discern from all of the self-importance and general aura of your reviews, you're a really shallow person.

    This kind of relates to "emo" because, the overwhelming majority of the time, "emo" or "screamo" kids like Anchors merely pretend to give a shit about others with their flowery lyrics, but turn out to be ugly little scene kids.

    Keep rockin' Syracuse.

    Discern, assume, and guess all you want from my reviews. If you want to think I'm shallow based on what I say about an album, go for it champ. Have a field day.

    And I like the part about "screamo kids", really, good stuff. Now, would you care to explain to me the connection with caring about people, being ugly, and flowery lyrics? Maybe it's just because I'm not 17 anymore, and don't know everything, but I fail to see how any of those are remotely related. I'm sure you have some terrific, convoluted answer just waiting for me though.

    And keep talking like you know a damn thing about Syracuse. You know, because you being in Kansas City and all makes you the expert on it.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 30, 2005 at 8:52 PM (EDT)

    "Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but pretending to give a shit about faux sexism isn't going to get you laid"

    From what I discern from all of the self-importance and general aura of your reviews, you're a really shallow person.

    This kind of relates to "emo" because, the overwhelming majority of the time, "emo" or "screamo" kids like Anchors merely pretend to give a shit about others with their flowery lyrics, but turn out to be ugly little scene kids.

    Keep rockin' Syracuse.

    -Will

    Posted by theundergroundscene on 2005-08-30 19:36:39

    this week is cd-covers-with-half-bodies-holding-shit week!!!!

    see life in your way too

    Posted by Anchors on 2005-08-30 16:45:55

    Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but pretending to give a shit about faux sexism isn't going to get you laid.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 30, 2005 at 3:33 PM (EDT)

    I love the recurring theme of sexism present in reviews and comments on this web site.

    I'd be glad to take part, but you know, my mom never beat me, so...

    -Will

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 30, 2005 at 10:57 AM (EDT)

    Dude that guy on the cover totally looks ripped off from Sleep Station's album "Hang in There, Charlie"... But that too was probably ripped off.
    Sleep Station is yum.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 30, 2005 at 4:57 AM (EDT)
    My Score:

    Yes, mad Anchors is far superior to whimsical Anchors. Get angry!

    Posted by yayforapathy on 2005-08-30 02:16:12
    My Score:

    Score is for lossing the randomness of the first paragragh. I didn't mind it, but I didn't laugh at it either.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 30, 2005 at 1:21 AM (EDT)

    christ almighty, yet another shit-fest. oh how i love carbon copies that no one will ever care about.

    -phdecontrol

    Posted by stevejonestherealbones on 2005-08-30 00:36:33

    This album is just like when you’re at the bar with your friends, and you see a gorgeous girl at the other end of the room with a completely hideous friend.

    uh, from your review, it seems more like, when you walk into a bar and sit down for a drink, then look around and notice that every girl in the bar is the hideous friend...

    no hot friend in site

    - jones the bones

    - stevejones8770@yahoo.com

    - no offense to you hideous ladies out there

    Posted by Archangel on 2005-08-30 00:12:58

    The introductions are making more sense. Good job, Anchors!

    Posted by psychoos231 on 2005-08-30 00:06:54
    My Score:

    so many low scores

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