Once in a while, you throw in some new music and really, honestly don’t know what to think of it. Is it an inspiring work of art, thrilling and promising, making you one of the few lucky witnesses of a new musical sub-genre or do you have mixed feelings about music that simply doesn’t sound that good and is plainly dull to listen to? I’d like this split between A Day in Black and White and Black Castle to fall in the first category. I listened to it a bunch of time, trying to evaluate everything and anything they give us. From the unique elements both bands are bringing to their distinctive sound, I think I listened to it more than enough to now know its strength and its weaknesses.

And clearly, it doesn’t make the cut in the first category but tends to be in the second without being impossible to listen to. First of all, you get A Day in Black and White. It’s the most straight-forward yet surprising of the two bands. They play a kind of atmospheric metal intro (“In A Groove” as a live recording of the band), followed by a pumped up, shorter and faster “What do you want me to do, sign your freakin’ yearbook?”, reminder of noisecore bands such as Curl Up And Die, with the repetitive guitar riffs and the spastic drumming. The last song is a mix between the short and fast second song and the atmospheric first one… except the fact it’s way longer (over seven minutes). You have some noisy parts mixed with smoother parts. And the same weakness: the sound quality is nearly the same on the three songs. Are the two last songs live? The vocals are way in the back, nearly inaudible. But apart from the technical mistakes, it’s ok. Tough to get a hold of the band, but I can live with it.

Things aren’t getting prettier when it comes to Black Castle. In fact, this band reminds me more of pop-trash and or kitsch bands than anything hardcore. And much of this comes from the “synth” element. In fact, keyboards are so prominent on the entire release that it ruined their whole performance. They sound messier than ADIBAW even though they don’t play as noisy as them. I have to admit: I really have a hard time to listen to bands which heavily rely on keyboards. So this might be the main reason why I don’t get BC. The keyboards are basically taking up where the absence of guitars is felt. Keyboards are everywhere in this band. It might be good to throw in an Halloween party or some gothic disco, but I don’t like it. Other than that, their tunes aren’t that bad. Switch keyboards for guitars, turn up the production quality, hope they practice for a while and try again. Because the multiple vocal attack is nice and the bass lines are solid, they could deserve another chance.

This is not worth it. Bottom line. It’s not exactly bad. It’s experimentation. I’m fully into avant-garde or anything ahead of its time. I must not be enough into this kind of experimentation though. You thought a band like The Disease made a poor use of the keyboards? Try Black Castle. You thought Curl Up And Die were too straight-forward in their noisy screamo? Try A Day in Black and White. But if, like me, you thought that these bands were already on the verge of making a bad step in a wrong direction, stop right now. It might appeal to you as it did to certain individual. It clearly missed with me. I might keep an eye open for A Day in Black and White… but I hope I’ll be sleeping when Black Castle will come back, mostly if they try their luck in the hardcore scene. Play with kitsch bands, play with power pop rock outfits… but don’t think of putting out a split with a metal or hardcore band anymore.