REVIEW: The Devil Wear Prada's Color Decay off Rise Records


Growing up as a fan of heavy music The Devil Wears Prada was huge to me. In high school I would listen to their entire discography from With Roots Above and Branches Below and back pretty much everyday. As time went on though I grew less and less attached to the Dayton, OH band to the point that I hadn’t checked in for a few years. That was of course until ZII the follow up to the scene classic Zombie from 2010. For me personally ZII was a project I checked out feeling nostalgic for my lost love but of quality enough that I’d want to check out a new record but for the scene at large the EP left such an impression that whatever the band did afterwards had to be as good or even better and it seems like their eighth record has lived up to the hype.


There is lots to love on Color Decay from the beginning with its grandiose opener in “Exhibition” as well as its pretty memorable single rollout. Co vocalists Mike Hranica and Jeremy DePoyster have a renewed sense of chemistry between them which, delving a bit into the years I’ve not been around for, has felt lost for quite awhile and Hranca specifically sounds better, maybe better than ever. All of this to say; on my first listen through of the record I thought this was the first great TDWP record in over a decade.


However as I delve into repeat listens I start to see the cracks. My biggest criticism of Color Decay is one I can say about a lot of -core releases of the best few years; get about halfway through this thing and it starts to get a little old. Not only does it stagnate even the cuts that are different aren’t worth the side trek; be it “Fire” with its tiring sound clipping or fairly boring attempt at an emo cut. The song “Twenty-Five” also sticks out in a not so great way, sounding like a stale leftover from the band’s record The Act. 


There is a massive exception to side b’s stagnation in “Hallucinate.” This one offers a simple lyrical passage that's presented in new ways with the song's ever evolving instrumental progression. Walking away from the record it might be one of my favorite songs of the genre this year.


I think, to me, where this falls short is that at the end of the day Prada is still a metalcore band and fails to stick out beyond their reputation. Where they, themselves trump other acts is they can carry that quality over for more than a single or two and maybe that’s why they’ve stood the test of time.


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