Band:	Miksha
Album:	Collect Your Hazardous Waste
Style:	Industrial metal
Release date:	February 18, 2005
A review by:	Undercraft

01. Locomotive
02. Reflect, Conclude, Return
03. Beautiful War
04. Concept Bi-Polar
05. What Fight
06. Win / Win
07. First In Line
08. Behind The Scenes
09. So Solid
10. The Hunger
11. The Coop
12. Sedated

Electronic Metalcore?

Here's a band with a funny name, Miksha. While the name may seem taken from one of Hello Kitty pals, it really means "hammered out of metal" in ancient Hebrew, what is a Norwegian Industrial Metal band is doing with a ancient Hebrew name? I don't have the slightest idea, but hey, at least the name means something.

As I stated before, the band plays Industrial Metal with some electronic bits here and there, musically this is very "modern-sounding", that is, some Metalcore slipped in into the mix. The band manages to mix powerful riffs with crazy musical landscapes, bleeps, beeps, among other cool effects.

The best feature of the album listening how the industrial/electronic sounds fool around with the music, they intertwine in a deadly tango from the obvious electronic sample to some lees obvious sounds in the background. Some keyboards add some texture to the music too.

The downer of this album is the whole Metalcore influences, of course, the opinion comes from someone that doesn't like Metalcore that much, so if you like Metalcore, don't waste your time reading my rants, but if you want to know my point of view?.

What's wrong with this? Mainly the vocals, they lack aggression, we get here the typical angst-driven Metalcore screams, what's wrong with a grim shriek or a fierce growl? Shouts and screams won't do it for me.

First 2 songs "Locomotive" and "Reflect, Conclude, Return" are powerful, dynamic songs that emanate a lot of energy, great songs, but in track 3 things go downhill "Beautiful War" sounds like Limp Bizkit went industrial, that was the song that ruined the experience, at least for me. Of course there are other songs that caught my attention, "Concept Bi-polar" and "Win/win", those are prime examples of what the band can achieve when they're inspired.

Anyway, if you don't dislike Metalcore as me, you definitively will dig Miksha, if you like Industrial music you'll dig this too, as for me, I really liked this but lacked a little more aggression in the vocal department, screams don't do it for me, and for you?