Melbourne party-starters Ocean Grove get weird in both good ways and bad on album number four…
In ODDWORLD, the riffs are loud, the party spirit’s high and the freak flags fly at full mast. This is Ocean Grove’s universe, and the philosophies that rule it were even put to paper in a detailed manifesto when they released their 2017 debut The Rhapsody Tapes. Now on album four, plastering this word on the album cover feels like a renewed statement of the Melbourne crew’s identity. The irony is, however, that at points the record lives up to its name in the opposite way from which it intended.
Ocean Grove’s knack for cranking out the sort of bangers that make you want to pour yourself a pint and buy a one-way ticket somewhere sunny has arguably never been appreciated enough. Nonetheless, they’ve not stopped churning them out. The monstrous chorus of FLY AWAY, for example, embraces the oversized swagger of nu-metal for a huge slice of stank-faced fun – with turntable scratches thrown in for shits and giggles. Elsewhere, the hazy RAINDROP has the feeling of a warm fever dream and MY DISASTER smashes together razor-sharp riffs with a fuzzy chorus that draws out a feeling of chaos.
On the other hand, it can be a little overblown. The bolshy CELL DIVISION is a few shades away from greatness, weighed down by overproduced riffs while its opening statement ‘It’s the rhythm, it’s the sound / Of the Oddworld underground’ is as cheesy as it sounds written down. It’s repeated with the mawkish STUNNER, an attempt to flirt in song that would probably not result in its subject giving out her number (‘You got me hollering / ’Cause I wanna know what you’re feeling / You’re a chemical I’ve been needing’), while OTP is a clunky, forced attempt at what is presumably meant to be trap metal.
Although their essence and character remains ever-present as they swerve between sounds, Oddworld is more inconsistent than most of Ocean Grove’s discography. Somehow, it’s both mosh-worthy and a little cringeworthy.
Verdict: 3/5
For fans of: Limp Bizkit, Turnstile, BLACKGOLD
ODDWORLD is released on November 22 via SharpTone
