Rating:

2004's Panic in the Skies accomplished a level of grandstanding from emo/post-hardcore/metal diehards, producing minor rock radio hits like the pensively written, romantic ode "Half of 8" and the slit-wrist painful "Harakiri." The album's most sacred revelation more than its music was Alexis Sarmiento's crafty poetic sensibilities, which is far from thwarting and awful just like most emo lyrics.

After those stellar write-ups and raves, the effort to topple the success of Panic in the Skies must have challenged PDTS to gear on a charismatic departure from the debut record's strident, fueled intensity. The Campaign to Capture, their brand new album still maintains its action-packed histrionics, paranoid hardcore grooves and technical well-verse but leaves more space for sonic punk rock energy, melodious singing and less of wailing and the guttural shrieks which they are known for.

Although furious and promising, The Campaign to Capture has abandoned the distinct lyrical profundity of its debut and instead maximizes on bigger, gloomier concept of an epic war whose storyline from beginning to end is pretty conventional. It's like Final Fantasy or Black Hawk Down on defiant sonic blast, only that it is poetic and less visual. But as they say it in music scores – it's the atmosphere that lets you feel the most more than anything else. In PDTS' The Campaign to Capture, it's also their drive to make you listen to their hurtful but thriving stories that passes off for commendation, even though the whole saga accounts relativity with almost all war films with machine guns, suspense plots, and what else of blood and gore. Think of Coheed and Cambria, minus the cheese, the prog-rock virtuosity and the annoyingly whiny vocals.

Each tracks in the album serves as chapters, with a flashback narrative account evident on opener instrumental title-track "Campaign to Capture" which serves as the introductory sample to the finale "A Halt to hallucination," also an instrumental track with moody and sober vibes. "The Elements of fire," "Flowing lakes and kindness," "Dogfight (He who fights true stands forever)" and "The Elexir must be consumed" represent the early fight scene stages, where sturdy dynamics becomes rapid, intense and more action-packed. The well-calculated marriage of double guitars with aggressive but catchy beats, the nice shift from steady punk to aggressive and the incorporation of gang vocals and sax interlude ("The Elexir must be consumed") makes the build-up of musical dimension to the war visual - more exciting and more car-of-a-chase to watch.

The time you reach "Transmission to Error," "Trapped in flames between gardens and meadows" and "Sights reminiscing falling," "We stand together on the grounds of doom" and "A 5 day dance with danger" – the emerging climax materializes problem concerns, defeat and victory. "Closer (In the memory of those who leaves us behind the battle)" is the album's most melancholic moment and also its centerpiece. It's a nice little tribute enough to break hearts and bring sunlit smiles to our faces.

The story goes on with the victory prelude "Waves Calling to Embrace,' a quirkily done hardcore and noise that combines rhythmic genius with tambourines, percussions and jumpy chorus-quality; the pop-metal shtick of "Liberty to the Prisoners of the sun" which connotes triumph and success on the long war; and the celebration cum tribute of sorts, "An anthem for those who survive."

 In just 54 minutes, the epic saga of The Campaign to Capture challenges you to sit on the corner and listen to its unraveling success story. The storytelling might just be plain, lackluster and banal – who cares? It's the whole listening experience to die for, in the first place.