Chris and I talk a great deal here about how one of the ways to stand out in a choked and overcrowded musical sphere is to do something familiar really well, and that’s the camp Cage Fight calls into. Is there anything on Exuvia that makes the listener say ‘holy crap, I’ve never heard that before’? No, not really. Instead, the album offers a clever collection of established pieces - thrashy riffs, the relentless cadence of death metal bordering on grindcore, and big, thumping breakdowns like we’re used to hearing from Knocked Loose or Alien Weaponry.
Skip on down to the anthemic “Pick Your Fighter,” and you’ll hear what we’re talking about. Sure, there’s a metal-on-metal crunch to the drawn-out second half of the song, but the big chorus that lends itself to crowds cheering along ties the piece back together. It’s a similar phenomenon to Arch Enemy or the best works of Destrage, that no matter how far the band may go down the rabbit hole, there’s always a comeback hook to put it all back in sync.
Now, the differences between those two bands and Cage Fight are myriad, but the principal one is that while those bands strayed into other, sometimes abstract musical concepts, Cage Fight, when they venture into the unknown, defaults to being heavier than they were a minute ago. ‘Heavier’ is the only word in metal that gets used more than ‘darker,’ to the point where both words have been rendered meaningless, but it applies here. “Un Bon Souvenir,” is the perfect example. There’s a melodic chorus (a rarity on the album, with clean vocals and everything,) but just when it seems like the track might get mired in melodrama, here comes the big 2/4-time breakdown to drag the track into the mud. Which in this case is a compliment.
As the title track rolls around, it would be easy to think Cage Fight has shown all their cards, but this song brings another to the fore - suddenly, Exuvia becomes a melodic death metal record. Where did this come from? Who knows, and who cares, the song works, and provides an important and attention-grabbing change of pace just as the album was otherwise starting to lose its head of steam.
For all that, there is a ceiling to Exuvia. As stated earlier, what Cage Fight is trading on is the ability to be really good at the familiar; as with everything, there are levels to it. To make a poor comparison - Cage Fight is really good at this music, but they are not, for example, as good at what they’re doing as Graveyard is at making blues rock.
In the end, what Exuvia really represents is a summer fling. It’s a great, listenable record with many high moments and some unique puzzle pieces that fit together in interesting ways. It’s an album that the listener will have fun with over the next few months, but by the time the leaves start to turn, attention may divert elsewhere.