Let’s admit it, Moments In Grace’s first EP was pretty weak. However, opening up “Moonlight Survived” with a radio-friendly and intense “Stratus”, the band starts off on a strong foot. Even though the breakdown seems a little too drawn-out and cheese-ball, the chorus meshes well enough with the instrumentation on the track that most mistakes can be forgiven. “The Patient” uses a lot of the same guitar lines that immediately precedes the track and Jeremy’s vocals seem a little tinny. After the heights reached by “Stratus”, both “The Patient” and “Broken Promises”, while still keeping a common thread with the opening track, feel as if there are a weak facsimile of it. Coming back somewhat strong during “My Dying Day”, the arrangements on the track are what ultimately sink Moments in Grace. Sure, Tim’s drums may be impressive, but everything else is disconnected from the listener base. The mastering by Brian McTernan seems to fall in upon itself instead of stressing the virtuosity by the rest of the band, rending a number of the tracks into jumbled messes.
Each member in Moments in Grace has their time to shine, but the bad thing here is that there is nary a song on “Moonlight Survived” that has the entire back working together to make a magnum opus of a song. A number of tracks show Moments In Grace as being anemic – even a tack like “My Stunning Bride” shows enormous amounts of restraint and a general unwillingness to move to the next level, leaving many of the tracks with a tempo that, while being slightly faster than the average track on pop-radio, still is painfully slow. Moments in Grace may be masters at keeping a cohesive sound to their entire CD, but are dreadfully weak in expanding and innovating with their general sound. “Monologue” still has the wide-open, U2-like guitar licks of “Stratus” and the crooning by Jeremy that finds its way through each and every song.
Where Jeremy’s voice came out as something that “was not done to death on (These Days Will Fade)”, it is killed, buried, turned into a zombie, and then killed again. Each instrument, by the end of “Moonlight Survived” is tired out, its usefulness coming in three or four different riffs or beats. Moments in Grace is palatable in small doses (say an EP) but the same thing iterated 12 things on a piece of plastic does not a disc make.
Top Tracks: Stratus, Distant and Longing Light
Rating: 3.2/10
Moments In Grace – Moonlight Survived / 2004 Atlantic Records / 12 Tracks / http://www.momentsingrace.com / http://www.atlantic-records.com / Reviewed 14 November 2004