The Early Chapters by Soilwork is the first EP to be released by the band, and acts simply as you generic five song EP. This release features materials that were previously released, but only to limited markets, as wel as two cover songs and the obligatory live track. For the casual fan of the band, it doesn't really seem like much, but for the devoted fans who may not have already picked up this release, it's a nice companion piece for the collection.
There is essentially two sections of this EP, but they wind up being spaced apart nicely in the long run. First of all, you have the two cover songs that have not appeared anywhere else then on this EP. "Burn" is a cover of the Deep Purple classic, and it's really nothing at all special. The best way to describe this is to consider the band approaching this as Children of Bodom, and including female clean singing at times. "Egypt" follows suit, but doesn't have the additional keyboards, and the screaming is actually very monotone, leaving a lot to be desired of this cover due to the lack of emotion vocally that drives the song in the first place. The music itself is good, but much like with "Burn", it can often feel rushed and even sped up a little more compared to the original, though much of the songs sticks to the original speed.
The second section of songs on here are all bonus tracks from the band's debut album. The only difference is that two of the songs come from the Japanese edition of the album, while "Aardvark Trail (Live)" is just a song that was made available as a bonus song for the album, period. This live track isn't too bad, but the live performance's audio just isn't that great. While it's clearly a more professional recording instead of something raw that a fan recorded, the audio sounds a bit light and hollow. The guitars actually sound conflicting at times when the more melodic aspects of the song come in, as if simply off key, and the bass is practically buried in the mix. This makes for a nice treat, but could have had a better production job to it. The other tracks, however, are studio recordings, but "Shadow Child" winds up being a demo, so the quality is expected to be a little lower then normal, but it's not too bad actually. The song sound very close to the material on the first few Soilwork albums, just a little more raw, and the vocals have more of an echo effect to them. This demo track makes up a good reson to pick this EP up lone, as it shows Soilwork at their strongest at their earliest moments, especially with the inclusion of clean singing on this recording. Of course, "Disintegrated Skies" is another studio track, but is a professional recording. There's nothing all too fantaastic about this song, but for fans of the early Soilwork material, especially those who never heard this song before, it makes a great reason to buy this EP.
So, the only downfalls of this release really lie with the cover of "Egypt", and the shallow recording of the live version of "Aardvark Trail", which is something that could have been fixed with as little as podding up the bass in the recording a bit. For fans of Soilwork, purchasing The Early Chapters is honestly a no brainer, as some of the material here is enjoyable, especially if it's something you haven't heard before. However, acting outside of a dedicated fan's collection, it doesn't really hold anything special for listeners to sink their teeth into. Either way, if you happen to look into this release, you would probably be better off jut buying it used at a cheaper price due to the value of the material here.
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