Escape the Fate - I Am Human

I’ll give that this style is another cup of tea that I just don’t like the taste of (not very emotional, high school scene kid emo with wimpy Blink 182 vocals), but I’ve been able to get past the elements of it that show up in work from other bands and on I Am Human, I really didn’t find very much redeeming for Escape the Fate in terms of that style. However, it did end up being a better experience than what I thought I was in store for.
I’d really rather keep this one short, both because I acknowledge my bias against the style of course played a huge part in me not liking a lot of the core of this album and because I don’t want to tear into this album quit like I’ve torn into too many albums this year already because it doesn’t really deserve it quite like Ministry or Black Veil Brides did.
To put it in terms of other recent music, this album is kind of like a combination of both of the latest Three Days Grace and Black Veil Brides releases, though I think this came out above both of them with a few gems the band can be proud of. “Empire” and the occasionally Korn-esque “Recipe for Disaster” are decent aggressive alternative metal bangers with some glitchy electronic backing on the former that helps out the crunchy guitars underneath, and “If Only” is a well-executed emo ballad that I could see having “Never Too Late” status into the future if it’s lucky. “Do You Love Me” is another one of the more tolerable tracks with a little bit of bite in the guitars, and “Let Me Be” is a pretty alright ballad-y closer.
It’s pretty formulaic and it features a few token callbacks to the band’s older sound, but it’s not so cookie-cutter I find myself tearing my hair out, except maybe to the low-bar lyrics of the title track.
While Three Days Grace’s last album was sadly devoid of fresh ideas and Black Veil Brides’ album this year was disgracefully phoned in, Escape the Fate at least sound like they had a lot they wanted to do on this album, and some of it was pretty invigorating. It still has far too many emo-metalcore crooners to warrant me ever getting through it start to finish again, but I could see a number of these tracks being worth revisiting. Lastly, I know I’m not the one the band is trying to please with this record and I know that what sounds annoying to me is a part of the music to the band’s fans, and honestly this album is better than I thought it would be and better than some albums I expected more of this year. 
Salute to Escape the Fate, keep doing what you’re doing, even if not all of it is for me.

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