When Everything Falls — Haste the Day

Haste the Day's When Everything Falls came out on Solid State on 28 June 2005. It's twelve tracks and runs just under thirty-six minutes. Garth Richardson produced and engineered it, Dean Maher and Josh Wilbur mixed it and Howie Weinberg mastered it. Asterik Studio handled the art direction. Jimmy Ryan did the unclean vocals, and Brennan Chaulk sang clean vocals and played rhythm guitar. Jason Barnes played lead guitar, Michael Murphy played bass and sang backing vocals, and Devin Chaulk played drums and sang clean vocals. Francis Mark of From Autumn to Ashes guests on "For a Lifetime." It was Ryan's last full-length with the band until the 2015 reunion record Coward. It's mid-2000s Christian metalcore on Solid State, leaning towards screamo.

Who they were in 2005

In 2005 they were a Christian metalcore band from Carmel and Indianapolis on Solid State. They took their name from a line in "It Is Well with My Soul," and they played the same heavy-music venues as Underoath, Norma Jean and Beloved. The faith sits in the lyrics, and the cover doesn't shout about it.

What the critics keep saying about this album

AllMusic's Alex Henderson heard it as closer to Christian screamo than pure metalcore. He said it leaves itself more room to breathe than the harshest end of the genre. Like screamo, it plays extreme vocals off clean ones, with melodic moments right next to head-kicking brutality. It even includes a cover of the Goo Goo Dolls' "Long Way Down." Henderson found the songs catchier than your average mid-2000s screamo. He heard Ryan's voice as an inspired mix of metalcore and hardcore screaming with a black-metal rasp, nothing cookie-cutter about it. He said the lyrics are Christian and introspective rather than preachy. They share experience and a Christian view of it without beating anyone over the head. He called it one of the more memorable screamo albums of 2005.

Sean Lex reviewed it for Jesus Freak Hideout on 22 June 2005. He called it a blazing mix of crisp, fast metal with some emo-core thrown in, like a burlap sack full of anvils. He said it stays in the same territory as Burning Bridges instead of reinventing anything, and the "Long Way Down" cover was a pleasant surprise. He heard thirty-five minutes of fast riffs, heavy breakdowns, throat-ripping vocals and uplifting harmony, with simple but clear lyrics about redemption, healing and loss. He said Ryan's ability to scream and sing was as powerful as the band behind him. He called "Bleed Alone," a song about selfishness and lies, the incredible standout. He heard a throwback to Swedish death metal without the operatic vocals, plus crisp clean guitars and pumping riffs that carve out a spot in a crowded genre. He had two complaints. The album is very short, with most songs barely three minutes long, and he wanted more variety and guitar solos, since the only solo is on the cover.

Jonathan Langley at Cross Rhythms was cooler on it in 2007. He heard a blur of metal and hardcore, with growled screaming closer to black-metal "goblinry" than plain hardcore, some weak clean singing and singalong refrains. He described twelve thrashy gallops through angst, girls, temptation and Jesus' grace, and said he'd heard it all before, and heard it done better.

AbsolutePunk.net gave it 86%. Alternative Press later reported that it had sold over 40,000 copies by January 2006. That's a modest but real number for Solid State in the mid-2000s.

Sputnikmusic's user reviewers were split. One called it a letdown after Burning Bridges, with repetitive songwriting, production that pushes the vocals up front and shorter breakdowns. That same reviewer still praised the great choruses on "Walk On" and the title track, the fun of "If I Could See" and the odd appeal of the cover. Commenters pushed back towards three or four out of five and called Ryan a beast. I think both sides have a point. The hooks stick and this is Ryan at his peak, but Lex and that Sputnik reviewer are right that it's short and samey.

Four tracks from this LP

When Everything Falls is the title track, and its official video leads off the videos. It's Henderson's memorable screamo in miniature, with the chorus Sputnik said sticks.

Walk On has the live energy Lex heard and the other great chorus Sputnik pointed to.

Bleed Alone is what Lex called the incredible standout. It's a hard, fast assault about selfishness and lies, and the lyrics do a lot of the work.

Fallen is the opener, the first wallop before the arguments about the samey middle stretch kick in.

After those four, there's "If I Could See," "The Perfect Night," "For a Lifetime" with Mark, "All I Have" and the "Long Way Down" cover, which Lex called fantastic and Cross Rhythms didn't mention. Lex's gripes about the length and the lack of solos, and Langley's "heard it before," are fair. So are Henderson calling it one of 2005's more memorable screamo records and AbsolutePunk's 86%.

What the room sounded like in 2005

Garth Richardson's production put Indiana metalcore on Solid State in the middle of the decade without smoothing Ryan down into Christian pop. The CDs sat in Christian bookstores and in the racks at mall chain stores. More than forty thousand had sold by early 2006, according to the Alternative Press piece on the band replacing its singer. It isn't a chart story. It's Ryan's last full-length from the original era, with a title-track video that's still worth a look, and it's a record people still argue about instead of forgetting.

The score

It gets a 7/10.

It falls short of an eight. Lex marked it down for being short and samey, Langley heard nothing new, and the Sputnik reviewer who called it a letdown wasn't imagining the blur in the middle. Still, it's clearly better than a six. Henderson put it among the more memorable screamo albums of 2005, AbsolutePunk gave it 86%, "Bleed Alone" and the title-track video still hit, and Ryan's rasp and scream here are the sound people mean when they talk about early Haste the Day. It's the Jimmy Ryan record that matters on Solid State, rough edges included.

Where this album sits on Loud Faith

Christian metalcore on Solid State in 2005 had a real audience. It meant Myspace melodies, shows on the fringes of Warped Tour, Garth Richardson behind the desk, and kids learning the band's hymn-line name before Stephen Keech took the mic. When Everything Falls is Ryan's last full-length from the original era. AllMusic heard it as catchier than most screamo, while JFH and the tougher critics found it short and samey. The title track is the one to play first.