It's satisfying to see a band evolve positively from a clashing melting pot of genres into a unit that manages to combine the best elements of their diverse influences, and 'Colors' is undoubtedly the finest album from Between the Buried and Me thus far. The singing is less whiney, and works alongside the heavier riffs whenever it's called for, rather than requiring its own special, remedial section elsewhere, and the greater influence of post-rock and classic prog rock once again helps to meld the other styles all together in a manner that works surprisingly well. No wonder it took the band so long to develop a successful formula.

The other aspect of this album that makes it stand out from the discography is the sheer length of some of the songs. Overlong tracks running out of steam was a problem that affected the first couple of albums especially, but here 'Ants of the Sky' tends more towards bland, tedious repetition (and includes Hammond organs, which earns immediate negative points), while 'White Walls' uses its fifteen minutes to explore the full spectrum of sound from brutal death metal to emo, in a manner that still doesn't sound right, no matter how skilfully it's executed.

This isn't an album for metalcore fans with short attention spans - which I'm guessing is most of them - but it's an effective album if you're in the right state of mind, and will likely appeal to those who enjoy the similarly drawn-out works of Tool. For me it's just a little too dull, the incorporation of classic prog being nothing I haven't heard before, and better, seeming more like a bandwagon-jumping thing after bands like Porcupine Tree and Opeth highlighted its potential for contemporary music over the last few years.

1. Foam Born: a) The Backtrack
2. Foam Born: (b) The Decade of Statues
3. Informal Gluttony
4. Sun of Nothing
5. Ants of the Sky
6. Prequel to the Sequel
7. Viridian
8. White Walls