This third full length studio album by Oakland, California-based formation All Shall Perish was recorded at Castle Ultimate Studios with Zack Ohren (e.g. Brain Drill) and has duration of (only) thirty six minutes. That’s the only negative remark to make, because Awaken The Dreamers is a winning album. The recording is slightly different from all former material, but I think this progression isn’t but positive (even though I’m sure not everybody will agree). First of all, the intense Deathcore contains much less influences from Hardcore than before. Both vocally and instrumentally, (Death) Metal seems to overpower the former Hardcore-elements. The album is much more melodic too, but don’t expect a soft, melodious bunch of would-be Metalcore tracks, because this goes much further. Blasts and breaks made place for ingenious (sometimes slightly progressive) experiments. And more than before, the album contains (semi) acoustic parts and clean vocals (like in Tiamat’s Wildhoney-alike track Memory Of A Glass Sanctuary). The Hardcore-oriented fan base, and those who did like this band for its grinding extremity, might be disappointed with this evolution, yet the addition of more ‘intelligence’ to the music is superb. All Shall Perish still know how to convince, the members still play with pride and craftsmanship, and the sound / production is dry and full. And Awaken The Dreamers probably shows the band’s darkest material to date.
Anyway, the quality of the individual and group performance, the quality of the sound and the quality of the compositions all are high and maybe this album is All Shall Perish’s most mature one?!
The album comes with a bonus-DVD, featuring the ‘making of’: sometimes funny (in spite of some stupid Jackass-inspired idiocy) and interesting, yet sometimes it bores the sh*t out of me.

90/100

Ivan Tibos.