Small Victories - Positives in the Negatives

​Small Victories

​Positives in the Negatives
self-released; 2016

3.3 out of 5

By Jamie Funk

Small Victories is the solo project for Ryan Trickey. His recent release Positives in the Negatives is a complete DIY effort.

Trickey plays visceral, cathartic music that comes in the form of screaming and highly distorted guitars. I have heard a lot of music but the song here may take the cake in terms of having too many high frequencies. If there is one word of advice I have for Trickey it is to start cutting those high frequencies with a Low Pass Filter or an Eq. The fact is you cannot blast music that contains this many high frequencies. Well you can but you might go deaf or your ears will be ringing for about three days. The reason you blast metal records is because the engineer realizes it's all about the mid-range.

This is far and away my biggest issue with the EP. Other than that I thought the songs were powerful, well written and intense. Things get going with “Doom” which is intense to say the least. Trickey screams as if he is dispelling demons and waves of distortion pour down on your eardrums. I couldn’t make out what was being said but he sure seemed like he meant it. 

The next song “Embrace the Pain” is slightly less intense at moments than the first song but not by much. Trickey follows the same formula on this song relying on aggressively strummed power chords and hard-hitting drums. In fact that's pretty much what you are going to get with the rest of the songs.

​”Just Go” veers towards ‘90s punk rock while “Too Late” is arguably the highlight and centerpiece on the five songs even though it's mostly instrumental. He closes with “What you want” which ends the EP with the same kind of intensity he began with.

​Trickey has some talent and I think the next thing he should concentrate on is the production. He built a solid foundation here and with a good producer/engineer these songs will be brought to the next level.

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