Short attention span people, your focus is called upon. Since you do not have much of it, I shall try to keep it brief.
Architects: math/technical metal, with melody and/or feeling here and there. They are from Brighton, Sussex, England. ‘Nightmares’: title of debut album. I say: interesting, but not great.

Okay, now, you’re just going to have to read faster, because I can’t keep up this fragment-style writing. If you feel your attention is slipping away, go run around for a few seconds, eat three bananas and come back and read the rest.
Architects are a really young band. They formed in 2004 in the lovely city of Brighton (what the hell do I know, I was never there). They were approximately 16 at the time, which (oh how I love logic) makes them 18 now. That’s quite young. However, I only knew this after listening to the album twice already, so that speaks in their favour.
‘Nightmares’ starts off kicking and screaming (one cliché per review is acceptable) with ‘To The Death’. Lots of riffs with high screeching notes like Into The Moat or what have you: Dillinger Escape Plan. Fifteen pace changes, nine different parts, screaming, the works you mathcorians are familiar with. However, already during the opener, the band lets you in on a secret (damn, that’s two in one paragraph): they put melodic, friendlier parts, with feeling into the mix as well.

Okay, I’m counting fourteen people still with me, damn you Christian, at least try to focus! Sit down. Read the screen.
Some time into the second song of the album, with the awesome title (they should’ve named the album accordingly) ‘You Don’t Walk Away From Dismemberment’, you notice more and more of these melodic bits, but you’ll also notice some of the riffs become a bit tedious. It is like there’s not enough depth to some of them. ‘Minesweeper’ and ‘They’ll Be Hanging Us Tonight’ lean more toward violent again, although they do contain melody and some minor pace changes. In the latter, there’s even some clean singing -with a really weird voice-. Alas, we also hear some of the now almost overused screeching high guitar notes. It seems they are keen on that note being the same one every time, whilst there are many high notes to be hit on a guitar.

Okay, we’re halfway. I’ll rap number five up quickly: slow, instrumental, with pretty basic use of drums.

Pretty good song, it breaks the album in half nicely. It’s a dreadful word, but you could call it emotional. Only two paragraphs to go. Take a shower or something, or go eat things with carbs, they`ll aid your concentration.

‘In The Desert’ and ‘A Portrait For The Deceased’ begin with fury again, but then somewhere halfway (`ITD`)or after twenty seconds already (`APFTD`), they go into melodic mode again. While these bits can work quite well, at this point, they’re overusing them, and the contrast between the friendliness and anger becomes too obvious and loses power. It gets that weak in the knees feeling to it. Honorary mention before the conclusion must go to the album closer ‘The Darkest Tomb’. This one sounds more creative and way better balanced. Quite an apocalyptic sounding song and the best one of the album. Everything on ‘The Darkest Tomb’ is excellent: riffs, high notes, pace, structure.
Okay, this just in between, because I forgot to say anything about it: the vocals, although sung, 98% of the time in one style, don’t tire throughout the album, I think because they’re somewhere in the middle of grunts and screams.

By now, I can’t possibly know anymore whether my tips helped and how many of you are left to read this conclusion, but here goes: Architects have brought us a good debut album with ‘Nightmares’. However, the most important issue I have with it are the melodic parts. You hear them so frequently that you grow tired of them after about four songs. Also, not all riffs are equally great, and if you know some mathcore bands or the like, you could get the feeling that you’ve heard them before. Another point of criticism: the song structures tend to repeat themselves, causing you to think: ‘Didn’t I already hear that song just now?’ All those points taken into effect, but these guys are eighteen, have lots of time to learn and as a first effort, it’s better than lots of big bands` third or fourth album. So if the band takes a closer look at the song structures and use their melodic talents more effectively, in other words ‘less’, they could be great in a couple of years.
Class dismissed. Go make up for lost time and do five things simultaneously now.