This is some excellent metalcore, with just about everything you would want from the genre.
I haven’t heard Converge’s debut but I have heard their second album. And though those earlier albums are possibly more significant in the evolution of metalcore (and maybe mathcore), I may like this one the best though I’m not sure if that’s recency bias or if the record really is their strong album (I’ve heard).
As I noted, this has everything you want from metalcore: screaming, super loud and aggressive music, but very well-played and well-produced (this is not a lo-fi record). There’s also a teeny bit of diversity in the sound, which is nice considering how some of these bands in niche fusion genres commit to only the very particular sound of their nice fusion. And there’s a good balance between song lengths – nothing is too long and there aren’t any song-fragments being passed off as actual songs, which is so often the case with this kind of music.
At least without having listened to another Converge record in quite some time, this might be the record I would recommend to someone who was wondering what metalcore sounds like.
Great stuff.
9/10
- “My Unsaid Everything” 3:23
- “The High Cost of Playing God” 4:17
- “In Harm’s Way” 4:20
- “Conduit” 4:10
- “The Lowest Common Denominator” 3:53
- “Towing Jehovah” 2:20
- “When Forever Comes Crashing” 3:14
- “Ten Cents” 2:20
- “Year of the Swine” 3:47
- “Letterbomb” 3:47
- “Love as Arson” 3:22
- Jacob Bannon – vocals
- Kurt Ballou – guitar, vocals
- Aaron Dalbec – guitar
- Steve Brodsky – bass guitar, guitar (track 8)
- Damon Bellorado – drum kit
Additional musicians
- Travis Shettel – cymbal on “Letterbomb”
- Ben Cummings (Bane) – backing vocals
- Grail Mortillaro – backing vocals
- Jay Randall (Agoraphobic Nosebleed) – backing vocals
- Jeff Feinburg – backing vocals
- Matt Pike – backing vocals
- Ryan Parker – backing vocals
- Tre McCarthy – backing vocals
Production and recording history
- Steve Austin – mixing, engineer, producer
- Kurt Ballou – mixing, engineer, electronics
- Jacob Bannon – mixing
- Dean Baltulonis – digital editing