Weekly Update #4 – February 4, 2024
FEATURED ALBUM
August Burns Red // Death Below
Released: March 24, 2023
The kings of metalcore have returned! And to celebrate their 20-year anniversary, they’ve delivered another great record. Perhaps their best in a decade.
Over the last 10 years, I’ve been skeptical about the way ABR has explored progressive metalcore, especially on ‘Found In Far Away Places’ and ‘Phantom Anthem,’ because they didn’t seem to have a clear end-goal. There were too many interludes, few satisfying conclusions, and a general sense of aimlessness. On ‘Death Below,’ they’ve leaned further into their progressive tendencies, and it feels like the pay off has finally arrived. By doubling down and committing to the progressive elements, ABR is starting to define their own progressive identity.
Many songs have ABR’s classic, thunderous breakdowns, but they are no longer the driving force. ‘Death Below’ is more of an artistic effort, and although that may frustrate fans who were hoping for a straight forward sound, those who enjoy the journey of progressive metal will be delighted. The closest parallel I can give is Between The Buried And Me. After a first listen, it might be easy to conclude that there aren’t many stand out moments, but as with most progressive metal albums, there are plenty of gems, you just have to find them.
To be clear, this is a heavy album. Easily one of their darkest and most intense. But it’s a different type of intense. Instead of buildups and breakdowns, there are blast beats, darker atmospheres, and winding paths. Yes, it’s progressive and there is experimentation, but it’s fast and heavy.
Personally, I’m very happy with ‘Death Below.’ In recent years, ABR has tried to make their sound more accessible, but appealing to the masses limited their options. ABR is meant to be on the more extreme side of metalcore, and I’m glad they are back on the edge, pushing their boundaries again.
“Fools Gold In The Bear Trap” is the coolest ABR song I’ve heard in a long time – it doesn’t sound like a song they would ever make. The first half is a melodic death metal intro and the second half is basically black metal. This is the perfect song for people who say “all ABR songs sound the same.” You haven’t heard them do anything like this before.
Another favorite is “The Cleansing.” The opening drums also belong in a black metal album, Jake’s vocals are all over the place, and the instruments constantly shift and evolve. What a ruthless way to kick things off. Easily a top 15 ABR song of all time.
A lot of these songs seamlessly blend into each other. Throughout ‘Death Below,’ a couple songs purposely pick up where the last left off, making the album more cohesive. This is a major improvement because ABR’s overuse of interludes and spoken word passages on past albums killed their tempo/momentum. They keep things moving this time around – you probably won’t even realize when one song ends and another begins.
At the same time, ABR is continuing to incorporate more singing. I actually like what they did on “Deadbolt” quite a bit. However, I hate Jesse Leach’s singing on “Ancestry.” Weakest part of the album for sure. Meanwhile, Spencer Chamberlain’s singing on “Reckoning” was excellent – he fit the overall sound much better. JT Cavey was also superb on “The Abyss.” It’s super rare for ABR to have features, so it was cool to see them have four this time around.
In terms of the vocals, Dustin is involved quite a bit, and I’m not sure how I feel about that. I’ve never been a big fan of his high pitch screams. Jake has a ton of variety in his screams, but I kind of miss his standard mid range and deep lows. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m having a hard time understanding the lyrics on ‘Death Below.’ As cool as the progressive stuff is, I think the songs would hit a little harder if they were slightly easier to consume (like what they did on ‘Constellations’). I don’t know if it’s the layering or the mixing, but I think the indecipherable lyrics slightly hurt the catchiness of the songs.
Lastly, “The Cleansing” and “Reckoning” are super long at almost 8 minutes each, coming only behind “The Seventh Trumpet” off of ‘Thrill Seeker.’ You can clearly see the progressive influences in ABR’s approach to these longer tracks, and that is where I think they shine the most.
Playlist of New Songs
Quick playlist highlights:
– Dealer is back. Despite their vocalist’s baggage, I prefer this over Alpha Wolf. It’s still edgy, but it doesn’t feel so try-hard.
– Enterprise Earth just released an incredible album. “Blood and Teeth” is probably my favorite song of 2024 so far.
– Oceans Ate Alaska‘s ears must have been burning last week after I finally posted my review of their 2022 album. Well they’re back with a new song…and they have a new vocalist. If I wasn’t so slammed with work this week I definitely would have covered it in the “drama” section…maybe next week if things are looking light. The new guy is decent, he’s from an old band called Silent Screams. He doesn’t sing in the new song though so I’m not sure if he’ll be able to recreate OAA’s soaring choruses from past albums.
– Erra‘s new song is exactly what you’d expect. They’re so good at what they do.
– Scarlet Rot is Dickie Allen’s newest project (he’s the vocalist of Infant Annihilator and Scumfuck). He partnered with Logan Young (who was in Reflections for a while) to create an insane mix of deathcore and djenty progressive riffs.
– Boltcutter is outrageous slam. I’ve been digging bands like this and Peelingflesh a lot lately.
– One Morning Left is a band I haven’t heard in a long time. They’re kind of a silly band from Finland, but they’re working on new music and this song features Jake Luhrs from August Burns Red. I probably wouldn’t love a full album of this sound, but this song has been my guilty pleasure lately.
– Job For A Cowboy is back. It’s crazy how much they have evolved from their deathcore days in 2005. Their new album is absolutely going to turn heads – very impressive progressive death metal.
– Ghost Atlas is Jesse Cash’s (singer of Erra) side project. It’s a little soft for me, but the new album is definitely worth a mention.
– Gravemind continues to go down the heavy metalcore route. I liked their deathcore sound a lot, but this is solid too.
– Being As An Ocean is making me correct the myself. I said they released an EP earlier this year, but they actually released a full album shortly after I posted that. Whoops. The album’s a banger.
Drama – PecksMetalPicks??? >:(
I accidentally created my own drama this week. I posted the article I wrote about Architects from last week’s newsletter on Instagram and people lost their minds. There was a lot of misunderstanding and people were reading way too far into my intentions. I was too busy with work this week to follow other current events super closely so the best I can offer is the comments of my Instagram post.