“Metalcore. Deathcore. The ever nebulous ‘melodic metal.’ These are tags that discomfit discerning metalheads like myself. In those rare moments where I experience the excitement for a new release in these genres, as I did with Russia’s Quiescency, the worst case is that my anticipation overinflates. Since the band announced Message for Lamb roughly forever ago, my expectations for their debut record swiftly reached an unreasonable altitude. Alas, what goes up must come down.” Lamb stewed.
“All in all, they’ve done a pretty remarkable job of defying AMG‘s Law of Diminishing Records, and yet that very fact made me a bit apprehensive of Atonement. Wouldn’t it be just my luck to score reviewing rights to such a renowned and personally beloved[1. I’ll admit that I’ve cooled on Killswitch and metalcore in general over the years, but they were integral to my dive into the depths ov metal nonetheless, and I say thank ya.] act only for it to be their Cold Lake?” Atone for what?
“This is sure to come as a surprise, what with the kvlt as fvck album art and all, but Through the Noise are about as trve as Santa. With their accessible angst and envelope-friendly chuggatry, these Swedes crabwalk the thick, downtuned line between nü-metal and metalcore, and by all rights, Dualism should have been inflicted upon a n00b. However, there have been far too many 4.0’s awarded as ov late, and I would be remiss to turn down an opportunity to bring you bastards crashing back down to reality, so we are here.” Punishment is due.
“With that technicolor cover and macho album title, First Strike makes its presence and intentions clear from the get go. Or so you’d think, but you’d be wrong—this is a melodic thrash metal band we’re talking about here. If you never liked and never will like, uh, “melodic thrash metal,” Ketos won’t change your mind on the subject and you can feel free to scroll right down to the comments and tell everybody to listen to some vomit-inducing folk-power-black album on bandcamp. It’s your loss, since First Strike is a great example of “melodic thrash metal” passing both the taste test and sniff test—it’s a good album from a band with some serious chops.” Keto friendly.
“Has there ever been a time when metalheads ’round the ‘verse rightly celebrated non-Converge metalcore? I am not qualified to answer this question, for in my infinite wisdom, I actually dig In This Moment quite a lot—and, for the record, Maria Brink sounds incredible live. I feel no shame for this, and because of that I am sure Angry Metal Guy would love nothing more than to sacrifice me to a rabid Muppet while playing Tetragrammacide in the foreground for good measure. But I digress. Germany’s For All I Care is a metalcore sextet of the non-Converge variety, and Forever and a Day is their debut full length. And as you might suspect given my polarized taste, it is possible that I might love this stuff.” We care a lot.
“It’s been pretty interesting to watch metalcore’s evolution over the years. I’m talking specifically about the strain of metalcore that cropped up in the early 2000s, the good cop/bad cop style played by the Killswitch Engages and As I Lay Dyings of the world, the type that infused At the Gates riffs with choruses cribbed from the latest alt-rock band. I ate that shit up in high school and stayed for the party when the style started adopting faster and more technical playing (see: August Burns Red and Texas in July). When djent had its heyminute in the early 2010s, bands realized chugs weren’t too different from breakdowns and thus began to add some djentiness to the proceedings (see: This or the Apocalypse’s Dead Years and Hollow).” The core cycle.
“Metalcore is an important genre. Now that all the metal elitists are lighting torches and gathering pitchforks, let me explain. Most kids these days (sadly) aren’t listening to Master of Puppets, and the gateway bands of the 80’s simply are not converting new people. I would never have discovered this site and thereby many of my now favorite bands like Wilderun, Barren Earth, Æther Realm without first stumbling onto Killswitch Engage. So, my interest was piqued when Lord Druhm visited the n00b dungeon to deliver the promo for Italian band Manam’s debut, Rebirth of Consciousness, promising a blend of melodeath and metalcore.” Gateway thugs.
“Oh, Metalcore, I mourn for those who never knew you. Glorious was the heyday of such then-gigantic core ‘core acts as Killswitch Engage, All That Remains, Shadows Fall, etc. The alchemy of fusing melodeath-inspired riffage and radio-friendly songwriting yielded far more quality results than one might expect or willingly concede, yet the saturation and over recycling of this formula ultimately failed to maintain the staying power of its trve idols. Nonetheless, it’s still a thing, so people are still doing it. In Germany, Burden of Grief are hard at work being that collective guy.” Burden of core.
![Counterparts – You’re Not You Anymore [Things You Might Have Missed 2017]](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Counterparts-Youre-Not-You-Anymore-01-768x768.jpg)
“An old teacher once told me that the best poetry conveys a sense of longing. I would argue the best music does the same thing. Perhaps that’s what first drew me to Canadian melodic hardcore quintet Counterparts about four years ago, when life was growing difficult and the only solace was a long jog through the woods while listening to the group’s 2010 debut Prophets.” Fear and longing at AMG.
“Five years ago, another metal blog referred to As I Lay Dying’s Awakened as “the world’s first retro-metalcore album.” While that same not-to-be-named blog was also recently guilty of authoring one of the most idiotic self-serving shitposts I’ve ever read, in the case of Awakened they were actually right. With its melodic Gothenburg riffs, gang vocals, soaring clean choruses, and pummeling breakdowns, the record hearkened back to mid-00s metalcore at a time when the rest of the scene was too busy being balls deep in whatever Periphery was doing.” Old core, new core. At this point, what does it matter?
