It seems like a lifetime ago that I sat down to listen to Suicide Silence, and it happened to be at the behest of this esteemed closet of pain and boils that manifests itself as Ave Noctum, to sit in judgement over their last full-length effort ‘Become The Hunter’ in 2020. As per that review and in the interests of not plagiarising myself (if that’s at all possible…for the sake of consistency I will say it’s either plagiarism or laziness), I’ll sum up that review and move on to their new album. Looking back at my words, written I believe at the start of the global pandemic and in a haze of banana bread and clapping the NHS (underfunded, undervalued, and let down by successive Tory governments…the NHS not banana bread), I banged on about how Suicide Silence had course corrected itself having suffered unimaginable tragedy which subsequently (that’s being generous) led to them releasing some substandard and frankly incongruous music (2017’s self-titled effort). But, with their last album, the band seemed to have listened to the villagers carrying flaming pitchforks and buckets of boiling tar and decided to revert to their patented crunchy deathcore without further ado. I could’ve spent the following paragraphs castigating the band for trying something new, but who wants to read that, enough to say that the band realized that they’d taken somewhat of a perilous journey with the band’s legacy and decided that prudence was the natural antidote to a serious to a career misstep.
So, to this latest chapter in the Suicide Silence story and whilst the deathcore scene has as many detractors as it does supporters, it would be a disservice to the band to conflate this album with some of deathcore’s more egregious scene politics and dubious lyrical content. In fact, some of the slings and arrows aimed at this genre are often more about scene or genre grandstanding where a certain style of music is viewed as a fragrant rip off or jaded facsimile of the sum of its parts. And yes, you can point at some elements of this genre and mock it, but I’ve always felt that Suicide Silence were a cut above some of the detritus that populates this scene, treading the path less travelled adding extra splashes of death metal sauce into their heady brew of weed infused metal.
On ‘Remember…You Must Die’, it feels as though the band had regressed back to the brutality of their first couple of albums (including deathcore classic ‘The Cleansing’) but have also introduced enough tempo shifts and voyages off into other genres that sees blast beats coexisting with crunching middle-eights and breakdowns. There’s also some lovely, pinched harmonics on the guitars that are straight from the Dimebag school of shredding, coupled with some soaring solos that provide well needed respite from the chugging guitars and spit balling double bass drums.
The band have taken the essence of Suicide Silence and not only updated it but have also embraced the legacy of their older selves and combined the two to create a ferocious but well-rounded album that takes in several genres of metal (often within the same song). It’s an intriguing album certainly from a vocal perspective with Eddie Hermida’s range put to spectacular use on album highlight ’Be Deceived’ which also features some lovely cymbal choke hold work from new drummer Ernie Iniguez. And it’s a one-two punch knock out as penultimate track ‘Dying Life’ bears it soul, as brutal as it is head bangingly moreish.
I have to say that my hopes were indeed fears when it came to reviewing this. I have a decidedly soft spot for the band that have undergone tragedies and career FUBARS that would’ve ended any lesser act. Following up their last album, which I felt was somewhat placeholder in a career resuscitation exercise, the band have returned with a belter of an album that takes all that is good, heavy, and wholesome about Suicide Silence and injected that DNA into a body of work that shifts shape and form throughout its running time. Its eminently enjoyable and a fearsome return to form and whilst it may not quite reach the dizzying hights of their early career, it’s certainly a statement of intent.
(7.5/10 Nick Griffiths)
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