I'm not really sure how it started but, about a month ago, I started listening to Bring Me the Horizon. I was never really that into metalcore but I suppose it was inevitable that I would give metalcore an extended look since I'm pretty into punk and metal (well, older metal bands like Metallica, Iron Maiden, etc.).
I first landed on the album Sempiternal which is their most recent album. The opener of the album, "Can You Feel My Heart," actually takes you by complete surprise as it starts with a blaring synthesizer that makes you wish you never woke up that morning. When you get used to the synth though, it's a pretty well done song. The most notable song on the album has to be the song "Go to Hell, For Heaven's Sake." It's still not as heavy or loud as I expected metalcore to be but it's still a very good song. Actually, Sempiternal is probably a pretty good gateway for punk fans to get into metalcore in the first place. I decided to check out another album.
Suicide Season is the second album by Bring Me the Horizon. The first thing you will notice about this album is the album art. The cover is a girl standing there with a pile of intestines for forearms (or intestines in her arms, I can't tell which). It makes for a pretty cool album cover.
This album is definitely more like what I think of when I think of metalcore. It's much more heavy than their pop influenced Sempiternal. Over the past few weeks, I have really grown to like this album a lot. It's raw passion fused with complex composition. Not only is it instrumentally complex but the lyrics are also very poetic. I feel that most people don't like poetic lyrics but I, on the other hand, like poetry and love it when it's in music.
As far as individual songs, the song "Chelsea Smile" is very good. It makes good use of build-ups and breakdowns. However, my favorite song on the album is the title track "Suicide Season." It's a pretty deep song about dealing with the loss of someone to suicide. I love the lead vocals in this song a lot. He sounds so passionate that it's possible that he could have been crying while recording this. It's not very often that you hear vocals this passionate in any genre so I try to laud them whenever I hear them. The song's bridge is even more fantastic than the rest. It makes the best use of whispering that I've ever heard in a song. It's done incredibly well and this song, though still good, would not quite be great without the bridge. When it gets to the part when he whispers "This is suicide season," chills shiver up and down my spine. You should give it a listen for yourself.
I highly recommend listening to this whole album, even if you aren't a metalcore fan. They do some interesting things that a composer from any genre would appreciate. But, at the very least, you need to give the song "Suicide Season" a listen. It's fantastic.
I did also give their first album Count Your Blessings a listen. It's much more intense than any of their other albums. I'm not an expert on the various sub-genres of metal but I would probably place Count Your Blessings more within the deathcore realm than the metalcore realm. The writing is definitely more rudimentary and typical on this album. It's still pretty solid though.
Parkway Drive
I checked out some singles from Parkway Drive and found that I didn't really like them that much. I found myself relatively bored listening to them. Most of the guitar riffs were simple and repetitive (and not in a good way like The Ramones). I can see why many people may like Parkway Drive. For a metalcore band, they're very polished and have some pretty cool drum parts. They just didn't quite click with me.
Falling in Reverse
I checked out some singles from Parkway Drive and found that I didn't really like them that much. I found myself relatively bored listening to them. Most of the guitar riffs were simple and repetitive (and not in a good way like The Ramones). I can see why many people may like Parkway Drive. For a metalcore band, they're very polished and have some pretty cool drum parts. They just didn't quite click with me.
Falling in Reverse
I checked out the single "The Drug in Me is You" and thought it was pretty good so I decided to check out the rest of the album with the same name. In general, I liked it instrumentally but lyrically I thought it got a bit arrogant at times. Once you get to the second track, he starts singing about how he overdosed and that it worked out good for him because he was able to write catchy songs about it and now he's called the "King of the music scene."
As far as the genre of the band goes, it isn't really metalcore. It's more pop and metal influenced post-hardcore with metalcore moments. Although I find the arrogance of the lyrics unrelatable, I still enjoyed listening to this album overall and think that the single "The Drug in Me is You" is at least worth a try. It also has a very 80s metal guitar solo in it that is pretty cool.
A Day to Remember
The thing about A Day to Remember is that instead of blending genres together like the other bands on this list, they switch back and forth between genres mid-song. It can be a bit jolting at times but on the other hand, it's relatively unique in that not many bands have that kind of approach to composing. In fact, really the only other band I can think of off of the top of my head that does that is Linkin Park (a lot of their songs switch between rap verses and pop choruses).
I was pretty intrigued by some of the songs I heard so I gave the album For Those Who Have Heart a try. I enjoyed most of what I heard and I didn't find myself getting too jolted by the pop-punk to metalcore transitions. I would give this album a try at some point opposed to the singles as I found myself enjoying this particular album more than the singles I listened to (though I still liked the singles a bit).
Pierce the Veil
What was rather impressive about the singles that I checked out by Pierce the Veil is that they frequently change tempos and do it just about flawlessly. The transitions work much more smoothly than a lot of other famous bands that have tried and failed at it. They are kind of like A Day to Remember in that they don't blend punk and metal as much and more just switch back and forth. However, they really do more tempo changes than anything and do much more blending of the genres than A Day to Remember does.
Out of the singles I checked out, "King For a Day" seemed to be their most popular as it had way more hits on YouTube. However, I thought that "Bulls in the Bronx" is a much better song. I would have listened to an album of theirs or something but I ran out of time to do so.
If you recall my post about Day 2 of Riot Fest 2013, I actually saw The Devil Wears Prada live and was less than impressed, to say the least. However, I decided to spend a few minutes and check out some of their studio recordings. I found their studio recordings to be much more refined and a much better attempt at dynamics and just overall quality. Perhaps they were playing the songs that they figured would get the most intense crowd reaction but from the few studio recordings I checked out, they're certainly a better band than that. I will probably take a pass on seeing them live again but maybe I will give their studio stuff a legitimate chance in the near future.
Perhaps I will look more into this vast branch of music that I have hardly touched. For now though, I will leave it at this. If you like punk and/or metal, I think that you should give some of the bands I have listed above a listen. Some of it is surprisingly complex and interesting to listen to from a composing standpoint. Also, the music is generally relatable in the same way that metal and punk are in the first place.
Basically, it's worth a listen.
As far as the genre of the band goes, it isn't really metalcore. It's more pop and metal influenced post-hardcore with metalcore moments. Although I find the arrogance of the lyrics unrelatable, I still enjoyed listening to this album overall and think that the single "The Drug in Me is You" is at least worth a try. It also has a very 80s metal guitar solo in it that is pretty cool.
A Day to Remember
The thing about A Day to Remember is that instead of blending genres together like the other bands on this list, they switch back and forth between genres mid-song. It can be a bit jolting at times but on the other hand, it's relatively unique in that not many bands have that kind of approach to composing. In fact, really the only other band I can think of off of the top of my head that does that is Linkin Park (a lot of their songs switch between rap verses and pop choruses).
I was pretty intrigued by some of the songs I heard so I gave the album For Those Who Have Heart a try. I enjoyed most of what I heard and I didn't find myself getting too jolted by the pop-punk to metalcore transitions. I would give this album a try at some point opposed to the singles as I found myself enjoying this particular album more than the singles I listened to (though I still liked the singles a bit).
Pierce the Veil
What was rather impressive about the singles that I checked out by Pierce the Veil is that they frequently change tempos and do it just about flawlessly. The transitions work much more smoothly than a lot of other famous bands that have tried and failed at it. They are kind of like A Day to Remember in that they don't blend punk and metal as much and more just switch back and forth. However, they really do more tempo changes than anything and do much more blending of the genres than A Day to Remember does.
Out of the singles I checked out, "King For a Day" seemed to be their most popular as it had way more hits on YouTube. However, I thought that "Bulls in the Bronx" is a much better song. I would have listened to an album of theirs or something but I ran out of time to do so.
The Devil Wears Prada
If you recall my post about Day 2 of Riot Fest 2013, I actually saw The Devil Wears Prada live and was less than impressed, to say the least. However, I decided to spend a few minutes and check out some of their studio recordings. I found their studio recordings to be much more refined and a much better attempt at dynamics and just overall quality. Perhaps they were playing the songs that they figured would get the most intense crowd reaction but from the few studio recordings I checked out, they're certainly a better band than that. I will probably take a pass on seeing them live again but maybe I will give their studio stuff a legitimate chance in the near future.
Perhaps I will look more into this vast branch of music that I have hardly touched. For now though, I will leave it at this. If you like punk and/or metal, I think that you should give some of the bands I have listed above a listen. Some of it is surprisingly complex and interesting to listen to from a composing standpoint. Also, the music is generally relatable in the same way that metal and punk are in the first place.
Basically, it's worth a listen.
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