Heavy Song of the Week is a feature on Heavy Consequence breaking down the top metal and hard rock tracks you need to hear every Friday. This week After the Burial’s “Nothing Gold” get the top nod.
Progressive metal act After the Burial return this week with a double single, marking their first new music in four years.
Comments from vocalist Anthony Notarmaso give the impression that the band’s return was one of artistic necessity. The new songs detail the band’s experience with pandemic lockdowns and a particularly difficult period for Notarmaso. Penning the songs brought “solace.”
“I went to a place that some of us have been before, and some have never come back from,” he revealed in a press release.
Notarmaso’s catharsis is tangible on “Nothing Gold” (packaged as a double single with another new track, “Death Keeps Us From Living”). His screams are ridden with angst and vitriol, almost completely removed from the realm of tuneful melody. Behind him, the band unfurl a harsh palette of dissonant and complex progressive metal that’s as bleak as anything in After the Burial’s discography.
“These songs are undeniably After the Burial, but with a modern twist,” offered Notarmaso. “We hope you enjoy this next journey with us.”
— Jon Hadusek,
Senior Staff Writer
Honorable Mentions:
Cattle Decapitation – “Scourge of the Offspring”
Cattle Decapitation have an innate ability to meld the horrific with the intellectual. On one hand, a track like “Scourge of the Offspring” is densely complex and technical, combining mathy prog with more recognizable death metal and metalcore elements. Thematically, however, it manages to conjure grotesque images of a post-apocalyptic future where humans are “shat out and left to make sense of this world only to end up being part of the problem simply by existing,” as vocalist Travis Ryan so eloquently put it. Through an expertly woven tapestry of barbarous grunts, technical riffs, and primal energy, the band depicts this rotting world with a Cronenberg-like craftsmanship.
Dropkick Murphys and Violent Femmes, “Gotta Get to Peekskill”
Celtic punk meets acoustic punk meets folk music on the new song “Gotta Get to Peekskill.” With words written by late folk icon Woody Guthrie, veteran punk acts Dropkick Murphys and Violent Femmes have teamed up on the new track that finds them confronting the Ku Klux Klan. The anthemic rasp of Dropkick singer Ken Casey and the distinctive nasal delivery of Femmes frontman Gordon Gano blend in perfectly on this unexpected but welcome collaboration.
Enforced – “Starve”
Enforced make their second appearance on our HSOTW rundown with “Starve,” the latest single from their forthcoming album War Remains. Late ’80s crossover thrash is alive and well thanks to these riff-dealing revivalists. Torn denim, back patches, and high-tops — it’s hard not to be nostalgic for a past era when you hear metal like this. The bitter nihilism is as palpable as the blistering riffs.