ALBUM REVIEW: Love Letter – Everyone wants something beautiful

“Take something you love and run it around a thousand times.“

The revival scene in deathcore and metalcore is rich, with acts like Balmora, TracheotomyAnd Long farewell They bring a near-perfect performance of the genre’s roots and produce perhaps the best representation of any genre. Melodic hardcore, however, has not experienced such a revival, despite the widespread love for some of the genre’s favorites. Aside from a few acts, including HEAVY HEX And Take a breakthere are only a few acts that play this kind of melodic hardcore. The sweetheart bands of this microgenre, like More than life And Conquerorhas done such a good job that melodic hardcore seems like a lost art.

The latest addition is a band from New England, love letter, with members of the above mentioned Conqueror And verseHer debut album is an album entitled Everyone wants something beautiful. While it continues to grow in popularity, it still may not quite capture the magic the genre once had.

The opening section of Everyone wants something beautiful has an immediate effect. Opener “New anthem” has the emotionality that people like Rewarding beat, as singer Quinn Murphy cries”I can’t hold you, I can’t love you, I can’t look you in the eyes anymore” with pure agony. The exchange of singing between Murphy And Jay Maas At “Health checks and dead friends” throws the mind back in time Meuse have it on Conqueror Records like Letters home And Empty days and sleepless nightsHe reiterates the strength of these achievements for Love letter.

It feels like a perfect ode to the heyday of melodic hardcore, but it hits a divergence when it comes to “Popular Memes“. The track takes aim at the dopey nature of the alt-right, which is not insignificant, but having a mention of Turning Point USA screamed in your ear has the same feeling as having one of their awful clips cursing your social media feed, which may not be what you want from a record.

“Following tracks”Projects on homelessness” And “settlements” address political manners in a much more relevant and touching way. The former touches on the scourge of homelessness, as the track painfully laments: “A life worth more than fake smiles and sorrow“. Here the instrumental work of is worth mentioning, the guitars of Meuse And Spencer measure the tempo of each track in a graceful but hard way, while the grooves and fills of Reitz complement them perfectly. This is only confirmed as “Projects on homelessness” breaks into its final phase, while Murphy Screaming “There is only violence here“.

The above-mentioned “Settlements” could be the moment that many take away from Everyone wants something beautiful. A presented a relevant piece on the ongoing genocide in Gaza and how Western governments are being forced to give in. As “A world impossible to love” is shouted as the track ends itself, it is a lyric that recalls when Broken vow screamed”I hate this damn world, I would do anything to change it“, a feeling of desire for change despite the impossibility of everything.

Everyone wants something beautiful quickly throws himself back into the mixer “Medicines“, which leaves little time to process the last few tracks, where perhaps an interlude would have been welcome. The second half of the record struggles to get out of this state, as both “Paralyzing self-doubt and the will to use it” And “Late-stage damage reduction“Sonically, they don’t have the ability to capture the ears’ full attention. While both are solid tracks, one feels that they perhaps lack variety considering how they are written compared to what came before.

As “Panic disorder” closes the record, Love letter come with one of their best performances on the record. Packed with great guitar work, be it the sparkling plucked guitars against the strummed chords or the explosive riffs that Conqueror offered.

I don’t want to go into too much detail, but it seems that Love letter have revealed their cards on their own behalf. Not wanting to be a revival band or a reinvention of the melodic hardcore genre, each member decided to put together a record that was an ode to a genre, even if its original magic could not be recreated. At the same time, they used their record to narrate and comment on political issues that need a voice. What Love letter The work done here is commendable and the project certainly has a promising future ahead of it.

7.5/10

Everyone wants something beautiful will be released on 28 June via Iodine recordsand can be pre-ordered Here.