Jason Schreurs

Rise And Fall Faith It doesn’t take long on Rise And Fall’s fourth album, Faith, for the Belgian bloodletters to challenge the speed and fury of labelmates All Pigs Must Die and Converge. This is some angry, pissed-off, maniacal chaos that takes raw chunks of D-beat, thrash metal, noise rock, hardcore and even a little […]

Meshuggah Koloss Those that have followed Swedish extreme-metal band Meshuggah’s career will no doubt be enthralled by their latest opus, Koloss. It’s every bit as epic, heavy and serpentine as the other albums in their swelling discography. The trouble is, not much sets this new album apart from their career benchmarks, like 2002’s Nothing or […]

August Premier Happy Miserable Happy Miserable is the sound of August Premier maintaining integrity, instead of pandering to some chance at 15-minute fame. The band folded nearly a decade ago after releasing their Fueled By Ramen debut, Fireworks And Alcohol, a glossy pop-rock album that had them primed as Fall Out Boy v2.0. Their comeback […]

Total Chaos Battered And Smashed There’s no denying Total Chaos’ legitimacy in the political/peace-punk scene. The Pomona Valley, California, foursome have spent the past 20-plus years playing ’77-inspired punk rock, all the while working with likeminded organizations such as Food Not Bombs and the Los Angeles Anarchist Center. But Battered And Smashed is the sound […]

Dead Swans Anxiety And Everything Else EP Dead Swans hail from the U.K., but sound like they should be based in Boston and playing long-ago classic hardcore shows with the Hope Conspiracy and American Nightmare. This seven-song EP is a suitable stopgap between 2009’s Sleepwalkers and whatever they decide to do next, as it employs […]

Narrows Painted Narrows are a collaboration between former members of Botch, These Arms Are Snakes, Unbroken and Some Girls. They took the metalcore formula and churned in some Swans-like darkwave, art rock, British shoegaze and ambient noise on their debut album, 2009’s New Distances. But on Painted, they don’t think quite so hard; instead, Narrows […]

Borgore Flex EP It’s too bad 24-year-old producer/songwriter/DJ Borgore had to hinge his new release on the despicable track “Flex,” because some of the remixes on this EP are pretty good. But back to the song in question: Unless this is some kind of Lonely Island spoof song, or a modern-day stab at shock rap […]

Young Magic Melt Young Magic have a lot going on throughout their debut full-length, Melt. The New York City-by-way-of-Australia trio tackle more in 11 songs than most bands do in an entire career. Dreamy, psychedelic shoegaze signifiers atop recurring dance beats and worldly vocals create a sound that’s vibrant, if not a little unsettling. The […]

Caravels/Gifts From Enola Well Worn Caravels’ material on this new split release is on par with their astounding Floorboards EP from 2010—angular, dissonant hardcore with heaps of melody and angst. They frequently remind us of a hungrier, more desperate version of Touché Amoré, and tracks like “Sagan Genesis” and “Beer Pressure” are piercing and powerful. […]