Man, young people today are morbid. Take British five-piece Bring Me the Horizon, whose new album is called Suicide Season and features images of a girl clasping a knot of internal organs and the band dripping blood from their frowning, sneering mouths. But dissatisfaction sells now more than ever, and these guys’ vicious collision of death metal and hardcore has been dubbed “deathcore” and garnered as many fans as haters. Some of his sentiments may be somewhat lugubrious, but singer Oliver Sykes knows enough to alter his vocals throughout each song, going from a Cookie Monster roar to a more intelligible shout with lively shades of gray in between. And even when BMTH is hurtling along with fire in their eyes and drums so fast they don’t even sound like drums anymore, there’s enough production trickery to keep the onslaught more moody than numbing. The rabble-rousing Sykes once got into trouble offstage by reportedly urinating on and assaulting a female fan — the charges were later dropped — so when he screams, “I’d rather live than live forever,” it’s tempting to believe him.
This article appears in Nov 13-19, 2008.