Label - Nuclear Blast Records
Release Date - 4 March 2022
Words - Tony Bliss
Whilst the turn of the 21st century ushered in an as yet unsurpassed golden age for mind-expanding hardcore (think Converge, Refused, The Dillinger Escape Plan), of late a particularly exciting new breed of future cult heroes has emerged to redefine and remould the heavy music scene, with that same rulebook dismantling, ‘fuck you’ frame of mind as red-hot as it was twenty years ago. Blindsiding the underground with their debut LP ‘Errorzone’ in 2018, Vein’s particular strain of scattershot dynamics may contain the unmistakable whiff of nu-metals big-shorted bounce, however the band couldn't sound any less interested in crossover success on ‘This World Is Going To Ruin You’. It’s an ‘effing horrible record, in the best possible way.
Broadly speaking we could label this a metalcore album, yet with so much happening in both spirit and scope assigning genre labels seems a tad redundant. Instead, it’s probably best to concentrate on keeping your faculties, and indeed limbs, as intact as possible whilst the albums first half hacks a gore-strewn path towards the finish line. Sub-two minute cuts such as ‘Versus Wyoming’, Inside Design’ and ‘Light Out’ are genuinely terrifying, on occasion touching levels of throat-slashing violence akin to the grindcore intensity of Nasum or Insect Warfare in full flight - and providing an ears-agog showcase for drummer Matt Wood’s multi-armed chops - whereas the lengthier likes of recent single ‘The KIlling Womb’ and ‘Fear In Nonfiction’ are just as disfigured and aggressive basement show pit-starters (although the latter does feature a clean sung chorus hook from Thursday’s Geoff Rickly).
There is innovation built into Vein’s very DNA, as evidenced on the rumbling noise-rock/shoegaze hybrid ‘Magazine Beach’, Waveney’s hazy post-metal threat or seven-minute closer ‘Funeral Sound’ (an ambient, alt-metal collision), however every second of this album shares the same relentless desire to detach your skull from your spine and spit poison into your panic-stricken face, whether via hammering, dissonant grooves (just check out the ickily titled ‘Orgy In The Morgue’) or the more measured thud of the aforementioned above. ‘This World…’s unerringly virulent atmosphere means that this is just as extreme, disturbing and downright grim as any death metal record you can name, and conjures images of crime scene polaroids more readily than stage dives and mosh-calls. It’s also the best distillation of heavy music's primitive, heart stopping thrill our world has produced in recent memory.
9/10
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