Album Review #1: Misery Everlasting by Line of Scrimmage

I first had the pleasure of listening to this album on October 15th, 2018 when I received a YouTube notification from a YouTube channel I am subscribed to called “Slam Worldwide.” “Slam Worldwide” is a YouTube channel with 128,000 subscribers that releases unknown bands from genres ranging from Deathcore to Slamming Brutal Death Metal (which are the heaviest genres of metal known to man). When I received this notification on this album, I was surprised to see the genre of this band was “Metal / Hardcore,” which essentially means its subgenre is “Beatdown.” I had never listened to a beatdown album, so I was curious to see what it was all about and oh boy—I was in for a treat.

My first surprise when I heard the opening riff of the first song “Calloused” was the tuning of the guitar. Typical tunings of bands previewed on this channel fluctuate anywhere between B standard to drop G# on seven-string guitars. However, this band is tuned to D standard on a six-string guitar, and immediately had one of the heaviest guitar tones I have ever heard on an album (and I’ve listened to quite a few albums in my lifetime). I was immediately hooked and was prepared for this to be an album I would be listening to for the rest of my life but… the vocals were yet to be introduced. With an album this heavy, I would expect the lowest of the low death metal growls, but instead, I was bombarded with screams, which at first saddened me. Slowly, when the palm muted chugs were not as prevalent in the earlier stages of the album, the vocals actually started to grow on me because they correlated quite well with the music. However, a little over halfway through the album, “Line of Scrimmage” make known their sick kick drum sound and start chugging away, getting heavier, and heavier, and heavier. The opening riff of this song plays four open heavy chords followed by three super slow palm muted chugs of sheer awesomeness. Although the vocals did not match this part of the album, it didn’t matter, because I was too busy headbanging to sheer brutality at its finest. They even pulled off a breakdown within a breakdown!

Overall, this album is killer. I was not expecting such a pleasurable experience from a beatdown band, and I am still in awe, a week later, in how they achieved such a heavy sound from only tuning a step lower than standard tuning on a guitar. This album gets an 8½ /10 (not a 10/10) due to the vocal range and the guitar range just not matching up to my liking. The best track was track #6, “God Take,” due to three chugs of sheer awesomeness. Memorable tracks on the album were track #1 + 2, “Calloused,” and “Countless Acts of War,” as well as track #8, “Rage Incarnate,” due to generally just being super heavy. Mediocre tracks on the album were tracks #3,4, and 5, “Wolf Tickets,” “Incarcerated,” and “Pestilence” as well as track #7, “Ruthless,” due to the other songs on the album simply being too good to compete against. The worst song on the album was the last song, track #9, “The Meter Room,” do to the tri-tonal vibe and lacking the brutality the rest of the album had—this album should have just smashed you in the face the entire time—not just smash your face and then help you, just the smashing your face part. Stay metal and subscribe to “Slam Worldwide”! \m/