EP REVIEW: This All Will End – Overgrow

Chicago slowcore quartet OVERGROW began to build a buzz last year with their potent combination of midwest emo and modern pop-punk on debut album Walls Of Mirrors. But it was no easy road to get there, which may be why the ‘sad-boi’ vibes were so palpable. Their agent had quit music, their label contract expired and it seemed like their days were done, without it even being their choice. 

A year on, they sound all the better for surviving those trials and tribulations, back on a new label with the same melancholy and malcontent. The four songs of This All Will End deal with lost loves, bitter acceptance and an overarching nihilism that we’ve all felt at one point or another. I’ll Ruin Everything That I See quickly establishes this sombre slant with an opening melody that calls to mind the likes of GRANDVIEW’s The Only Constant. The chorus should invoke mass singalongs and the crystalline guitars will sound just as comfortable ringing out from a festival tent as they will on your earphones when you just want to shut the world out.

In fact, (almost) every song on This All Will End possesses that earworm quality. Even with the layered instrumentation drenched in reverb, the melodies shine through like a lantern in a woodland graveyard that’s fallen into ruin. Sadly beautiful and beautifully sad all at once, there’s a therapeutic edge to it all, whether it’s the angered truths of When You’re Not Around or the tragic romance of Nowhere Without You.

While OVERGROW may not be doing anything particularly new or novel here, This All Will End is enough to keep existing fans happy and should draw in new ones along the way. After a rocky few years, it seems like all of the pieces are right where they need to be for yet another proponent of the midwest emo revival. Just make sure you’ve got tissues handy.

Rating: 8/10

This All Will End is out now via Acrobat Unstable Records

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