ALBUM REVIEW: Become The Hunter – Suicide Silence

To say people were waiting with baited breath for the new SUICIDE SILENCE album is an understatement. The band’s last album was met with a lot of polarising feedback from critics and the fans thought similarly. Now it has been three years since then and the band have worked hard on their new album, Become The Hunter. Does it improve on their previous work, or does it fall into the same traps again?

Putting it bluntly, this is what their self-titled album should have sounded like; inclusive of their deathcore roots, but expanding on the style and revitalising their sound with new ideas that work with their established style. Guitars are heavy and chunky, the bass is strong, and the unclean vocals are as vibrant as ever – this is a massive step up from the last album.

Meltdown is a good introduction to the album and Become The Hunter is an insane but brilliant way to close the album. Other tracks like Two Steps, Feel Alive, The Scythe and Disaster Valley are very memorable and uniquely brilliant, especially The Scythe, which contains a brilliant riff in the guitars as well as keeping the album vibrant by changing up the tempo and mood into something new. Love Me To Death is another brilliantly executed track on the album. Whilst heavy and easy to jam to, its internal nature seems like organised chaos; every instrument sounds crazy and all over the place, but in reality, everything is precisely played and exact to the energy that the band want to portray in their music. 

However, there are some points where songs can blend into one another, for example, In Hiding and Death’s Anxiety, both of which have very similar sounding guitars, similar energy, they aren’t tracks that will stand out any time soon. But even with that said, there’s still some really beautiful moments within the songs, for example, Serene Obscene has some beautiful guitar work, both at the beginning of the song, and within the body of the track. 

Overall, Become The Hunter is a pretty solid album, and SUICIDE SILENCE are really commendable for taking on the criticism from the last album and working on their music to improve and turn that into creating this album. This stands strong within the rest of their discography, and one that shows the band can keep to their original style without sounding boring or repetitive.

Become The Hunter shows not only that, but also how it can stand up on its own as a solid album. Even if the previous self-titled never happened and there wasn’t a huge amount of pressure on this record, it’s still a genuinely good record. Despite its flaws, it is a strong effort that fans would be pleased to hear vibrant, heavy and harsh songs in a familiar style, but done in a fresh and unique way to make it special for the audience. It keeps up with the energy that metal is known for as well as making sure that it is uniquely SUICIDE SILENCE. To summarise, a great album, and it’s nice to have this band back on top form once again.

Rating: 8/10

Become The Hunter is set for release on February 14th via Nuclear Blast Records.

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