ALBUM REVIEW: No More Must Crawl – Cleaver
French metallic hardcore trio CLEAVER attack as violently as their name suggests on their debut full-length No More Must Crawl. Taking well-informed inspiration from the likes of CONVERGE and BOTCH, the band hack away at their listeners with all the vigour of a particularly enthusiastic butcher across the record’s ten tracks. It’s nasty, noisy and thoroughly chaotic – an exercise in hardcore at its most deranged and depraved. Granted, there’s a lot of it around at the moment, but clearly the well hasn’t run dry yet.
Given its well-worn influences, many will probably have a decent idea of what to expect from No More Must Crawl. Opener Desperate definitely doesn’t disappoint; originally released as a single back in 2019, this one gets straight to business with raucous riffing and barked vocals. It twists, turns and tears its way through two and a half minutes, and by the end of it one should have a pretty good idea of much of what CLEAVER have in store for the album to come. Second track Dressed In Sorrow ups the dissonance a bit, while Sunset and Inner Voice soon provide back-to-back early highlights. Both of these drip with CONVERGEisms, the former lurching into life in a manner reminiscent of classic Jane Doe opener Concubine, and the latter showing the first real signs of CLEAVER’s more dynamic side to particularly crushing effect.
Fear not however, this isn’t a case of complete identity theft. CLEAVER pull from a reasonably diverse pool of ‘core’ influences here, all to largely compelling effect. Elements of noise, grind and screamo definitely trickle in, while tracks like Kyg provide moments of more straight-up metalcore chug. That one sets up something of a closing peak for the record, its meatheaded final breakdown simple yet satisfying. Light On follows as a vaguely melodic but still noisy interlude, while the record concludes with the powerful closing pair of the title track and Grief. Landing at over 10 minutes combined, these take up well over a third of the album’s total runtime; they’re predictably dynamic, hitting with something of an emotional weight that has arguably been hitherto unheard on the record.
It’s worth mentioning that the production is pretty raw on No More Must Crawl. For many, that won’t be a problem, as it does suite the band’s feral intensity well, but those more accustomed to modern hardcore’s more polished fare may take a couple of listens to come around to it. Fortunately, the record’s 27-minute runtime makes that easy enough to do, and it is definitely worth it. There’s also a decent overall journey here, evolving from the sheer ferocity of the opening tracks to something more considered but no less potent by the record’s end.
If you like nasty, chaotic hardcore, then you’ve probably heard a fair few records like this by now. That’s totally fine though; not everything has to be a VEIN.FM or a SOUL GLO. CLEAVER mix up enough of their influences to maintain interest throughout here, and they know how to execute all of their ideas to a high standard. Chances are they’re just getting started, and it feels like the best is almost certainly yet to come.
Rating: 7/10
No More Must Crawl is set for release on May 6th via Klonosphere Records.
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