Make Them Suffer: Separating Themselves From The Pack

MAKE THEM SUFFER have always been something of a musical island. Sure, at their core they’re a structured attack of modern metalcore/deathcore, but look even slightly wider and you soon realise the Aussies have always maintained a solid identity of musical courage. Debut record Neverbloom (2012) was unlike anything else permeating deathcore at the time. While the likes of WHITECHAPEL, THE ACACIA STRAIN, and JOB FOR A COWBOY were cementing their hyper brutal, breakdown fronted legacy – MAKE THEM SUFFER were pulling out seven minute tracks of progression, and symphonic beauty.

The record almost became an oxymoron, it was peerless while still competing in the same ring as its contemporaries. You knew that deep down the MAKE THEM SUFFER jigsaw wasn’t complete, but it was a mighty starting point. Vocalist Sean Harmanis remembers the days of their infancy fondly. “We always knew we had a really strong, defined sound,” he recalls. “I think everyone knew what we had to do on that album [Neverbloom] we had to step up from our debut EP – and expand on that sound. The recording process wasn’t without its hiccups, and there’s definitely things that I remember regretting at the time about the album, but I’m still super proud of it.”

What came next arguably sums up the MAKE THEM SUFFER mindset more than anything else. They’d found not only a gap in the swollen deathcore market, but one they could excel in – but that wasn’t enough. The extensive, progressive nature of the band was ditched, in its place came a swap in song structure which delivered their pre-existing gut punch with jabs of ethereal cleansing. Sophomore record Old Souls gave them the opportunity for then keyboardist Louisa Burton to add clean lines of character to efforts like Let Me In and the title track.

It’s interesting how when discussing the bands stylistic departure from their debut Sean describes it as a decision of instinct rather than a large scale debate. “We didn’t think there was a need for it [their previous song structure] any more,” he says. “When we came into the second album, we thought the strongest part of our sound was keyboards, and our use of melody. We felt that’s what was setting us apart from other bands, not just that PLUS the deathcore thing, so I think we wanted to see if we could push that into other areas, and genres.”

Sean is far from bitter, but he’s also quick to point out that the bands traversal into a slightly different make up was a universal decision. He talks of how as proud of Neverbloom as they were, the fact is the record wasn’t a game changer for them. “It’s an album that means a lot to a lot of people but the success we saw off that album wasn’t much. We felt like we never really got much recognition from it, we got barely any touring opportunities.”

Where Old Souls peered into the looking glass of something new, it’s the record that followed which truly lead us to where we are. 2017’s Worlds Apart brought Booka Nile into the fray on keyboards and melodic vocals, and the birth of elegant tracks like Uncharted, Fireworks, and Save Yourself came to fruition. And it was here that MAKE THEM SUFFER cemented their individuality yet again – they were no longer an extreme metal band that flirted with symphony, they had become a multi armed metal machine, capable of transcending emotive depth within an instance.

If the bands journey so far seems to read like something of a three step process – that’s probably because it has been. And step four? How To Survive A Funeral – a record that, through no fault of its own, is being looked at as the album that ties the last decade of MAKE THEM SUFFER together. Cliche as it may be: this is the Aussies culmination, How To Survive A Funeral takes every aspect of the quintets arsenal they have dazzled you with over the last eight years, and concocts a spellbinding listen of empathy, beauty, and barbarity. Even with this new record solidifying their sound in a way we’ve never heard before though, it still feels the need to push the boundaries. Sean discusses a track like The Attendant – a soulful, mellow effort to accept your demons, and states how without the bands former courage, they would never have reached the creative latitude to pen such a unique song for them.

“I mean, I hope people take to it [The Attendant] immediately, but there’s always gonna be a group of fans not going to think it’s the best move for us, or wish we would go back to our deathcore roots, but we’re hearing from those people less and less these days. There’s definitely elements in How To Survive A Funeral that we would not be comfortable using if we didn’t try them out on Worlds Apart – it was kinda like our curve ball record, our chance to experiment with different sounds, and having tried them we had the confidence to go forward and continue using some of the things we liked about that record.”

Skewed as their career diagram may look – it’s this new chapter that seems most likely to be the talking point if MAKE THEM SUFFER come up into conversation a decade from now. Neverbloom was only a cult hit, and the duo of Old Souls & Worlds Apart had the band still searching for how best to stir their formula. How To Survive A Funeral is the first time the band have ever really stuck their flag in the ground of metal – it’s unique, fresh, brooding, and ultimately: the best they’ve ever sounded.

Interestingly, Sean manages to sum up the whole purpose of the band in a mere sentence: “Originality is the most important thing for me, if you hear a band and think ‘oh that’s just something I’ve heard before’ then you’re not really inclined to listen to more.” And when you apply this logic to the quintets career, it absolutely makes sense. Though historically the likes of THY ART IS MURDER, WHITECHAPEL, and SUICIDE SILENCE will be looked as the fathers of deathcore, it was MAKE THEM SUFFER that were brazen enough to be something different, and one of the first bands to at least attempt at expanding the genre, to the point where now, arguably, they’re just a metal band.

At the precipice of the biggest moment of their career thus far, there’s no nerves. Sean directly states his belief in the new record. “This is everything we’ve been trying to achieve musically for the last four records in one album.” He’s blunt, but he doesn’t need to expand, because he’s right. MAKE THEM SUFFER have spent the last eight years arguably being massively under-appreciated by metal as a musical landscape, expect that to change come the record’s release.

How To Survive A Funeral is out now via Rise Records.

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