Density is likely the best word to describe Norma Jean‘s sound on “Wrongdoers“. Sure there’s an abundance of dynamic interplay, incendiary meltdowns and crash and burn outbursts. But it is the groups heft which keeps the album tumbling along.
For a band whose strongest trait throughout the years has often been their modernized re-envisioning of the groundwork laid by the likes of Botch and Coalesce; such heft can make for deadly results.
A hungry & subversive organic collapse of meat hook bass lines, wrenched barks and smoldering flash-fire riffs; “Wrongdoers” does not disappoint. It’s routinely a sludgy, caustic reaction against the predictable sterility that passes as ‘metalcore’ these days. To that end the group are encouragingly resistant to breakdown cop-outs and sappy choruses.
Sidestepping the candy coated Warped Tour schlock; the ample melodicism on this album emerges through strains of traditional post-hardcore. The gloss is never applied and the imperfections are left to startle as waves of charismatic vulnerability help invigorate the bottom-heavy onslaught. Suitably raw enough to capture the unfiltered aggression, the production plays up the groups rough edges, while still maintaining arresting amounts of clarity.
Anchored by the mass of a thunderous rhythm section, the band lay out their fair share of screeching riffs and verbal upheaval; but never so much as to shift the foundations of the songs themselves. It’s in this that the tracks are able to take hold and develop rather than constantly be uprooted by an unending series of catastrophic part changes. The material is still frenzied and electric, but bullish enough to stand its ground.
“Wrongdoers” is one of those rare moments in a bands career where every song connects with each other to form a bigger whole. To single out or remove one track is like pulling a component out of an engine. Not every part is crucial, but it works best when everything is in place.
Yes there are some murky moments (see the sprawling nature of the closing track for starters.) But there’s also an innate sense of heart, sweat and maturity to the material that makes it stand united.
A lack of immediate diversity may give some listeners tunnel vision as the only real curveballs thrown are the hypnotic voiceover led backmasked-sounding segue that is “Afterhour Animals“; and the dreamy Isis meets Baroness-styled drift through harmonies and harshness found on “Sun Dries, Blood Moon“.
But if you’ve got the time and patience to appreciate the bigger picture, “Wrongdoers” finds the band delivering one of the most honest and direct releases of their career.
