Review Summary: I guess we have to take Emmure seriously now...
Well. This was unexpected. After the immense disappointment of the new Suicide Silence "album", I never expected the mantle of best deathcore album of 2017 so far (in my opinion) to be taken up by Emmure.
Look At Yourself, the bands 7th album, first with the new line-up (starring Josh Travis formerly of Glass Cloud and TTDTDE) was released on March 3rd on Sharptone Records, the new Sumerian for deathcore groups.
The first track I want to dig into is Shinjuku Masterlord, which kicks off with an aggressive "I'm back!" as we delve into fairly typical riffs and vocals with some well done rapping by Mr Frankie Palmeri. Whilst this track and others like it don't really do anything different, the song is catchy, has a heavy breakdown etc.
Smokey and Natural Born Killer, whilst heavy and somewhat catchy, don't have a lot of substance and depth, in part due to their short running time, which is probably my only real complaint of the record, but we'll get into that later.
Flag of the Beast opens with screechy chords before kicking into high gear with Frankie roaring
" I. Am. Your ***ing saviour!" I. Am. The ***ing Antichrist" which warrants an eye roll or 20.
Ice Man Confessions opens with some ghostly notes and spoken word as it kicks into a chuggy, grooving chorus which is incredibly catchy.
After that, the record starts to become old, but Torch and Gucci Prison, another of my favourite cuts, save the second half from becoming a glorified EP.
I do have one glaring issue with the album, song length. The three 1 minute tracks could have easily been combined and the 2-3 minute running times don't give the tracks the breathing room I feel they needed. Gucci Prison is the longest track on the album, clocking in at just under 4 minutes, a rarity in Emmure's discography.
Overall, I'd have to say that the leaving of the entire band in the back end of 2015 was exactly the boot up the ass Frankie needed to turn the band around. If this is the kind of quality we can expect from future releases, I'm going to start giving Emmure a lot more credit.
