Review Summary: Marbled Progression.
Ohio-based metalcore band Thirty Nights Of Violence(now known as Thirty Nights) are possibly one of the most interesting bands to come out of their scene in the last decade or so. Their style of music blends every kind of heavy music from Deftones to Disembodied in a way that never feels forced or disorganized. You’ll See Me Up There is an EP of six songs that show a talented and ambitious group of musicians synthesizing the best elements of their favorite genres of music into a perfectly-sized package.
The most clear way they show this is with their guitar work. Opener “Lost In Your Light” shows them shifting from a dissonant panic-chord opening to deathcore breakdowns to a Deftones-esque chorus of big, dissonant chords, and then an eerie spoken-word interlude backed by intricate, dark guitar melodies, and finishes off with a final burst of dissonance and heaviness. This isn’t as chaotic as it sounds. The band returns to the chorus and ends with a satisfying breakdown, and they know how to write transitions that don’t feel forced but also feel distinct.
Other standout tracks include “In Vein” and “Marbled Regression.” The former opens with the guitars playing a big, dreamy chord progression sounding very similar to a certain song about being quiet and driving far away before the rest of the band jumps in, before switching quickly to something that wouldn’t sound too out of place on an afflicted, early 2000s post-hardcore record (think Skycamefalling’s 10.21) with driving power-chord grooves over a staple punk drumbeat, vocals rising in intensity as multiple members of the band contribute, vocalist Zach Wilbourn’s metallic hardcore mid-shout doing most of the work yet aided by drummer Ethan Young’s dirtier, high-pitched screams, eventually going into a soaring chorus where the cleans of the bassist trade with Wilbourn’s shouts. The outro is stunning, beautifully transitioning out of a deathcore pinch-harmonic heavy section and into soaring melodies and clean singing and right back into a satisfying, simple, yet still melodic breakdown.
“Marbled Regression” is perhaps the most linear, yet by no means lesser song on the record. The riffs on this track bring to mind Eighteen Visions and other early 2000s Trustkill Records bands, the chorus being something special, dark and melodic with all the vocalists contributing something. The bridge, in a tribute to old-school melodic metalcore, features the guitarists trading solos over arpeggios building up to the chorus and then a final breakdown. It is all very well executed.
Drummer Ethan Young also deserves much praise for having the versatility to keep up with the guitars. He can do everything from simple post-hardcore grooves to blast beats to big fills that lead perfectly into a chorus or breakdown. He knows when to step back and when to pummel the kit.
As far as the other songs go, “Shattered Glass” is pretty good, kind of a mix of poisonthewell and As I Lay Dying, although feeling somewhat more predictable yet still well-executed. The title track is a cool ambient electronic interlude that isn’t too long. “Salt” is a good, more straight up grind/mathcore song that is also very short compared to the others. The bass mostly follows the guitars, but is pretty well-mixed and adds weight to the sound. Lyrically, a lot of this album is about personal struggles, be it with change, self-hatred, loss. “Marbled Regression” and “Shattered Glass” stand out as the most interesting to me, the former about struggling through a depressive spiral, and the latter seeming to be about self-reconstruction from pain and tragedy. With lines like “does it feel like slow bleeding onto a blank canvas” “with everything i fall in love with i’m an object of resentment” they put themselves a cut above average metalcore lyrics with all their undertow and gravity-related clichés, if still being a bit generic.
Overall, there’s nothing on this record you haven’t heard at least once before. But you probably haven’t heard it put together with such competence and smoothness.
