Victims

A Dissident

Written by: PP on 22/06/2011 02:25:20

Victims from Stockholm, Sweden ought to be a familiar name for anyone who has been following the Scandinavian hardcore punk scene in the last ten years. Established in 1997, these guys have been dealing out ferocious d-beat / crust / hardcore for a while now to varying degrees of success, and "A Dissident" is the latest addition to their back catalogue.

Although I can't claim to have in-depth knowledge of their back catalogue other than having heard a few songs here and there, I can't assure you that Victims have changed ever-so-slightly. Their previous material was all about the hardcore onslaught delivered with the fire and intensity of an exploding sun, but it had a tendency of sounding monotonous to all but the fiercest hardcore warriors reading this site. For "A Dissident", they've added an odd, some might argue unsuitable element for the genre: pop. That's right, in the midst of this freight train speed, take-no-prisoners approach to hardcore, you'll find gems like "Bringing Me Down" and "We Are Not The Future", both of which include chorus sequences you could argue to be catchy. In a fist-pumping, get-the-circle-pit-going kind of way, of course, but still.

This is a welcome addition alongside increased melody in their scathing guitars (see: "Lifetaker"), both ideas that have been taken from more succesful and more melodic counterparts from the European and the US scene. You'll even recognize some pounding hardcore in the vein of Sick Of It All's heaviest material if you pay close attention. That said, at heart "A Dissident" is still a d-beat / crust lover's album. No breathers are included, and the listener is expected to absorb the music in the same manner as one absorbs a fist arriving in your face during an unprovoked bar fight: shake it off, and fight back.

7

Download: Burning Bridges, Bringing Me Down, Lifetaker
For the fans of: Discharge, Sick Of It All, Disrupt
Listen: Myspace

Release date 12.04.2011
Deathwish, Inc

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