REVIEW: Hereisaropegoodluck – Nothing to Write Home About [2024]
Artist: Hereisaropegoodluck
Album: Nothing to Write Home About
The term “supergroup” is a tricky term that often gets used to the point of abuse; and while Wax Vessel’s newest initiates Hereisaropegoodluck don’t call themselves a supergroup in any sense of the word, the harsh truth is that they’re more in line with supergroup stardom than most of the bands that hang themselves by the same moniker. Comprised of Destroyer Destroyer’s Michael Carroll and Plagues’ Brian Cole, Hereisaropegoodluck is a vaguely nostalgic take on grind amplified by splashes of grisly, dissonant death metal, eerie doom elements and a production from Digital Ghost Audio that makes the entire release a visceral, gut-turning adventure. To classify them as grind seems perhaps too simple for the awe-inspiring undertaking the duo embark on with Nothing to Write Home About, but in a release where dangerously few things are simple, perhaps a simple descriptor is the best. A maelstrom of dizzying speed, terrifying technicality and grotesque heaviness with interspersed, tactfully used moments of unsettling calm, Nothing to Write Home About is a lively, lurid and languishing slab of unrelenting aggression that is, as it turns out, something to very much write home about.
Nothing to Write Home About captures the whirling onslaught of frantic riffs, machine-gun blast beats and sludgy, crushing bass that made the early days of MySpace grindcore and mathcore the blast (pun intended) that it was, and sees it grow up, as it were. Hereisaropegoodluck infuse dismal atmosphere by way of doom-tinted riffs with enough dissonance to sink the titanic in some portions, mere moments before throwing the listener headlong into a woodchipper powered by spastic fretwork and frenetic percussion. Carroll’s work as the outfit’s instrumentalist is a top-tier example of bringing the past into the present without relying solely on nostalgia to keep people engaged. Sure—the superficial similarities to the intense grind of days bygone might draw listeners in (it worked for me), but the diverse array of styles and influences infused into the album’s instrumental soundscape is what keeps them glued to the speaker. Carroll expands even further, adventuring into industrial-tinted segues that serve as sparse intermissions between immolating cascades of remorseless, eviscerating aggression. While he reigns as a master of chaos, the chaos he brings to the table is precise and technically immaculate, made practically perfect at the hands of Hunter Young and Brandan Lopez at Digital Ghost Audio. The dialectic between technicality and unbridled chaos is perhaps the greatest instrumental achievement Hereisaropegoodluck accomplish on Nothing to Write Home About, as few bands—even with members as experienced as the rope duo—are able to accomplish.
While Carroll’s skills deserve the extolment above, Cole’s work on the microphone takes the vision set forth by Hereisaropegoodluck and brings it to life. In a word, he is primal. Nothing to Write Home About takes a frantic instrumental soundscape and Cole, atop it, lets loose with shrill screams and robust, monstrous roars that echo through the listener’s mind like the shouts and screams of a starved man in a sealed cave. He covers an astounding range of styles and tones with equal ferocity and driving energy, taking so much of what made him a fearsome force on Plagues’ material and translating it something new. Cole’s vocals add a degree of urgency to the record (not that it was lacking), giving the listener something constant in the swirling sea of blast beats, brutalizing riffs and dreary atmosphere to cling to—even if it turns out to be just as aggressive and skin-rending.
I was introduced to Hereisaropegoodluck with a simple phrase: grind is back on the menu, boys. They were definitely right, and the praise lauded by their debut single and the likes of Wax Vessel is no overstatement on their skills. Nothing to Write Home About is a dizzying venture not for the feint of heart, that covers bases from blitzing grind to d-beat and bass drops and near everything in between. Here is Hereisaropegoodluck—good luck.
9/10
For Fans Of: NAILS, Destroyer Destroyer, Plagues, brain-dead death metal meets spazzed out grind.
Connor Welsh
