By DAN SOUTHALL
THE beauty of art and music is the subjective nature of it.
One band that has made a career of its subjective nature is Bring Me The Horizon, beginning as badly played, noisy deathcore before gradually morphing into pop metal band on poorly-received Amo. Since then, perhaps because of member changes, perhaps because they realise that not all art is necessarily good art, they have slowly rediscovered their heavier side.
This journey has led BMTH to revisit their first album for its 20th anniversary. Not content with the ole remaster/rehash trick that every band has done at least once (and will surely happen here eventually), they decided to re-record everything from the ground up, introducing later-coming fans to their roots.
Like so many other listeners, I didn’t jump on the Horizon wagon until There Is A Heaven…, an album that is arguably only second in most minds to their classic Sempiternal. That album helped to define modern metal and introduced the slippery slope of slowly watering down of the band’s sound.
The first thing that leaps out here is the vocal performance of Oli Sykes, something to be expected after 20 years of recording and touring, but perfectly in line with the intent of this album: a better produced and constructed effort than what was essentially an attempt by teenagers to replicate what they were hearing at the time.
Fear not, that immaturity is still writ large all over Repented. BMTH changed only one song title and made one of the more nonsensical ones legible. “Liquor and Love Lost” now goes by its original title, “Dragon Slaying”
The biggest talking point has to be the added closing track “Dehumanized” openly showing that if Bring Me the Horizon chose to continue with their rediscovered love of actual heavy music, they are more than capable to keep up with the bands that have followed in their wake.
Really though, if you weren’t a fan when this album was released the first time, you probably aren’t going to be a fan now. As a skeptic, I would recommend giving it a listen. This is a different band here from what it once was and whether you like it or not, what they have recreated is a great example of early if ignorant deathcore, a brand of music that has now exploded.
But it’s exploded with the modern outlook that as a band Bring Me The Horizon have spent 20 years building.
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