Emmure – Slave to the Game CD review

After last year’s awesome release entitled Speaker of the Devil, it’s hard to think how Emmure could top such a mind-blowing hardcore album. Now in 2012, this New York five piece are back with their best album to date. Presenting Slave to the Game – a commanding and imposing hardcore album jammed full of grimy beat downs, grizzly vocal lines and powerful rhythm sections. With twelve memorable, hard hitting hardcore anthems, this is an album you need in your collection and whether you are a fan of hardcore, metal or alternative you are going to love this; for it is one of the heaviest releases of the past 10 years.

The highlight of any hardcore album are the filthy, encrusted guitar beat downs and one thing is for sure Slave to the Game is crammed to the brim full of them.  This is the ideal album to throw down to in the comfort of your own home and when the subsonic boom of tracks such as ‘She Gave Her Heart to Deadpool’, ‘Bison Diaries’ and ‘Blackheart Reigns’ smash through your speakers, you would have to be either mad or ignorant not to bang your head like crazy to. Every track on Slave to the Game would be awesome to see and hear at a concert and would no doubt ignite the crowd into a head banging frenzy… YES, IT IS THAT BRUTAL!

Slave to the Game has a very punk like feel to it. The songs are short, turbulent and punchy, radiating out so much anarchy and attitude in every song. Emmure have no problem with hooking the listener with tracks such as ‘Protoman’, ‘I Am Onslaught’ and the murky sounding finale of ‘A.I’ and the reason why these songs have the wow factor is because the songs are so short. The songs are intense, extreme and compact meaning Emmure can fill three minutes with as much flare and style as they need to ensure that this album has the wow factor.

From looking at promo pictures of Emmure the first thing that you will say is… “Have these guys just stepped out of a Fred Durst convention”. Their chosen look of baggy shorts and baseball caps is quite deceptive and although their wardrobe collection may raise a few brows in the metal community, Emmure have more balls and brawn that Alex Webster having a wrestling match with Zakk Wylde. It’s the image that will let Emmure down and it’s such a shame as their music is mind-blowing.

Emmure have to be the greatest hardcore band going and now with two brain-melting in their repertoire, will finally get the recognition they deserve in the metal world as well as the hardcore scene. Prepare to be rocked like you’ve never been rocked before! [9/10]