A beginner’s guide to post-hardcore #4

What better way to wave goodbye to week 4 than with a timely fix of post-hardcore goodness. This week, I’ll be telling you all about Every Time I Die. As was the case with the second lesson’s band, Refused, Every Time I Die doesn’t strictly belong to the post-hardcore genre but for anyone following this column, this band cannot be missed.

As a product of the New York alternative music scene, Every Time I Die has a strong hardcore influence present in their sound but they have a vast platter of extra offerings too. Frontman Keith Buckley adopts the gruff vocal style of hardcore punk but in some tracks does show off his more gentle side with melodic tunes sure to get stuck in your head. A prime example of this is in the song ‘Wanderlust’ from their most recent album New Junk Aesthetic. I am almost certain that some weird voodoo magic has gone into the track because it is literally always in my head. That being said, it’s a pleasure to have such a great piece of music as an imaginary friend.

As I mentioned earlier, they are not strictly post-hardcore and this is evident when they are compared to other bands in this series. As opposed to the unpredictable and choppy music of Glassjaw and At The Drive-In, Every Time I Die do not infuse this kind of underlying asymmetry into the essence of their music. Their sound is more (for lack of a much better word) conventional, without the strange time signatures and noise experiments. But this shouldn’t be taken the wrong way. Every Time I Die never fail to create a phenomenal album with every part of their back catalogue being as good if not better than the last. Every time they release a new record, I always get the feeling that they cannot top their previous release and so I always think the new one will be a let down, but it never is!

For this reason, I urge you to buy their upcoming album Ex-Lives (out March 6) as I would not be at all surprised if it is their best… so far. Remember to check out the recommendation and see you all next week!

Writer’s Recommendation

Listen to the song ‘Wanderlust’, although I warn you, it will get stuck in your head for the rest of your life.