CENTURIES from Florida is one of the few bands that dwell within the reach of Hardcore that are able to keep things highly interesting and distinct without receding too far away from the given principles of the genre. The band recently inked a deal with Southern Lord Records, so you probably might guess that CENTURIES are not exactly playing Pop Punk. Their all-go-no-slow approach shows an edge that has been immersed in frustration, angst and despair, accumulating in a dismal cloth of anger that covers all of their recorded material to date.
All this recorded output plus four new previously unreleased songs are to be found on the compilation Broken Hymns, which has been put out by This Charming Man and Halo Of Flies Records. Thus the record perfectly portrays the development CENTURIES underwent from their very first EP to the current day.
On the Creation/Extinction EP from 2010, all the trademark elements of CENTURIES’ sound are already present, but still had to be fully formed. Taking the same line as His Hero Is Gone for example, CENTURIES expressed their anger in an unaltered, pure matter, paving the way they were about to follow later on.
Roughly a year later, the band released a split 7” with Homestretch. On these recordings, CENTURIES started to include more Metal influences into their sound – most obvious is the well-dosed use of blasts that perfectly complements the rush of d-beats. In comparison to the material of Creation/Extinction, the songs here are characterized by a way stronger urgency, which saw its perfection on the follow-up release.
On the split 7″ with the German band Patsy’O’Hara, CENTURIES had developed into an absolute force when it comes down to dark, Metal-influenced Hardcore. Finally the production totally underlined the sound and song-writing. The massive wall of sound created an incredibly grasping atmosphere, and the instrumental and vocal performance reached new heights. Especially the latter comes across extremely pissed and angry, not unlike Dwid Hellion in his best days. The four additional new songs on Broken Hymns totally keep that direction and alone would justify the purchase of this record. Especially when CENTURIES throw in these great, sinister melodies they’re on top of their game.
Broken Hymns shows the impressive development of CENTURIES and delivers 15 tracks of dark, melodic and damn clever Hardcore that should not be missed by any means. I’m sure we’ll hear a lot from this band in the future.
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