Bring Me The Horizon - Sempiternal 

 A much tame cover if you ask me!

Lets go back to 2008 before I get into this. I’m in 10th grade, a kid starting to get into heavier music. My friend comes up to me and shows me the artwork for the album she is listening to on her iPod. The album cover depicts a girl holding her bloody intestines. Going what the F$#% in my head, I ask her what the hell she is listening too? She tells me it’s a song called “Diamonds Aren’t Forever” by Bring Me The Horizon. I ask her if I can take a listen. As I put on the headphones, I am suddenly thrown into a violent head banging session as the heaviness takes over my body. I tell her, “THIS IS AWESOME” and go home and get the album, Suicide Season, for myself. Jump to 2010, I am waiting till midnight of October 3rd, 2010 for the highly anticipated release of Bring Me The Horizon’s third album There Is a Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It, There Is a Heaven, Lets Keep It A Secret. The album hits the web, I download it, and I love it. While yes, it wasn’t even close to being as heavy as Suicide Season, the album was more structured musically. The lyricism was dark, but different dealing with topics such as personal discovery and realization.

The reason for this long introduction is simple, Bring Me The Horizon is a band that doesn’t do the same album twice. It’s what makes them one of my favorite bands. I know they have a wide variety of haters, but I can appreciate a band who tries to experiment and do something different, than just chug out the same album time after time (I’M LOOKING AT YOU WIZ KHALIFA). That being said, if you expected Bring Me The Horizon to go back to the heavy days of Suicide Season, you might be a little disappointed. Don’t let that deter you from listening to Sempiternal though, because Sempiternal is a bold step for Bring Me The Horizon. One that sees the production of experimentation hit a high and surprising level.

The most prominent change with the band this album is the heavy inclusion of electronics. Anyone who has read an interview with singer, Oli Sykes, knows Sykes loves electronic music and has wanted to incorporate it into the bands sound for quite a while. The band recruited keyboardist Jordan Fish of the band Worship to help give that electronic sound to Sempiternal. You see this implemented in just the first song, the very different but in my opinion catchy as hell “Can You Feel My Heart”. You can get a sense that keyboards are now a part of Bring Me The Horizon. The keyboards are heard on every song as Fish makes a nice transition into the sound of Bring Me The Horizon as he adds elements to help the mood and atmosphere of each song. A great example of this is the song, “Crooked Young,” which explores the question of if faith really matters.

Another big change with Sempiternal is singer, Oli Sykes, finally making the full transition to using clean vocals. A change that I say, “BRAVO OLI!” Sykes clean vocals are not far from his screaming voice, but they are still unique. The use of clean vocals also helps with expressing the lyricism better than any other Bring Me The Horizon album has been able too. An incredible example of this is the last song, “Hospitals For Souls”. The song is the most mature song lyrically, and musically the band have ever produced. The lyricism, dealing with the acceptance of the fear of death, is made all the more stronger by Sykes clean vocals. It works to the atmosphere to sing clean and low the prominent lyrics of losing that person you care about than screaming them out. It’s eerie, but beautiful to listen too, and should shut up any hater that says Bring Me The Horizon doesn’t have musical talent.

It’s weird because the bad I have to say about the album is in the two songs released before the album, “Shadow Moses,” and “Antivist”. It’s not that the songs are bad, it’s just that they are both the weakest on the album in terms of musicianship. Moses suffers from the generic chorus, breakdown, chorus formula that is rampant in the metalcore genre today. In terms of “Antivist” the song just feels out of place on the album as it is almost too angry. It feels like a song that would have worked perfectly on Suicide Season, but doesn’t exactly work on Sempiternal.

The final verdict:  If you won’t listen to Sempiternal because you don’t think it is heavy enough, or you are a hater of Bring Me The Horizon, you are truly making a mistake. Sempiternal is a bold album for the band, as two key changes lead to a drastically new sound. Mix in some experimentation music-wise, and you have a HELL of an album that is going to shock a lot of people. I just hope that shock is in a good way as Sempiternal is an album I feel like is going to be on my best of 2013 list at the end of the year.

FINAL GRADE:  A
CHOICE CUT:  “Can You Feel My Heart”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5aibZNVqS4&list=PLcZMZxR9uxC8x1b-IqehsFsSWemdLJWgk

Just to drive the point home...this is a pretty accurate depiction of my face when the album finished