Metalcore has become a diluted premise, associated more with bands that write processed, sing-along choruses than the mix of metal technicality and punk-rock fury it started as. Converge’s 2001 breakthrough Jane Doe remains the masterpiece of the genre’s pre-bastardisation days: vicious as a pit bull, yet played by men unafraid to test the limits, as evidenced by the tormented, 11-minute title track. The New Englanders have never rested on their laurels, either, with subsequent releases emphasising different shades of their trademark anarchy.
The band’s 10th album and first in nine years (Chelsea Wolfe collaboration Bloodmoon: I not included), Love Is Not Enough condenses their carnage, intricacies and emotional pangs into their shortest-ever run time. Distract and Divide and To Feel Something are incensed and tightly arranged, as if Napalm Death and Slayer had joined forces to strangle you through the speakers.
There’s much more than anger to this 30-minute onslaught. We Were Never the Same unloads pure adrenaline with its tapping guitar melody, whereas Beyond Repair is an ominous interlude that makes the snare strikes of follow-up track Amon Amok hit like a rugby tackle. Make Me Forget You stabs with devastation rather than physical rage, with Jacob Bannon screaming in anguish over a whirring riff.
It’s rare for a metal band to still sound fresh this long after forming, and even rarer when they’ve spent almost all of their career in one subgenre. But Converge have a seemingly bottomless well of inspiration. Masters of metalcore, in 2001 and 2026 alike.
