The Dusk in Us

Converge may be slowing down in their output, but this is perhaps the band's best record since You Fail Me, keeping in mind the three albums in-between are not to be sniffed at.

On The Dusk In Us, we have a handful of tracks that see Converge pushing at the boundaries of their sound, even escaping it entirely. This leads to some of the most accessible, catchy, and (uncoincidentally) most emotionally resonant work of their careers.

It's still heavy as fuck, but it's also textural, emotional, diverse and defiant as fuck, too. [No. 148, p.52]

The band still maintain their status as leaders. Frontman Jacob Bannon is physically incapable of phoning in his performances, and always ready to bring the fear. Kurt Ballou’s guitar work is a joy to experience, whether he's carpal tunneling through downstrokes, picking out lyrical phrases to frame Bannon's ominous moments (“Thousands Of Miles Between Us”) or bringing the straight-up noise like a hateful glass-bomb explosion ("Under Duress").

The Dusk in Us is, then, a 44-minute master class in wielding extreme art toward human ends, using hardcore’s berating heft as a foundation for dirging experimentalism.

The Dusk in Us continues to show the depth that Converge can hold below the abrasive sounds. They don’t create chunks of music to be instantly digested, they create art which is meant to take you prisoner in a darkness that will ultimately show you more than you ever realised.

If anything, the songs are more dramatic than ever, making greater use of near-silence and dynamics to underline hooks and refrains.

The Dusk In Us can’t match the apocalyptic power of a classic like 2001’s Jane Doe, but when Converge takes a victory lap, it still does it at a mad sprint.

As sharp, urgent, and exploratory as they’ve ever been, The Dusk in Us is quintessential Converge, given the grand new purpose of salvation.

Converge has not been going so much through a process of transformation as one of maturing. Still angry and rebellious as in their early releases, they also display a much wiser and patient perspective that only years of experience can bring.

An unerring sense of conflict courses through The Dusk In Us, and while that might sound like business as usual for a Converge record, it’s a testament to Bannon and his cohorts that they remain so compelling nine albums in.

At this point in their story arc, Bannon, Kurt Ballou, Nate Newton, and Ben Koller really don't have anything to prove, which makes it all the more impressive that they haven't let up on trying to do just that.

Gut-busting, heart-wrenching and captivating from vicious beginning to devastating conclusion, the likes of ‘Cannibals’, the jolting ‘Arkhipov Calm’ and beautifully excruciating title track capture the band at their most ambitious and dominant.

On this form, there are few around who can match them.

The Dusk in Us is another step forward for Converge, pushing their sound to new levels in a way that is uniquely their own. Although it took five years to come to fruition, the record was well worth the wait, and stands as a testament to why the band have become so hugely influential.

There are some nods to years past, and most longtime acolytes will be satisfied with what is mostly testament Converge; but the band's causal nexus doesn’t exist in a vacuum, or in the grips of GodCity Studio, but out there, rooted in the mundane and then amplified to hysteria. Much of The Dusk in Us seems to obsess over the everyday, or maybe more accurately, our demons lurking on the cusp of day and night.