Justice Replaced by Revenge is the first appearance of
Ringworm in four years, since 2001 and Birth Is Pain. Their particular strain of hardcore remains impossibly brutal -- in "Seeing Through These Eyes" and "House of Hell," vocalist Human Furnace screams like he's using his own head to pound the snare drum. Fast, ferocious, and unfailingly passionate,
Ringworm remain as close to hardcore cohorts like
Hatebreed and
Converge as they do to the dark psychosis of Steve Austin's
Today Is the Day or
Lamb of God's new wave of American metal. Through "Day of Truth," "Devil's Kiss," and (the awesomely named) "God Eat God" they vary tempos with mechanical precision and fling hulking guitar chords off like punches to the brain. Metal-derived solos appear here and there in a flurry of notes, and "Whiskey Drunk" offers a brief acoustic interlude, but mostly Justice is focused singularly on its two-handed hardcore chokehold. "Life After the End of the World" sounds impressively live, while "No More Heroes" fires off even more defiant screaming and machine gun drumming. Some hardcore wants to consciousness raise, or at least preach solidarity. But HF and
Ringworm's aesthetic exists somewhere else entirely. They shout equally at God and the Devil, and don't believe in Earthly help. Their creed is the fieriest form of self-reliance, a commitment to social atheism that has as little use for followers as it does heroes. "We never walk a worn path," Furnace screams in "No More Heroes." "We follow none; our heroes are gone/We are pure fury and wraith." And the music is, too.
Ringworm's back; you've been warned. ~ Johnny Loftus