Left to Suffer has gained a lot of traction over the last seven years, and while they may have started off on the more standard deathcore end of the spectrum the last few albums have brought in a lot more nu metal and metalcore into the mix. After putting out three full lengths and EP’s independently, the band has signed with Hopeless Records for their fourth effort Unwelcome Guest which continues to blur the lines between the aforementioned metal genres. Where 2024’s Leap of Death felt like it was trying as much as possible and seeing what would stick, Unwelcome Guest takes what did work and refines it into a consistently heavy hitting listen. There are still a few rough patches, but when everything comes together Left to Suffer is as catchy and speaker destroying as anyone else out there.
The appropriately named “Track One” makes it immediately clear the general direction that Left to Suffer is going in this time around, as upon pressing clear you’re greeted with extremely heavy, chugging guitars and a mid-tempo groove that feels like it’s ready to cave your speakers from within. It’s a short two-minute track, but the band strikes a good balance between deathcore and nu-metal that establishes the dense and aggressive cadence that drives most of the album. “Therapy” picks up right where “Track One” ends, opting for a bit more deathcore initially as it weaves between fast paced aggression and filthy breakdowns, but around the halfway point you get guitar tones that sound similar to the type of record scratching and moodier pitches that defined nu metal in the late 90s and early 2000s. It isn’t just nu-metal at work behind the rhythms on Unwelcome Guest, as the more you pay attention to the cadences the more hip-hop influence becomes apparent. Deathcore and metalcore heading into nu-metal and hip-hop influenced territory has been happening for awhile now, but the way Left to Suffer embeds it into their core DNA gives things a bit of a different feel and is one of the main reasons that the songs are just as catchy as they are destructive. “Gun in the Dufflebag” and the title track are other great examples, as the instrumentals have plenty of sections that are just extremely dense and breakdown heavy but the grooves make you want to move and have a lot of staying power to them. “Bleeding Out” also shakes things up with some symphonic elements that blur the lines between deathcore and metalcore, showcasing that the band can shake up the attack from song to song. There are a few bumps in the road though, as “STFU” and “404” lean fully into the nu-metal and simplify the structure just a bit too much, and some of the other tracks do start to repeat the established formula. But I found myself drawn back to Unwelcome Guest regularly, as when things do come together and reach that peak level of brutality and grooves there’s plenty to like.
Left to Suffer’s vocal work is another area where the band is able to offer a bit more variety compared to some of their peers. The core approach is the extremely low, guttural growl that you’d expect from anything deathcore adjacent, with Tyler Barber coming through with the force of a wrecking ball from song to song. But alongside the backing vocals and some switch-ups into a more nu-metal/hip hop type cadence there is more to the performance than you might expect, especially if you’re new to the group. “STFU” is one of the best early examples, as the low gutturals on “Gun in the Dufflebag” transition over to distorted spoken word/screamed sections. This is where the rapped/nu-metal elements are most prominent, but if you pay closer attention to the rest of the vocals you’ll notice that even the growls have more of a rapped cadence to them throughout Unwelcome Guest. In addition to these elements there are also some higher pitched screams that bring in a bit more metalcore, and some cleaner passages return on “Bleeding Out”. On the guest front, compared to Leap of Death there aren’t nearly as many as the one guest spot comes courtesy of Distant’s Alan Grjna on “Wrong Number” and it works well. My main complaint is with the lyrical content, as with plenty of tracks that address the haters the band has had over the years it’s a bit overly edgy. Sometimes it works and some of the other imagery works well with Left to Suffer’s sound, but other times the lyrics detract from the rest of the material.
On album number four Left to Suffer leans even further into nu-metal and hip-hop while also letting their edginess drive a lot of the material alongside some of the more violent and dark imagery. The edginess works to their advantage on some tracks and proves to be a little distracting at other times, and the way the nu-metal elements are incorporated does result in some songs falling into too close of a pattern. Yet even with that being the case, when this album hits its peaks it delivers crushing breakdowns and head nodding grooves that have made me want to hit the repeat button. Unwelcome Guest is available from Hopeless Records.
-Review by Chris Dahlberg