“It’s saccharine, this sacrament of lies.”
Not to play favourites right out of the gate, but screamo has got to be the best genre of music. The only rule is that you have to play fast and scream, and the rest is up to you. A band can pull from whatever blend of punk, ‘core, emo, or post-whatever for their fundamental sound, and – daresay – they can even do it sloppily, as long as the result is something the listener still feels with their entire body. Furthermore, it’s hard to imagine screamo coming out of any context that is anything but DIY. It’s destined for devoted audiences, small rooms, it’s practically gentrification resistant, and it’s inherently queer. The decade has been full of brilliant releases in the genre already, and one important project that we have not yet covered is For Your Health. It’s certainly the time to get on board, as This Bitter Garden is about to become their defining work.
“Davenport (A Rotten Pear)” was written by the band as their first in-person writing session, making it the ideal album opener from the ground up. Opening on canned laughter, alternating guitar blasts and lurching metalcore riffs, it’s the distillation of For Your Health’s sound and irony. With not one but two nasty breakdowns, it’s a dizzying start. “Flowers For The Worst Of Them” continues the momentum with their signature mix of skramz and metalcore, breaking out the acoustic guitars and piano near the ending to usher the record’s first melodic moments.
These tantalising moments of melody are joined by the perfect execution of the subsequent tracks: “With Empty Promises & Loaded Guns” and “Clementine” both provide incredible choruses. All their aspects align, as the verses and pre-choruses build urgency, the lyrics and vocals land the hooks and gut-punches they seek, while the instrumentals are continually interesting and develop in their own ways. On the former, they somehow turn “this is 9mm to the chest of everyone that you love and everyone that you know” into an ultra-hook. “Clementine” channels a similar anger, an essential part of the album’s being (“if time is all we have you’re the empty hour glass / if you could plug a sinking ship with the bodies of your failures you might live to sink another”). “Gaia Wept” and “The Radiant Apostasy” are power-violent buffers between these bangers, displaying noise tendencies out of The Mars Volta’s most unhinged moments. All of this adds up to a perfect run to start off This Bitter Garden.
It’s worth a deep dive into “Heaven, Here”, a piano-led devotional that grows into a dramatic set of vows. Thus far, the piano has been an element that has connected several tracks. “Heaven, Here” picks up this thread and turns it on its own head. As our speaker becomes increasingly lofty and sacrilegious, and the keys come flooding in with a rush of colour, a pause leads to a discordant smash. As if by way of apology, the most gentle melody returns on the keys, with a few more hushed lines that need to be said. Before long, the disquiet must return, in the form of three more chromatic hits which become the metronome for “Longinus”’s beatdown. “Heaven, Here” is much more than an interlude, so deeply entangled with the story, pacing, and fuck-you attitude of This Bitter Garden.
i’d swim up from the depths below, erect a ladder to the sky above,
and cleave the city of Yah in twain
turn it on it’s head
shake you from your chains.
With a gentle moment behind us, the second half of the record is cleared to launch into the extremes of For Your Health. “The Rotting Pear” and “The Valley of The Weeping” are Simona Morales’ finest moments, their synths and vocals coming front and centre for these two epic tracks. The short songs remain strong, with “Longinus” providing another all-star bleeder with plenty of tempo switches. The three remaining tracks suffer somewhat from the intense pace that the back half of the record brings, still asking listeners to absorb every detail. “Lamb Without Fold” is the most ‘biblical’ track on the record (“they say that God forgives… but i know who sent the flies”), and “Your New Curse” burns with the same retributive energy (“you’re a suicide note marked ‘return to sender’”). This track is perhaps the most melodically complex of the all, full of bright and tight chordwork that could fit into a more post-hardcore cut, yet through you at For Your Health levels of heaviness.
This brightness pulls us naturally towards the closer, “Hotel Elysia”. Singer Hayden Rodriguez giving us a hushed delivery that acknowledges the weight of the album that has passed, let alone of the last few songs. The instrumentals are blissful yet serious in tone, waiting two minutes before cranking the distortion one last time. This Bitter Garden closes on one last downtuned segment and Rodriguez’ words: “when you put your hands together / to wash away the blood / from down here where I’m standing / it looks just like applause”. This is a nod back to the record’s first moments of mocking laughter – instead we have piano and strings ushering peace, and six pairs of hands of the band clapping in unison.
This Bitter Garden is yet another screamo masterclass for the 2020s, and the defining document that should seal For Your Health as an essential part of the scene. Fans of the departed band See You Space Cowboy… or other artists in the ‘sasscore’ movement will be eating particularly well, and probably find this album to be among their favourites of the year. Beyond that, every heavy music enjoyer should appreciate the array of genres that have so coherently been combined and executed here.
8.5/10
This Bitter Garden releases on the 6th June through 3DOT recordings and can be pre-ordered here. The band are about to tour the US with their friends from the Hymns for the Scorned split awakebutstillinbed, with dates listed here.