How do you feel about being blown out of your seat right from the beginning of an album? Well, that is exactly what SURVIVALIST does when they start playing their album "A Place For Those Who Suffer, Alone". As for those who remember another band with the same name, beware. This is the band that hail Belfast, Northern Ireland and who play a mix of Metalcore and Deathcore with a very mechanical sound, and not the Groove Metal band from Los Angeles. Nope, these are the guys that have released their debut album "VII" in 2020. And as it goes, they are certainly going for just outdoing you in intensity and trying to achieve dominance over you by shoving their brand of very strong and direct music into your ears.

As I had never heard of SURVIVALIST before now, I was able to go in with a clear conscience, a blank mind and expecting ears. What I got with "A Place For Those Who Suffer, Alone" is a whole bunch of noises that sound good, but aren't all that I was hoping them to live up to. What I am saying is that in the process of trying to outsmart and impress you with how heavy and imposing they can be, the band has forgotten that the best way to do just that is by writing very good music and let the music do the talking. It's not that what they do is bad, on the contrary, but it also becomes very clear to me that I have heard not only a lot worse, but also a lot better bands is this genre. And no, they didn't feel the need to just waltz over me with extreme heaviness.

The worst offender of all is "Speak Up (Louder)". That one starts with a rap by Kid Bookie (?), but that's not even the bad thing, as singer Gavin Sharp takes over . The rap rhythms are okay, but the absence of guitars and the use of fake trumpets and such ruin the song. That doesn't change after the band has rectified those feats and take over. All of this is very unfortunate, as I to is abundantly clear that we are dealing with a band of good musicians in SURVIVALIST, but due to the lack of really good songs they haven't been able to make "A Place For Those Who Suffer, Alone" into the album they were either expecting or hoping to achieve.