Make Them Suffer - Gig Review & Photo Gallery 9th June @ Max Watts, Melbourne VIC
Make Them Suffer
Max Watts, VIC
June 10th, 2019
Supports: After the Burial, Saviour and Gravemind
Perth’s Make Them Suffer are ever-growing into a beastly entity that is leading the deathcore charge, not only in Australia, but globally. The maestros are mid-way through an enormous national tour, and stopped by in Melbourne for undoubtedly one of the biggest shows of the string of dates. As always, they brought along some homies for the ride.
It’s great when suitable locals are picked to support the headliners, especially when the genres seamlessly align; and this was the case with Gravemind. Becoming an affectionate favourite to the Melbourne deathcore community, and known as a big local name to open up the night’s proceedings, they made for a great hedging of bets for a consistent evening. The Victorians blistered through their set as the close-to-sold-out crowd spiralled down into the basement of Max Watts, a venue that highlighted the illusion of escape from reality. The metalcore setlist was delivered with passion and well-practiced delivery - and fans were responding accordingly.
Max Watts was becoming very full as punters moved across the venue to keep drinking ahead of a public holiday and sport the array of merch on display, spread across all four bands. The infamous sink-pit had its usual suspects having a stretch before swimming through the breakdowns of the bands to come.
As Make Them Suffer launched off a springboard in Perth, the other band that was flying up there with them were another outfit from WA. Despite being known for a completely different sound, Saviour have flourished in their own way, continuing to release emotive melodies with a crushing hardcore backbone. The Perth sweethearts were up next and delivered a nice and crunchy set for the punters, who all knew exactly who they were.
Bryant Best and Shontay Snow once again proved that their unusual duet-style worked unexpectedly well. The two starkly different vocal styles marry together in a way that feels like a representation of yourself with an inner struggle and a heavy heart from some kind of hardship, but expressed with the reasonable societal expectations of how to express it. Make Them Suffer’s Sean Harmanis made an appearance to scream through a verse with a hoodie over his head, and gave us a taste of what was to come. The band drew in a huge energy playing favourites like ‘Unstoppable’ and ‘Jaded’, and had that whole crowd singing along.
The volume knob for the evening was incrementally progressing upward. Reigning from Minneapolis, USA, After the Burial returned to Aussie shores after several years and after having faced some adversity, the band are bigger than ever. Known for their technical impressiveness, the Americans delivered just that, with djenty crescendos blistering across the venue. This is when the true circle-pits began. The virtuoso prog-metal style came with a consistent tempo throughout the set, which streamlined movement in the sink-pit of Max Watts. Having just released a new record ‘Evergreen’ the band were stoked to play some new tracks, including ‘Behold the Crown’ showcasing the song’s infamous whammy-riff-style. Diehard fans were visibly satisfied with the band’s set, who brought massive production from overseas.
Though Make Them Suffer have toured Melbourne time and time again, they just keep exceeding expectations, to the point where words cannot articulate how much better they’ve become since being described on previous tours as ‘enormous, massive, global’ etc.
The house-lights suddenly ceased and the crowd jammed to gangster rap track ‘The Next Episode’ before the band rapidly emerged on stage in the darkness. Everyone was screaming for the headliners as they appeared. Instantly the recognisable opening decibels to ‘Fake’ sounded across the venue, and everyone anticipated vocalist Sean Harmanis wretched squeal which was noticeably wilder than expected.
It honestly felt like the entire band had taken things to ‘11’ yet again since the last time we’d seen them, as they simply crushed every single song with wholehearted demonic veracity and ferocity. Harmanis was growling from deeply within and the guitars and drums were matching it with crescendo breakdowns that were equally unearthing. Bangers from their back catalogue were splintering all corners of the venue, with complete detonation of the crowd, as chaos ensued and bodies flying everywhere.
It was cathartic to hear older tracks like ‘Widower’ and ‘Weeping Wastelands’ performed with lightyears of further production than how they were recorded and performed years ago, but equally satisfying to hear the newer monster tracks that hold the band in the incredible esteem that they are. Songs like this included ‘Vortex’, ‘27’ and ‘Blood Moon’.
The band released a new track just days ago named ‘Hollowed Heart’ which is arguably one of their heaviest tracks to date. The band played it live and introduced us all to their next music video, which of course got the crowd ready to show-off their agility.
The set was simply industry leading whilst simultaneously ear-drum crushing. Make Them Suffer continue to soar beyond the means of what they expected of the average deathcore band and have no signs of slowing down. Their name is strengthening Australia’s reputation in the metal scene and will continue to raise the bar.
Review by Ricky Aarons @rickysaul90
Photo Gallery by Dylan Martin. Insta: @dylanmartin_photography
Please credit Wall of Sound and Dylan Martin if you use published photos.
Gravemind
Saviour
After the Burial
Make Them Suffer
