A Love Letter to The Amity Affliction’s Let The Ocean Take Me (Redux)

In 2014, I was an angsty and freshly diagnosed depressed 17-year-old working a casual job and wishing for high school to come to an end.

Dad’s old iPod with Foo Fighters’ Greatest Hits alongside video game-featured tracks such as Godsmack’s ‘I Stand Alone’ and Breaking Benjamin’s 'Blow me Away' and the new direction of Linkin Park made up life’s soundtrack. I was so hard set in avoiding screaming vocals, I thought it was all abrasive noise.

However, during a particularly hard shift at work after an equally particularly hard day, my emotions were at peak. Everything was threatening to spill over, then a co-worker played The Amity Affliction’s ‘Pittsburgh’; and I found myself enamoured. I went home and listened to Let The Ocean Take Me in full.

That was the night I fell in love with heavy music.

I developed a passion for screaming, both as a listener and as an aspiring vocalist. I learned to understand not only the words, but the genuine emotion behind this music. Desperation, pain, yearning, anger, satisfaction and everything in between. This album was fundamental in shaping my ever-changing tastes. I never thought I’d be a heavy music fan, but Let the Ocean Take Me is the reason I listen to metalcore, deathcore and hardcore. The Amity Affliction started it all for me, so when I heard this album was getting the redux treatment, I couldn’t hold back my excitement.

‘Pittsburgh’, ‘Don’t Lean On Me’, ‘Never Alone’ and ‘Give It All’ have been mainstays in my music listening for a decade now. The heavy themes of these songs have always resonated with me and the redux treatment pushes these songs forward with the rest of the album. While the production may feel over the top in comparison to the original, I think it complements the way these songs have been performed live for years.

As soon as ‘Pittsburgh (Redux)’ started, I instantly felt like I was watching the band live and experiencing the familiar catharsis The Amity Affliction provides for the first time. I smiled in pure joy as I screamed along that first iconic line “I’ve been searching for an exit”.

Let The Ocean Take Me (Redux) feels like a spectacle companion piece to the live performance of The Amity Affliction’s current iteration. To reflect on the noise they are prepping to head off on the road across Australia, performing this album in full alongside Ice Nine Kills, We Came As Romans and Heavensgate - and this redux was released at the right time and listening to it feels like coming home.

The modern metalcore nostalgia re-recorded with more production while retaining the same expression of feeling is a personal joy to experience.

Written by Tyler Lubke @huntsman421

Stream Let The Ocean Take Me (Redux) here

The Amity Affliction – Let The Ocean Take Me (Redux) Tracklisting

1. Pittsburgh (Redux)
2. Lost & Fading (Redux)
3. Don’t Lean On Me (Redux)
4. The Weigh Down (Redux)
5. Never Alone (Redux)
6. Death’s Hand (Redux)
7. FML (Redux)
8. My Father’s Son (Redux)
9. Forest Fire (Redux)
10. Give It All (Redux)