The Spill Magazine The Spill Magazine
The Spill Magazine The Spill Magazine
The Spill Magazine The Spill Magazine
  • Reviews
    • Album Reviews
    • Features
    • Live Reviews
    • Festivals
  • Portraits
  • Headlines
    • News
    • Contests
    • Events
    • Entertainment Headlines
    • Concert Listings
    • Toronto Concert Venues
  • New Music
    • Premieres
    • Track Of The Day
  • Track Of The Week
  • Books + Movies
  • About
2
new
SPILL VIDEO PREMIERE: RICH JACQUES – “EVERYTHING MUST CHANGE”
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: SHINEDOWN – PLANET ZERO
  • Reviews
    • Album Reviews
    • Features
    • Live Reviews
    • Festivals
  • Portraits
  • Headlines
    • News
    • Contests
    • Events
    • Entertainment Headlines
    • Concert Listings
    • Toronto Concert Venues
  • New Music
    • Premieres
    • Track Of The Day
  • Track Of The Week
  • Books + Movies
  • About
  • Spill Menu
    • Reviews
      • Album Reviews
      • Features
      • Live Reviews
      • Festivals
    • Portraits
    • Headlines
      • News
      • Contests
      • Events
      • Entertainment Headlines
      • Concert Listings
      • Toronto Concert Venues
    • New Music
      • Premieres
      • Track Of The Day
    • Track Of The Week
    • Books + Movies
    • About
Album Reviews
1
46
Editor Pick
previous article
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: VARIOUS ARTISTS - C91
next article
SPILL ALBUM PREMIERE: SARAH RAE - BRIDGE TO NEVERLAND

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: COMEBACK KID – HEAVY STEPS

Comeback Kid

COMEBACK KID
HEAVY STEPS
NEW DAMAGE RECORDS/NUCLEAR BLAST

Hardcore leviathans Comeback Kid have been in the genre game for 20 years. With years comes experience and knowing how to work the genre field to your favour. Comeback Kid has never played it safe when it comes to their records. Their extensive successful catalogue has proven that tenfold. Heavy Steps comes five years after their aggressive melodic gem Outsider. An album that peeled back a side of the dark underbelly of emotion and anger, such an album would open up the gates for the record that would follow after.

From the beginning, the hardcore heavyweights spare no expense in giving us the real deal when it comes to giving us the ultimate experience when it comes to traditional hardcore. Opening with “Heavy Steps”, we are welcomed as you would welcome an old friend you had not seen in years. Everything about this screams Comeback Kid. Massive, lyrically contagious, and impactful, it’s everything we would expect from the Winnipeg natives.

While that was not enough whiplash for you, the next few experiences are just as intense. With towering guitar riffs, powerful breakdowns, and inventive lyricism, Comeback Kid showcases a feeling of emotional suffocation within our skin within the problems we face.

Other hits that take center stage are “Crossed,” featuring Joe Duplantier of Gojira. Destructive and beautifully high-octane in its energy from start to finish, it’s no question that this will be one of the most enjoyable moments on the album thus far.

“Everything Relates” takes a more sentimental turn. Dedicated to CBK’s lead vocalist Andrew Neufeld and guest appearance drummer JJ Peters’ (Deez Nuts, I Killed The Prom Queen) friend that passed away during the making of this record, drummer JJ’s inclusion here holds a deeper meaning and makes us feel more connected to the track. While the album up to this point has been heavy, introspective, and emotionally driven, “Everything Relates” brings out a different kind of moving side we have not seen up to this point.

Thrashers like “Dead On the Fence” and “True To Form” bring the intensity back up again and show us why Comeback Kids are the kings of hardcore. Tracks like this are an example of a unique sound curated for 20 years and innovated with vitriolic passion, straightforward lyricism, and individualized style.

The album ends confidently and lets us breathe with “Standstill” and “Menacing Weight.” While the energy is still very high, it lyrically forebodes the raw and dark emotions that are still lurking even when you have gotten them off your chest. Comeback Kids have not just written an album that instrumentally and lyrically speaks volumes to the industry, but one that many in this time frame can personally identify with.

Heavy Steps takes us on a hard-fought emotional and mentally exhausting journey of life, its fears, and the uneasiness that comes with all of that. In many ways, it becomes an emotional backstage tale of struggle one faces today, approaching situations on eggshells, afraid of what might happen if we were to fall right through the cracks. It is everything that has come to make this band successful and more, and if this is the new sound Comeback Kids has on the horizon, the future of the hardcore scene has never looked brighter.



Artist Links

website_flat_2016 facebook_flat_2016 twitter_flat_2016 instagram_flat_2016

Editor Pick
Item Reviewed

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: COMEBACK KID – HEAVY STEPS

Author

Samantha Andujar

Here's what we think...
Spill Rating
Fan Rating
Rate Here
New Criteria
10
—
9.0
Total Spill Rating
—
Total Fan Rating
You have rated this
Album Reviews
album reviewalbum reviewscomeback kidheavy stepsnew damage recordsnuclear blast
album review, album reviews, comeback kid, heavy steps, new damage records, nuclear blast
About the Author
Samantha Andujar
Samantha Andujar is also a music journalist for Stencil Magazine. She loves rock music, video games, wrestling, anime, and horror movies.
RELATED ARTICLES
album reviewalbum reviewscomeback kid
 
9.0
Shinedown
—

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: SHINEDOWN – PLANET ZERO

by Melinda Welsh on July 1, 2022
Shinedown Planet Zero Atlantic Records Shinedown is returning with their seventh studio album, Planet Zero. This 20-track in-your-face album with 13 actual songs, comes at a time when it [...]
 
9.0
Alexisonfire

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: ALEXISONFIRE – OTHERNESS

by Gerrod Harris on June 24, 2022
Alexisonfire Otherness Dine Alone Records Despite releasing a string of stellar singles throughout 2019 to 2020, Niagara, ON’s very own Alexisonfire have now made a proper return that is [...]
 
8.0
The Dreadnoughts
—

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: THE DREADNOUGHTS – ROLL AND GO

by Michelle Cooney on June 24, 2022
The Dreadnoughts Roll And Go Stomp Records The Dreadnoughts have been baptized with a variety of classifications, from “cluster folk” to “polka punk” to “ciderpunk”. Their new album, [...]
 
8.0
Praises

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: PRAISES – IN THIS YEAR: HIEROPHANT

by Ljubinko Zivkovic on June 17, 2022
Praises In This Year: Hierophant Hand Drawn Dracula Praises, aka Jesse Crowe, caused quite a stir with Spill Magazine back in 2018 with their debut album In This Year: Ten of [...]
 
8.0
Dylan Moon

SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: DYLAN MOON – OPTION EXPLORE

by Ljubinko Zivkovic on June 17, 2022
Dylan Moon Option Explore RVNG Intl. Anybody who had a chance to hear Dylan Moon’s initial album Only the Blues, from 2019 might be taken aback by what is in the grooves (or bits) [...]

Latest Album Reviews
View All
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: SHINEDOWN – PLANET ZERO
9.0
—
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: ALEXISONFIRE – OTHERNESS
9.0
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: THE DREADNOUGHTS – ROLL AND GO
8.0
—
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: PRAISES – IN THIS YEAR: HIEROPHANT
8.0
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: DYLAN MOON – OPTION EXPLORE
8.0

Tweets by @spillmagazine

SPILL MAGAZINE MENU
  • Home | The Spill Magazine
  • Premieres
  • Track Of The Week
  • Album Reviews
  • Books + Movies
  • Features
  • Live Reviews
  • Festivals
  • Portraits
  • News
  • Events
  • Entertainment Headlines
  • Concert Listings
  • Toronto Concert Venues
  • About Us
  • Contests
  • New Music
  • Spill Magazine Contributors
  • TOTD
  • Privacy Policy
  • The Scene Unseen
  • Newsletter

Copyright © 2022 | The Spill Magazine
All Rights Reserved.

TRENDING RIGHT NOW
   
 
SPILL FEATURE: CRUISE TO THE EDGE 2022 – THIS YEAR’S PROG CRUISE MAKES A LOT OF NOISE. A WHOLE LOT OF NOISE.
751
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: PRIMUS – CONSPIRANOID
598
 
SPILL FEATURE: DON’T YOU FEEL CLOSER? – A CONVERSATION WITH CY CURNIN OF THE FIXX
588
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: THE FIXX – EVERY FIVE SECONDS
482
 
SPILL NEWS: BARENAKED LADIES TO RELEASE LIVE TRACKS FROM SOLD-OUT ROYAL ALBERT HALL SHOW | DELUXE EDITION OF ‘DETOUR DE FORCE’ OUT JUNE 3
344
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: NAZARETH – SURVIVING THE LAW
343
 
SPILL VIDEO PREMIERE: LOST CAT – “L.O.S.T.”
329
 
SPILL LIVE REVIEW: NIGHTWISH w/ BEAST IN BLACK @ HISTORY, TORONTO
324
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: LUCIUS – SECOND NATURE
290
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: DOROTHY – GIFTS FROM THE HOLY GHOST
278
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: FANTASTIC NEGRITO – WHITE JESUS BLACK PROBLEMS
277
 
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: AVI KAPLAN – FLOATING ON A DREAM
272
 
SPILL LIVE REVIEW: KRAFTWERK @ MASSEY HALL, TORONTO
243
ENTERTAINMENT HEADLINES