Hi everyone, Humthony Humtano here, the internet's busiest music nerd, and it is time for a review of this new Converge album, Hum of Hurt.

Here we have the newest album from Massachusetts metalcore legends Converge — wait a second, why am I getting déjà vu from saying that? Of course! This is a new Converge album, but not just any new Converge album— it's the second new Converge album to come out this year!

And yeah, I don't know if this is a recession indicator or a sign of the end times, but we did somehow get two brand new Converge full-length records in 2026. And what's even more surprising is that these albums are somehow distinctly different. And I don't just mean how the cover art for one is pretty good while the other is terrible. Seriously, like, what happened here? I mean, whatever the backstory was for this, there had to be a more interesting way to visualize it other than this.

Either way, while Love Is Not Enough, which dropped earlier this year— I wouldn't say it is a top five Converge album per se, but it is still a very great one, with the band taking their trademark metalcore and mathcore roots and streamlining them with a kind of hardcore punk ethos, with straightforward riffs and trim song lengths, politically charged lyrics with writing that isn't too on the nose per se.

But when it comes to the follow-up to that record, Hum of Hurt, I would say the biggest point of separation creatively between these two records is nuance, really. I think that also kind of makes it stand out in the rest of Converge's catalog too.

Now, of course, if you have been following the band's trajectory for a while, you know that it's no secret that Converge has really been experimenting more and more with dynamics in recent years, be it through the flashes of sludge metal and post-hardcore we've heard on records like The Dusk In Us, or the really heavy, moody Bloodmoon collab they put out not too long ago with none other than Chelsea Wolfe. And while I wouldn't say Hum of Hurt is quite that spacey and low-key, it does have its slower moments for sure, and a surprising amount of breathing room for a Converge album.

Thanks to the years and years and years of incredible production talent from none other than Mr. Kurt Ballou, most of Converge's biggest and best records are as tight as a drum, just with an impenetrable density to them. Lots of speed, lots of volume. Which was also the case for Love Is Not Enough, even with its hardcore simplicity. But there's something in the writing and playing and mixing on Hum that I think makes it sound so much more approachable than your average Converge record. Or at least legible on first listen without sacrificing all of the ferocity the band is known for.

There's just a lot less noisy layers going on in all of these songs overall. And there is a bit of an intensity loss, too, in some of the playing and performing. Less dizzying mathcore passages, for sure. There are still quite a few off-kilter grooves and odd time signatures to be had, for sure, but Converge is taking a much more obviously groovy approach this time around with these tracks and performances.

I should also mention many of these tracks feature frontman Jacob Bannon taking a noticeably a more measured approach vocally, where he's kind of weaving back and forth between these monstrous screams, but also these shouty, pained, super expressive cleans and yelled vocals.

Which is for sure a cool approach, and feels a little screamo-aligned at times, and gives a lot of these tracks some much-needed versatility. We get highlights like "Detonator," as well as "I Won't Let You Go" as a result. The former of which actually features one of the catchiest refrains on the entire record ("Detonator!!!"), which I would say is also the case for the opening track, "Slip the Noose," [which] also has some closing refrains that really stick in the back of my head. )"Slip the noose!")

And going back to "I Won't Let You Go," I really love the clarity of Jacob's messaging on this track, not just lyrically, but the way his vocals instantaneously read as he's yelling them. "I want to be the better me / That you deserve to finally see / The dullest blade sharpens the truth / That every day, I'm losing you." But in purposefully toning things down a bit on this record, I feel like there are some tracks that lack a certain punch as a result, or maybe just feel a bit bland by Converge standards and don't really feature a memorable riff or a hook like some other cuts in this tracklist do, like "Doom in Bloom," for example, which I think also has some pacing issues too.

But really, the biggest issue for me on this record is the final leg, which I think is mostly a kind of a big lull, starting with the 6-minute monster "Dream Debris," which I do think is a heavy and commendable moment on this record production-wise. Really sees the band going deep in a sludge metal direction and features some blaring, super deep, bassy guitars, just massive, ringing juggernaut-sized riffs, which I really do love the sound of. But all the slow tension-building moments around these heavier passages, for the most part, are underwhelming and almost feel like I'm listening to a more subpar version of, I don't know, a slower, more low-key, kind of eerie, spacey passage I might hear on any given new era Swans album before the band builds up to like a really big crescendo or payoff.

To put it simply, if the band was gonna make a track this long, they could have at least kept it interesting the entire time. And while the title track is definitely the strongest of the bunch when it comes to this last section of the record, I don't know if we really needed what was effectively a two-plus minute tension-building intro to that song with "It Used to Matter." I mean, it's certainly cool that Converge has the dynamics and instrumental versatility to build up a grandiose, dramatic moment like this, but it's not like the payoff with the title track was so great that it was really worth that extra time.

And the closing track as well, I thought, also kind of suffered from the same affliction that "Dream Debris" did — some heavier riff passages that are not too bad, surrounded by slower, spacier bits that again feel almost like Swans leftovers without anything all that interesting going on. I mean, again, the production is cool, the contrast itself going across these different sections of the song for the most part are fine, and I do respect Jacob Bannon's lyric game here for sure, but far from like the best writing and guitar work the band has ever put together for sure.

Which leaves me a bit torn on this record. Overall, I do think it is a very solid and respectable release from Converge with a lot of very good highlights, and it's cool to hear the band putting together some really good solid tracks that have a nice kind of flow and clarity to them, with some riffs and breakdown passages that feel very headbang-friendly, mosh-friendly, again, very groove-heavy. But Hum of Hurt is most definitely the blander of the two records the band has just released.

And I do think there is still some growth and work to be done when it comes to this legendary band continuing to just experiment more with subtlety and with dynamics. Because it's really clear at this point they don't just want to simply be pigeonholed into being one of the loudest, fastest, most difficult to untangle bands out there when it comes to the way they produce and perform and assemble their tracks.

But they really need to work on making sure that these slower passages continue to stay engaging and interesting as they take a more simple approach and more subtle approach. Which is why I'm feeling about a light 7 on this one.

Anthony Fantano. Converge. Forever.