Boundaries hits where it hurts with 'Yearning: the unbeautiful after'
- 11 hours ago
- 2 min read
On July 17th, Boundaries released Yearning: The unbeautiful after, their powerful new album.
There are albums that take several listens to fully grasp. This one, however, prefers to knock you off your feet right from the first track and let you process it afterward. Starting with Malconscience, they lay the groundwork for the project. The band opens the door and throws you straight down the stairs. Too bad if you weren’t ready.
Skies cast amber black features riffs blending palm mutes and dissonant chords, driven by a powerful production that further amplifies their impact. The result is particularly compelling.
Unequal whole maintains the same essence, alternating between slower passages and more jagged sections, where the breakdowns hit with devastating effectiveness. Everything you’d expect from a good breakdown, really.
When tracks like May this pain never leave, Death will follow me, or The leper’s ball slow the pace down slightly, it’s never to catch your breath, but to make way for clean vocals and finish the job while the guitars continue to blow your mind with the delicacy of a chainsaw unleashed in a library.
What’s impressive is this ability to navigate between raw violence and heart-wrenching melodies without ever really feeling like they’re just going through the motions. The fourteen tracks offer almost no respite and demonstrate an identity that doesn’t seek to copy the genre’s conventions, but rather to use them to build something more personal.
Collaborations enrich the album as a whole. Landon Tewers (The Plot In You) brings an extra layer of intensity to Crowned and crucified, while Sean Harmanis and Alex Reade (Make Them Suffer) add even more depth to Torn wide open. Each contribution fits naturally into the mix. And that’s probably the best compliment one could give them.
Behind this apparent chaos lies a profound reflection on grief, which lends even more weight to the album as a whole.
Yearning: The unbeautiful after is an album that hits hard from the very first seconds, but also reveals songwriting that’s far more nuanced than it initially appears. It’s an intense and masterful experience that leaves you with only one desire: to put it on repeat.
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