Love Is Not Enough is Converge stripped back to blunt force with no grand experiments or collaborative detours, just half an hour of furious, politically charged hardcore. Where previous records have dealt in grief, trauma, and fractured relationships, the first straight-up, no frills Converge record in a decade is a reaction to the encroaching fascism of the moment, and the catastrophe of dangerous American governance. Hardcore punk has always been the most effective vehicle for this kind of dissatisfaction, and so Converge lean in with total conviction.

Four people in a room making a deafening racket with no gloss, just instruments and fury, Jacob Bannon’s vocals are more discernible than ever, and remarkably you can actually catch the words he’s hollering, making his accusatory rage land even harder. The four-piece thunder with Ben Koller’s drumming remaining some of the most engaging and relentlessly inventive in heavy music. Tracks like Bad Faith and Amon Amok don’t thrash so much as stomp with huge, Sabbath-sized riffs grinding forward with Kurt Ballou’s guitar commited to true evil. There’s a dissonant nastiness to all of these riffs that recalls the malevolent intent of Slayer with every note designed to unsettle. Force Meets Presence is a prime example with a lurching groove creating horrible tension. Distract and Divide is a 90-second blast beat rager, To Feel Something shifts into their signature odd-meter urgency, and Make Me Forget You is nasty, fast and desperate recalling Dark Horse off Axe To Fall. With bands like Knocked Loose now pushing this sound into the mainstream and playing huge stages, Love Is Not Enough feels like a victory lap. Converge were doing this more than 20 years ago, and the sound they pioneered is more relevant than ever, so they return with their most direct and blunt record in years, because it’s exactly what the moment demands.