I've been eager to hear more from Connecticut metalcore unit God Program ever since the Fragments of Illusion EP all the way back in 2018 (I'm kinda stunned that it's been that long). A bit of a surprise, Forever Lasts Another Year hit right before the holidays, and I didn't have time to check it out until this week. The quintet continues to display high-quality metalcore with tons of vocal diversity—multiple members screaming, snarling, singing, speaking—chugging rhythms, and stabbing discordance balanced with melodic undercurrents and much more. I get the impression that the members are extremely well-studied in a particular niche of the genre—let's say 1998 to 2003-ish—and have nabbed only the finest elements to integrate into their own approach.
Each track herein really carries its own identity, and it's kind of a toss-up between "26" and "Fate Sealed With a Glance" for my favorite. I went with "Fate..." largely due to some freakin' insane percussive intensity that takes things to another level. Had God Program been around decades ago when their primary influences were running wild, they almost certainly would've been scooped up by an on-the-pulse feeder label like Tribunal or something before graduating to an upper tier. The writing, performances, and production value just strike me as being a step up from a lot of comparable acts that cross my path.
Wretched Records did a limited run of Forever Lasts Another Year tapes that already sold out, and Bitter Melody Records is supposed to be doing a batch of CDs sometime soon. I'm looking forward to picking one up, whenever "soon" arrives. Until then, head to Bandcamp or Spotify...
