Torch Runner - Committed To The Ground

TL;DR = raging 90s metallic hardcore punk with a hint of (good) 'screamo'. Think Unruh, His Hero Is Gone, Systral etc.



I guess Torch Runner might be one of the reasons I started this here web log. At the weekend I was having a bit of a dig through some of the usual music download blogs for some new bands to check out. Can't remember where but one of them said there was a new Torch Runner. It was one of those blogs that, despite the fact it's offering up free downloads, actually puts a bit of an effort into the description and puts a load of links to all the bands facebooks and labels and bandcamps and all the rest of it.

I clicked on the bandcamp link and was just a few songs in when I knew it was a total banger. I'd loved their previous LP which I'd downloaded yonks ago off some mediafire blog or another. The LP version of the new one was quite limited and it'd have cost me over a tenner just for postage from the US (about $20 if i recall). Their label's stuff doesn't often make it over the pond so I'd have been quite happy with a FLAC download. Got my wallet out of my back pocked and produced my bank card........nope, no sale, no way of buying it as the option for digital downloads wasn't set. Being a prick I looked up their Facebook page and told them. They relented. I bought it. Easy.

Anyway, there'll be time enough later on for me to post about my thoughts on why paid digital downloads are good for DIY bands. More important at the moment, the music....

As said above they've got a bit of a metallicy hardcore thing going on. I guess I need to be a bit more specific. Basically, this would have been praised in Heartattack, praised in Monkeybite, praised in an old Rob Coons column in Maximum Rock n Roll whilst also possibly getting half a page in Terrorizer. Nowadays they could go down well at a screamo thing like Cry Me A River or a fest for "sketchy dudes" (ie suburban teenagers) into Holy Terror. They seem to hit that sweet spot between the punky stuff which tends towards generic Tragedy d beat and that kind of post-Cursed thing like Nails/Trap Them which, quite honestly, just blends into one bland sound to me.

I'm beginning to just rant about other music. Basically it's well worth a blast.