Thick As Blood – Living Proof – Album Review

Living Proof, the third full length and Rise Records debut by hardcore band Thick as Blood, highlights a lot of problems with modern hardcore bands. With many bands releasing albums that, whilst not lacking in quality, fail to create an identity for the band. Living Proof highlights that Thick as Blood, like many other hardcore bands, have fallen into this hole.

The song writing throughout Living Proof is very much in the same vein as bands such as Hatebreed: hardcore. ‘Full Measure’ is the only song that lasts over 3 minutes, showing the urgency of Living Proof, with the rest of the album being a relentless blast of breakdowns, riffs and gang vocals. Mid album track ‘Diente Por Diente’ displays the quality of this album perfectly: a whirlwind of shouted vocals and frantic riffing, all topped off with breakdown leading into a slower paced mid-section.

Whilst the songs on Living Proof are perfectly solid, the album doesn’t overstay its welcome, lasting less than 30 minutes but providing enough material to keep you satisfied. Despite this, you cannot help but feel like you have heard all of it before. The song structures, guitar tone and even vocals sound hugely reminiscent of bands such as Terror or Knuckledust, which makes it difficult to distinguish Thick as Blood from some of their peers. This leads to Living Proof sounding like a slightly formulaic and generic album. This album is not of the same quality as records such as Perseverance or Always the Hard Way, so for Thick as Blood to not always be likened to such albums, future releases need to be more original.

Living Proof represents a strong Rise Records debut for Thick as Blood, yet with so many other hardcore bands such as TRC, Heights or Feed the Rhino releasing music that is pushing hardcore into new unchartered territory, Thick as Blood will need to create more of an identity for themselves on their next full length to keep up with the rest of the pack.

Track Listing

01. Pain & Gain
02. Full Measure
03. Madre Mia
04. The Outsiders
05. Living Proof
06. Diente Por Diente
07. Headaches
08. Unruly
09. No Rest For The Wicked
10. History Of Violence (Fearless)
11. Damned Nation