CD: Bullet For My Valentine - Temper Temper

There’s a certain kind of melodic post-millennial metal band where the songs seem to be merely a process of ritualistic, firmly fixed reference points. From Avenged Sevenfold to Bring Me The Horizon and thousands more, gargle-shouted thrash vocals and juddering - but supremely over-produced - hardcore guitars are interspersed with howled, harmonised choruses. It’s a formula that ostensibly roars yet is actually pristine clean, lacking dirt, grit or punk venom.

It rarely wanders from a well-beaten path. Welsh four-piece Bullet For My Valentine have done very well out of it, multi-millions in sales and a following that’s unexpectedly vast. Their new album, however, is a pleasing surprise for it belies its stylistic limits and is refreshingly furious.

The formula is there, for sure, yet somehow they – and particularly lyricist, singer-guitarist Matthew Tuck – push so hard they override it. Tuck has mentioned that Temper Temper’s songs were born from rage at substance abuse issues nearly splitting his band up. Simple anger hardly covers the spume of bitterness which explodes out of him. From “One more drink, one more pill/One more line to make me feel I have something left to give” in “Truth Hurts” to “Another taste is what you’re looking for/There’s nothing left so you can’t take anymore” in “Dirty Little Secrets”, there’s barely a roared lyric that isn’t freighted with livid indignation. The title track is, naturally, pitched at boiling point but also terrace chorus catchy, and “Riot” is an enjoyably hammy endorsement to “break down these fucking doors, smash the windows, tear down the walls – won’t stop ‘til it’s all destroyed”.

Meanwhile, for long-term followers, there’s a second chapter to one of Bullet For My Valentine’s best-loved songs, “Tears Don’t Fall”. All in all, there’s not really a dull moment. Toys are thrown out of prams with such forceful, contagious ire that you don’t have to be part of the band’s rabid fanbase to enjoy Temper Temper's explosion of an attention-grabbing energy and excitement.

Watch the video for "Riot"