Little known fact about me: I adore screamo. In high school, I used to spend hours laid out on the floor in my bedroom doing deep dives on YouTube and Bandcamp, trying my hardest to find new bands that would blow me away, and it wasn’t uncommon that those projects took heavy inspiration from bands like Saetia. As I got older, I unfortunately grew away from this practice. That being said, hearing the debut EP from Melanchor that dropped mid-January made me feel sixteen all over again; one note from the first song reminded me of the carpet burns on my elbows I’d get from laying there for so long.
Who are Melanchor? Figuring that out is no easy feat. There’s next to nothing online, just a post about their debut EP, titled “An Open Heart And A Hail Mary”, and a set filmed in a bookstore/cafe by VirgoTrash, which is linked below. In fact, it’s honestly a mystery I found this at all, considering the set was recommended to me via the YouTube algorithm and had less than 100 views when I stumbled across it. Nevertheless, these guys rip, and I can’t stop returning to the EP.
The five-track run is truly a testament to how the genre can thrive in a DIY scape. I mean, look at that picture. These are kids, and their EP “An Open Heart And A Hail Mary” is pure screamo perfection. “Memories Don’t Mean That Much to Me” kicks the project off with a bang, starting with subtle chords before going full swing into the dissonant melodies and impassioned screams the genre is known for, practically begging to be understood. There’s a level of catharsis here, a sense that this has been building forever and is about to blow. As the distortion increases, so does the backing vocals, and it all culminates to create an unapologetically raw song. This energy continues on to “Whisper To A Scream”, a one-minute blast of pessimistic abrasion I can’t get enough of.
My personal favorite song on the record is the next track, “Where Do I Aim If There Is No Target?”. It’s a big shift from the former explosive tracks, an interlude which opts for an instrumental that’s practically slowcore. The lead singer talks over it instead of the aforementioned screams. With lines like “You’re not dead but your spirit lingers. You were right there, right next to me”, the song paints the picture of a young love lost, trying to move on with your life while everything reminds you of them. Knowing you did your best and it still wasn’t enough can be devastating, and it’s even harder to keep trying afterwards, which is something they touch on heavily. “This is why I’m trying to push myself to a better mental and physical state. It should be for me, but until then, everything I do is for her.” It’s confessional and vulnerable, living in the eye of the storm that is the EP, and it’s stuck with me since I heard it for the first time.
After that comes “Seventeen Hearts Beat”. I’d argue this is the most intense track on the record, with erratic drumming that has me completely mesmerized. Its sludge-ridden melody goes back to giving dissonance a loving embrace. The smash-and-grab song rings in at just 1:40, and it feels like it sprints right past you. Finally, we have the title track, “An Open Heart And A Hail Mary”, which is anything but a gentle goodnight for the EP. Sonically, it’s the most similar to the beginning song, and the riff even feels like a sister to it. It’s melody is driving, and its noisy, thumping drums are best heard as loud as your probably blown-out headphones will go. The vocals alternate between fried screams and droning singing, always overlapping and chasing each other. It’s a stunner of an end to a fantastic debut.
All in all, Melanchor’s first EP is something to behold. I’m very grateful that it got recommended to me, and I’m going to be following these dudes with whatever they make next. I’d like to give a special thanks to Vic (@letmethankyouinphotos) for being so awesome and supplying photos for this, plus shooting me a video they took of the set. Go ahead and get into the media below, I promise it’s worth it.
Listen to Melanchor on Bandcamp:
Watch their set, courtesy of VirgoTrashh:
FAIR SHOT. 
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