Album review: BVDLVD – Absence

Of all of alternative music’s recent genre-fusing innovations in the last few years, it’s the amalgamation of trap and metal that has made for some of the ugliest, most creative and uniquely heavy sounds. Stepping up to take his own swing at it is Oxford’s BVDLVD who, on his second album, spits bars with the assuredness of someone who’s been doing it their entire life. Most intriguingly, the album he’s put his name to seems to be as multifaceted as BVDLVD himself.

Anyone walking into ABSENCE as someone more familiar with rock than trap might feel a little disoriented at first. But while it’s more trap than metal at first, it’s hardly a weakness. The grimy, rave-ready vibes of INEVITABLE is an early highlight, while TIME WILL TELL’s scratchy riffs and gruff screams bristle with the spirit of your usual four or five-piece heavy band. There are some rockier cuts too – TABLE CLOTH, meanwhile, seethes with an industrial harshness, while closer PRISON feels capable of mass destruction with its knife-edged guitars and incandescent aggression.

The other huge strength of ABSENCE is its huge personality. The glitchy, dizzying PANIC ATTACK sees BVDLVD screaming almost like a chimpanzee to mimic the feeling of hyperventilating, its lyrics shifting from comical ('Fuck, where’s my keys? / I can’t even find my penis') to deadly serious ('How am I supposed to write a hook if I ain’t feeling it?'), while AVODLOM is equally chaotic, with BVDLVD rapping over an accordion, opening on the hilarious, 'Got the whole pit doing the slav squat!'

Occasionally, a crack appears in his seemingly cocksure veneer. The woozy NUMB laments the feeling of being desensitised to emotional agony, while HOME’s posturing quickly dissolves into angst and regret over family troubles. BVDLVD has myriad doors open in front of him as to where he could go next – really, he could be anything. Whatever he does, he’ll do with excellence.

Verdict: 4/5

For fans of: Scarlxrd, $uicideboy$, Mimi Barks

ABSENCE is out September 29 via Earache

Read this: BVDLVD: “It’s a beautiful thing when you crack a troll”