Converge - Hum of Hurt Review

What can get better than one Converge AOTY album in 2026? Two Converge AOTY albums in 2026. Have at that; Hum of Hurt is a brutal assault on the senses that holds nothing back.

How about that. Converge’s early drop of ‘Love is Not Enough’; in February took the metalcore genre by storm and it was clear that we had an album of the year contender on our hands to anyone with good taste. Most artists would do a tour and then go back in for the next one. Not so with the newly incredibly prolific American band Converge, who are back at it with ‘Hum of Hurt.’ These aren’t albums that exist as twinned companion records but in their own entity; it’s a record that feels like a lot more of a hardcore release than a blistering ode to New England.

This eschews the metalcore origins for something comparable to Guilt Trip’s triumphant ‘Armour of Angels’, out the same day, following in the footsteps of something that was incredibly commonplace in the 60s and 70s and that was dropping two albums so close to each other. Black Sabbath of course – are the trailblazers for this in the metal genre, dropping their self-titled record and ‘Paranoid’ within 7 months of each other. This is not to say that immediate sequels are necessarily weaker or leftover material from their first record; but capable of being a living, breathing being.

‘Hum of Hurt’ is a cathartic overload of a record that fits its title: the hum, an emotional and intimate record that deals with the low throbbing noise that causes psychological distress (registered, by scientists, as something between 30 and 40 hertz, heard everywhere from Ipswich to Auckland and has been linked to suicides in the UK). It’s an album that sums up the hurt that it’s caused on people and the human suffering that this condition revels in – predictably as answer, Jacob Bannon allows to go all out from the word go at the rage caused by this.

‘Slip the Noose’ plunges us into some aggressive angsty hooks that get the ball rolling – and Ballou’s abrasive, bold riffs dominate the track opener. It keeps things simple and the hardcore influence of bands like Knocked Loose is felt here; brash and ready to go – exploring themes of the need to exist in an timeframe like this. The mathcore riffs themselves are a callback to Converge’s earlier days – and we’re in very familiar territory here. The sound that saw them have the impact that they did more than 20 years ago given a modern production helps it streamline it and make it sound even more authentic without losing any of their charm.

‘It Only Gets Worse’ is an oxymoron – the record just keeps on getting better. The double pairing of that track with ‘Doom in Bloom’ allows a propelling revolving door of pits to form when played live – this is Converge, we’re talking about, of course there will be pits – “No one has the right to change me” ‘Doom in Bloom’ cries, an introspective that follows the explosive answer of ‘Love is Not Enough’ – with a rallying cry that’s bold and exploring the deeper cuts of long-lasting pain. It’s personal, introspective and formal – caustic and rough around the edges it full on goes all in on the chaos. The three tracks leading into ‘Detonator’ sees Converge reach a boiling point ready to explode – dealing with these themes with empathy but tapping more into hardcore with emotional undertones; taking up the mantle of themes that exist as answering call to giving up and moving on – how ‘Detonator’ tackles that is something with respect and care.

 There is a tendency to go into noise here – the original plan, vocalist Jacob Bannon stated, was to make a noise rock album – and there are touches of that – but this is very much hardcore at its beating heart. But to say it is fully hardcore could be a lie, the six minute ‘Dream Debris’ could be a post-rock song, that just sits there and builds and builds around Ben Kollers’ triumphant drums. It’s only a short, sharp thirty minute album so to devote six minutes to one track could feel like too much, but it’s a success in every sense of the word. We also get an exploration of the albums’ core themes on title track ‘Hum of Hurt’, anchored with themes of realising that you’re not the person who you wanted to be and struggling with a sense of self-doubt and failure. It’s Converge’s most emotional track – a deeply powerful and incredibly effective way to cap a resurgence of one of the finest heavy outfits in the game. Some artists go whole years without making album of the year contenders. Converge made two in five months.