Contention, out of Tampa Bay, FL, came up in 2019 putting out a brutal sound that they dubbed “apocalyptic straight edge” that is defined by shrill vocals, thrash guitar riffs, and heavy-ass breakdowns. After releasing a couple early EPs the band really hit their stride, releasing their first full length album Artillery From Heaven that was well received and put them on the map. The energy and ferocity they put into songs like “I.C.B.M.”, “Chasm” and “Lobotomite Bliss” is admirable and interludes that pay homage to mid-to-late aughts metal core bring on a wave of nostalgia.
The album was put out by hardcore power label DAZE and the band set off on a world tour through North America, Europe, and Asia and got them booked at one of the premiere North American hardcore fests, Sound and Fury.
Immediately following their set at S&F they dropped a new 3 track EP, Nuclear Summer, that’s a real tease of things yet to come for Contention. “Second Sun” and “Blank Stare” turn the band’s sound heavier than ever before. The third song, “X On Our Knees X” is a cover from 90’s powerviolence band The Swarm AKA Knee Deep in the Dead and listening to the two versions side by side you can tell how much of an impact The Swarm had on their sound. On the messaging behind the new three-song drop vocalist, Cosmo Vidussi, had this to say, “Modernity brings no enlightenment, only more refined methods of annihilation. Annihilation of the enemy. Annihilation of the self. Our leaders have shed their increasingly thin facades of humanity. The masses shamble through life in a drug and media-fueled haze. They worship a machine that grinds them to dust and uses them for fuel. Cities are leveled in our name. Bombs are assembled with our tax dollars. We’re held hostage by a small group of deranged degenerates with nuclear arsenals and a lust for ruin.
Are these the final days? Or is the suffering of modernity only a single day swallowed by a quarter eon of unchecked brutality?”