Screamo is still a dirty word to those of a certain generation. It conjures up images of The Used and Hawthorne Heights and Silverstein. Well we’re here to tell you that before those bands became a thing, screamo was something entirely different. The best example of this is, of course, As the Roots Undo by Circle Takes the Square.

Won’t harp on about screamo too long in this post (you’ll need to listen to get the full rundown) but the OG version of it (or “skramz” as it is often called, partly as a way to differentiate it from the aforementioned early 00s, mainstream bothering second wave of it) has more in common with grindcore and post-hardcore, than it does metalcore and pop punk.

CTTS released this album in the midst of the mainstream screamo boom, but like their peers in Orchid and pg.99 (to name a few), couldn’t have been furt ...