Like every genre, hardcore has evolved over the years. From its snotty beginnings in the 80s to the present day, it’s been welded to just about every genre and subgenre of punk rock you can imagine. In this episode, we dedicate a little bit of time to talking about melodic hardcore, the bastard offshoot of hardcore, punk and emo.

Oh and we talk about Witness by Modern Life is War. A “foundational text”, as Mark puts it, for this kind of music.

It’s an album which has influenced a crazy number of artists. What’s more, it comes out of a tiny town in rural Iowa, a town that lead singer Jeremy Eaton has described as a place completely devoid of art of any kind. A marked change from their debut, My Love, My Way, it seen the band fuse Bane-esque hardcore with 90s emo to create the kind of melancholic, sincere, heart on sleeve style of mus ...