Huntsmen - American Scrap album review

The debut album from Chicago’s Huntsmen is steeped in Americana, articulating love and sadness for what their homeland represents versus what it’s become. American Scrap continues the story of their two preceding EPs, 2014’s Post War and 2016’s The Colonel – an uncomfortably apocalyptic tale given the current state of the US. Bury Me Deep and Pyre evoke a litany of classics, the affecting acoustic sorrows of Alice In Chains’ Jar Of Flies by way of War Pigs, vocalist Chris Kang’s workmanlike yarl channelling Bruce Springsteen as he degenerates amidst messy breakdowns into a snarl. Atlantic City’s snappy drums and stirring melodies provide the album’s emotive highpoint, building to a stomp, but as bombs fall on foreboding closer The Last President, you’re left with the distinct feeling that despite American Scrap’s high concept, it struggles to make you feel as much as it’s trying to.