Resuscitation of the Year is the second single that The Flatliners have released since 2013’s Dead Language. This 7-inch features two hard-hitting songs from the band; one of which was on their last full length, while the other is an unreleased B-side.

For those of you who are familiar with Dead Language you definitely know that the song “Resuscitation of the Year” is the very first track on the album. It has very soft guitar intro that morphs into this fast beat and octave-heavy song with Chris Cresswell singing (and almost yelling) the melody with his identifiably harsh-sounding voice. The back-up singers, sounding like almost like a chorus, come in to emphasize phrases like “You will never see me again!”

Of course “Resuscitation of the Year” has been out for about a year and a half, so it’s not exactly anything brand new. What is brand new is this unreleased B-side that we finally get to hear. The song is called “Fangs” and it’s a very exciting track because it’s the closest that The Flatliners have come to writing a hardcore song. There is almost no prevalent melody in the verses until they break for the melodic chorus. Chris is screaming the lyrics instead of singing them. You can hear his voice nearly break at some points because he yelling in such a high tone. The only way to describe the drums is fierce; the fills the drummer hits in this song are just insanely fast and complex. The guitar work throughout “Fangs” is very aggressive and ominous sounding and at times it relies a lot on dissonance, which adds some extra variety to the overall chord structure. If you are looking for songs to break things to, put this one on your playlist. It will get you pumped.

It was a good decision to not put “Fangs” on Dead Language. It’s one hell of a song and one of my favorites from The Flatliners, but it just wouldn’t have fit well on the LP. If this track gives us any clues as to what The Flatliners’ next release will sound like (whenever that may be), I can tell you that I am looking forward to their new material even more so now. Both of these tracks on this single are great though. Current fans of The Flatliners will be very pleased with this 7-inch and prospective fans probably will be, too.