Stick to Your Guns - Keep Planting Flowers (2025) Hi-Res

An aggressive, full-throttle eighth LP from the Orange County metal group. Now over 20 years into the game, Stick To Your Guns’ status as a respected name in hardcore isn’t in question. But with so many exciting new bands – Speed, Drain, GEL – causing new waves, it’s arguable that relative veterans like STYG need to be producing music that’s stronger than ever to keep up. Thankfully, Keep Planting Flowers – the Orange County outfit’s eighth full-length – is brilliant, and flies by with all the chaos, carnage and catharsis Jesse Barnett and co. are known for.

Packed with aggression from the get-go, opener We All Die Anyway hammers home its rather bleak message with aplomb, while the cataclysmic Permanent Dark is underpinned by a hefty hardcore stomp. They don’t hang around in getting the job done, with most of the tracks being sub-three-minute blasts of hardcore might, but that’s more than enough time for them to make their mark.