Rustbelt Nu Metal is the fifth studio album released by Flint, Michigan’s very own, King 810. A band who seem to thrive off of controversy and polarizing reception with intent to be the “most hated band in America,” according to their Instagram page. With antics that include their unapologetically violent stage shows that got whole music venues shut down, bringing weapons on stage, brushes with the police, and replicating crime scenes on stage, and frontman David Gunn even showing up to the January 6th U.S. Capitol insurrection to film footage for a music video, which was later discarded. Added on top of all this, a fiercely dedicated following that shows such zeal to where in one instance, a fan carved the band’s logo into their skin. The goal? To adopt the “most-hated” gimmick into their own sound.
In a way, King 810 is trying to be a shock rock group.
And I do say "trying" because, while their antics, especially in their earlier career, were notable, the music itself is not as impressionable as one would assume, given their attempts at shock value.
Some call them the realest metal band to come out in recent memory, even receiving the co-sign from Robb Flynn of Machine Head, going as far as to say that they remind him of his band during their early years. On the other hand, you’ve got less than generous takes, calling their antics, their gimmick, and their style all desperate and their music reeking of overly edgy condescension, backed by generic, quintessential nu metal riffs, all in a way to seek attention.
As the hype around them seems to die down, they have never been able to capture that shock factor that they initially came onto the scene with. This especially being the case due to their separation with Roadrunner Records after the release of their second studio release La Petite Morte, or A Conversation With God.
This brings us to the present. Their latest stint in a series of shock-laden nu metal, Rustbelt Nu Metal.
Now with a name like that, one would expect this to be something of a new style of nu metal. But upon first listen, you’ll find that that’s hardly, if at all the case. In fact, one could easily say that this is their worst effort to date. They recorded this all live in order to capture a raw sound, with a lack of studio enhancements that plague most modern metal today. However, instead of being an enhancer, it sounds more like an unfinished demo with a sound that feels like something akin to a beatdown hardcore band replicating Slipknot and Korn, delivered in a slam-poetry-type vocal delivery by their frontman David Gunn. The riffs just feel like something out of the Korn playbook, and Gunn forgoes his slam poetry vocal delivery in favor of some truly appalling attempts at “rapping”.
Nu metal isn’t exactly new to subpar rapping. One could say that that’s part of its charm. But when it really gets bad is when it’s trying to say something serious, but with no substance. David’s rasped vocal delivery has him sounding like Taz the Tasmanian Devil. And lyrically, it’s addressing major social and political turmoil such as the East Palestine, Ohio train incident as they send millions more to bomb Palestine, which is an apt critique to make if it was expanded upon... only it isn’t, and just sees Gunn further delving into various issues less with genuine concern and in depth analysis and more like grievances listed in a long, cracked out rant you'd find on Twitter.
The biggest factor about King 810 so unlikable to many isn’t really how edgy they are as much as just how condescending they come across. The attempts at trying to appear profound get lost in translation amidst the attempts at trying to appear big, tough and scary. On one hand you’ll get a line about the tragedies of Flint, only for it to be followed by a line about how they’d still fuck you up or kill you if you show any ounce of empathy for them. And that's the crux of this band's existence. They substitute understanding with theatrics.
It prevents the issues being talked about on various King 810 records from being taken seriously due to Gunn’s self-indulgent attempts at trying to be shocking. A band like this on paper should have made for one of the most prolific bands genuinely earning the controversy, but instead all we get is a group of tryhards, releasing albums that get worse and worse with time that snowball into their worst one.
I recommend skipping this one, it doesn’t just embody the worst of nu metal, it’s just an objectively shitty album from a band that doesn’t put effort into their mission statement and yet pretends as if what they’re saying is more profound than it actually is.
