The Scene Is Dead

There are no banjos or ukuleles on 2017’s *The Scene Is Dead*—just Scallon shredding like an extreme-metal god. Sticking exclusively to guitar, he unloads a torrent of djent-style instrumentals: With its choked riffs and shape-shifting tempos, “Jerome” is visceral and complex; on “And Ever” he turns simple, sludgy riffs inside out and upside down until the mind is drunk on repetition. Another key track is “The Dial,” one of several to feature Scallon weaving proggy countermelodies into his dense compositions.