warning: this is also very long, so settle in.
tl;dr: save me good
save me. there was a very real possibility that this would be the last piece of music we would ever hear from avenged sevenfold. it was truly the boys' last ditch effort to put it all out there, and you cant deny that with how much soul and heartbreaking emotion was poured into these 10 minutes and 56 seconds. youve already heard the traxx podcast, so i wont bore you with what you already know. instead, in the same brand of schizophrenic street-preacher ramblings that got across how much i love waking the fallen, im gonna try to explain why save me goes straight to the top of double-S, god-tier, goated, legendary, cri evry tiem level of so many people's tier lists including mine.
'i aint reading all that. im happy for u tho. or sorry that happened.' you say, but more importantly what about the first 10 tracks of nightmare? believe me, they do tie in. ~~they~~ we all know that this is the Rev's memorial album, and the fact that it has so much genuine, biting sadness is why it resonates down to our bones. even waking the fallen, as serious and on-the-nose as its four song suicide story is, still has an air of oOoOoOo sPoOoOkY sPiRiTs and hot topic high school drama. with nightmare, theres none of that. when you reach your late 20s, as the gang was when their best friend and the greatest metal drummer of this millenium (fight me) got fent-bent, you will inevitably face something that tells you how cruel existence can be. every pained line is brutally honest and exactly what the guys were feeling, as one last push to get their message out to the world.
it makes perfect sense then that this album largely follows the same script of their past ones. despite a7x designing their albums to piss off as many genre purists as possible, where else but on what they thought would be their last do they double down and create something truest to the "A7X Sound?" first of all, the track order. if you look, a7x has always split their albums into 2 of what i call 'runs' of tracks. Sounding the Seventh Trumpet is phenomenal wall-smashing music from To End the Rapture to Lips of Deceit with Warmness on the Soul as a break, then... stuff that was written by 17 year olds. Waking the Fallen is teenage angst until second heartbeat, then everything i yapped about last time. City of Evil: people love to hate seize the day but the momentum is high all the way from syns favorite song through strength of the world. sorry betrayed, someone had to get stuck at the end of that train. no disrespect to Dime. White Album is 5 songs for the big stage and pyro, then 5 songs for the real die hard experimental nerds. nightmare follows suit: first a blazing 6 song run of head drivers, double rides, and dueling solos capped off with a nice little bow of a stadium ballad, then 5 songs that make you wanna bawl your eyes out for our guys, finishing with a chorus of "Tonight we all die young." a line so solemnly bleak yet sickeningly hopeful for the future without their brother in knives and stallion ducks.
in the same way George Lucas used visual poetry as an excuse to recycle the plot of A New Hope, nightmare gets going with 5 tracks of classic bangers. a7x has always been phenomenal at openers and closers, and thats why nightmare ascended to surface-level popularity. that rolls right into the hawaii-five-o groove rap of Welcome to the Family, and right away you see something's different. the title track was usual A7X, some nebulous scary concept dressed up in cool sounding phrases and iconic solos and fills, but no song just outright screams "HEY KID, DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION!?" in your face. this is the first track that's completely and totally on point with how it feels to 'join the family' of everyone thats actually gone through some shit. even on danger line and natural born killer, where they try so hard to get back to a concept they know, the lyrics bite deep with lines like "remind the lord to leave his light on" and "this is the world you left behind... this is the guilt that CONSUMES YOU!?" buried alive? why of course they'll put their own spin on Metallica's One now that they just stared down the biggest tragedy of their lives. then finally So Far Away: yeah i know it started off for Syn's grandpa, papa papa gates if you will, but it became the rev's memorial song. at this point it feels like it's finally addressing the elephant in the room for this album, and you know what that sounds like to me? denial.
maybe he's not gone. maybe the band can stay the same. or more than likely, God just fucking hates you. why else would you lay down your last ever 10 second metalcore scream to shut all the haters up? once the dust settles from all that anger though, and you finally look around at the charred remains that were covered by the red mist... what now? we all cling to Victim for our own reasons, and i respect whatever yours are so i wont talk over them with mine. Tonight the World Dies piggybacks off that, but feels lighter. its as if the desperate bargaining paid off, and the thick muck of depression's starting to roll back. now, you can actually think, process, nurse yourself into some sort of catharsis or epiphany. the bridge feels like youre on the verge of one, with how it swells up into one of matts finest belts of the song title, 'Tonight the World Dies.' sounds awful similar to another line on this album right?
now, we finally reach the Rev's swan song, the same word tattoo'd across his chest. for such a character, you wouldn't expect his final song to be a brooding, gothic yet oddly soothing piano lullaby. i, like many of you, absolutely break every time i hear this. we all miss him, but it's the acceptance of his fate in the last lines he ever recorded that does it. matt called it 'almost haunting,' and i still believe jimmy was fully aware of what was to happen to him in 3 days' time. whether it was self inflicted or not, we'll never know. what else would he want to leave to the world besides a pinkly smooth song for this very moment? after all, thats what he cared more about way back in 2001. its the final duet of two best friends, the last minute and change, all this dying man wants his friends to know is 'i know you'll find your own way, when i'm not with you tonight.' with the last drawn out organ note, that's the end. it gently sets you down at the end of the grief cycle. the rev's gone. all you have left are memories. at the very least though, you can take solace knowing he just wanted them to be happy.
now, after all that we reach the end of the journey. you fought hard through all 10 tracks of terrible, biting misery, but now that it's over, you have to face life on the other side. you're alive, they're not, and you gotta figure out how to keep it that way. this is what save me puts so beautifully into an eleven minute piece of gothic neoclassical metal music. the bass line chants along, like the days you've been trudging through to get here. after a hard stop, the guitars blast in, and you can almost feel the chilly blue fog rolling into a graveyard of memories. its soothing, its playful, it offers a comforting escape, and you can almost hear them out of the blue say "SKULL" right next to you for no reason other than they thought it was funny. life goes on, every day a constant battle to find some sort of ground to stand on. the pain and regret attacks you almost every day, your only defense being to finally call upon the spirits around you in a dying hope that they'll finally answer. that's not what reality is, though, and it's time to pull you back into it and face the truth:
they.
all.
know.
you know the traxx podcast by heart, you know the first verse is questioning why the good times had to end. more than that, it's a gentle nudge of the Rev's spirit, hoping to wake him up from his long sleep and get an answer to a burning question. what is it like on the other side? you know they would tell you. more than that, why'd they leave in the first place? was it something we said? WAS IT SOMETHING WE SAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAID!?
this chorus, wow. melancholy has always been an undercurrent in avenged sevenfold's work, and this is what happens when they stop hiding it and put it front and center. the melody unintrusively sways like a classical lullaby, soothing you into the company that misery loves, but all underlining the ultimate question of why the hell am i still here? save me: from what? i dont know, just... save me... please...
while the second section is a copy and paste of the first save for the verse lyrics, it really continues the theme of aimlessness from being left starkly alone in this world. as if you would get an answer, you ask what it's like on the other side, on what humanity has always touted as some kind of higher plane. more importantly, if you were so close on this earth, why wouldnt they bring you along for the ride? what made them want to sever the tie? was it something we did? WAS IT SOMETHING WE-no.
after another spiral of sorts through the chorus, the dust finally starts to clear. every day is a battle against demons you didnt even know you had, and the second solo is when you lace up the gloves and face them head on. despite the madness and guitar-smashingly fast notes coming from syn though, this is a battle you win. your reward is a nice cruise through a starfield screensaver of clarity. even a second guitar joins the groove as you sail through, flying above the black and blue. finally, after you could say a... wild ride, youre left all by yourself, on a dark lonely night, watching the ceiling fan spin around with nothing but your thoughts to keep you company. or so you think. in one of the most heartbreaking prayers to anyone who'll listen, this is where you finally call out to the one you wish never left:
"help me find my way... i said help me find my way...
no pulse inside of me, stone cold lips and heresy, all lies and to a degree, losing who i wanna be you'll find- out- right- now-"
"he may be out of his mind, but some day you will find, that sanity's left us all blind, and dragged us all behind. a moment seen through those eyes, crystal blue disguise."
they say that all beauty must die, i say it just moves on. there it is, the point finally got through to you. the guitar starts to pick back up, as if you just finished a spell and conjured some new perspective. and then, as the music blows up into a goosebump-inducing swell, it's like you finally feel their presence again, fulfilling a final promise to this earthly realm. thing is, they're not giving you anything new, it's just a reframing of the last part of the prayer sequence and a new way to realize that the closure you wanted was always there. in the midst of that though, all you want to do is reach out and touch them, get one last memory to hold on to forever, beg them to stay just a little longer. before their soul finally moves on and releases you from the grief of loss, they console you with the final reminder: that as long as you hold on to the pictures, memories, and the sound of their voice, they will always be with you and you will never be alone.
in the final climax of the chorus, it's a stark reminder that you're still right where you started. every day is a battle, a constant loop of waking up and making it day by day, still with so many questions and yearnings and no one to fulfill them. the magic of the bridge still lingers on, hence Mike Portnoy being cut free to finally drum how he wants. and on the last line of "If you hear me let me know..." into a replay of the opening solo, it's one final call that if their spirit ever decides to come back, they are always welcome. for now, its back into the heavy blue fog, and another day of living without them. lucky for you though, they're always with you in the darkest of times, and realizing that was what made all the pain, suffering, and grief worth it. as the final riff blasts out in true A7X form, the guitars ring out for a long 10 seconds. the smoke fades to black, and avenged sevenfold drops the curtain and comes around for one last coda.
"tonight... we all... die young..." a chorus sung twice over a gentle piano, 5 words sung so softly it makes you weep.
"tonight... we all... die young..." the guitars and drums blast back to life for the next two, like the pale white moon spreading the fog and revealing the path forward. matt screams it out a fourth time along with the 3 survivors of his whole ordeal.
"tonight... we all... die young..." a serenade over a grooving jam session, with matt leaning one last time into his signature bro rasp over mike portnoy giving it his all in the last act of avenged sevenfold.
"tonight... we all... die~" as if condensing everything from waking the fallen through white album into one sung melody over a heavy riff. since the beginning a7x was about pop punk melodies over pantera breakdowns, and what better way to finish than with exactly what they do.
"tonight... we all..." this is it, the final note where the whole band joins in and takes a bow, "die... young......." wait, what? that doesn't sound like an ending. disonance radiates from syn's guitar over the same chanting beat from the very beginning of this piece, ending suddenly on a quick fill like this was just one giant 11 minute jam session. oh. these. mother. FUCKERS!
even on what was supposed to be their last song ever, the one where they leave everything out in the studio, shove all of their barest rawest emotions out to the world for all to hear, THEY STILL TEASE YOU WITH MORE TO COME. fuck me, guess im spending the next hour listening to this album again.
in all seriousness, these last 2 minutes, while it legitimately makes me glassy-eyed every time, is what the whole journey of nightmare leads to. zacky said it himself, there were two different sets of human beings before and after making this album. such a hopeful yet bittersweet mix of pianos and minor-key guitar melody, underneath the bleak lyrics of 'tonight we all die young,' truly gets across the end game of powering through terrible grief and rising again to live as a more mature, stable individual. gone are the days of being sad for the sake of it, or needlessly lashing out at what you cant understand. the old you is dead, and there's infinite ways you can go from here. whichever path you chose, you'll never be alone so long as you hold on to the ones you love, whether they're here or not.
and yet, even with all this lovey dovey hippy dippy spiritual emotional therapy talk, every day goes by that you have to live without them. that's why the cherry on top of Save Me is a dissonant repeat of the chanting, thumping intro, as if the cycle of surviving day by day comes back around. its just like the never ending cycle of me constantly listening to this album. thanks for reading, a7x foREVer, and rock on.