Review: Black Veil Brides - Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones

Well, it's about time I started writing album reviews again since every release under the sun for the start of the year came out two days ago. I would have done some reviews then and there, but then, why don't you try studying for a media law exam?? I'm done.

Guess what? That time has come around again for all spiteful internet trolls to get their knickers in a twist and for obsessive fans to, pretty much do the same. The Black Veil Brides are back to show us that they never really put much faith in the concept that less is more.

Where are we even at with the Hollywood quintet that everyone knows the name of these days? This time last year, they could not be ignored, especially from a negative point of view. The really tragic thing about it is that the criticism didn't even come in the form of some sharp NME type that displayed their cynicism with sophistication, just more like a splattering of of words referring to genital body parts and casual homophobia virtually vomited out onto comment boards and forums across the web, while the real fans insisted on needing to defend their beloved band which resulted in using phrases like "haters" and "hating on", both of which are a spread of cancer upon English grammar. Truth be told, I really have come to enjoy their first two albums, two friends of mine are in that latter category of devoted BVB Army members so I got quite the exposure, but all of this, the fact that it's become this all out war of those who love and those who despise the band stops me from wanting to make myself a massive fan.

Thus, the matter of how much I enjoy them has always been down to the music rather than immense love or hatred to spawn from other matters regarding them, and yes, their looking like weird kids that came last place in a dress-like-KISS-competition has always been a massive elephant in the room in this context. And with their third album, their long planned out "rock opera concept album" Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones, the music does the talking. And it talks big.

Sometimes it's easy to deliver mockery when someone takes themselves a little too seriously, but in the case of the performance the band puts on for this album, you can't really avoid it. You just have to hear the unrelenting venomous tones that Andy Biersack unleashes as he opens with I Am Bulletproof. It's the sound of a man that has become fiercer, sharper and willing to deliver his spite upon a world that has shown him nothing but contempt. And as the sound of threat in his voice shows no sign of letting up through the song's grandly constructed choruses from the entire band that keep hooks coming with a passion and enthusiasm that can only be commendable, it's obvious that this is a band that takes itself very seriously.

You can hear it in the songwriting. While 2011's Set the World on Fire was nothing more than a collection of rock songs designed to be continuously fiery in it's delivery, there's more substance to be found on the sprawling openings of to New Year's Day with it's sub industrial backdrops and on the dramatic buildups of We Don't Belong. Even if it carries some tackiness, the gothic buildup to Shadows Sun has strokes of classical-based soundscaping that one could find on a Nightwish or Cradle of Filth album. More intelligence and a greater desire for all things expansive can be heard in this manner of songwriting and it's clear that this album is designed to be so much more than just a collection of jams. That's right everyone! Black Veil Brides don't enter the studio with the same recording ambitions as Fu Manchu. You heard it here first.

And that's not to say that there's less emphasis on making a rock album in any way. Many would happily say that Jake Pitts is the main highlight of Black Veil Brides and with his shredding on Wretched and Divine and Nobody's Hero, it doesn't take much for him to prove why. Solos squeal with delight amongst beefed up rhythm sections that deliver sing-along choruses that will make those who sing along nothing short of ecstatic. I mean, Devil's Choir is a guaranteed stadium-filler anthem and Days Are Numbered is immense on it's own without even considering the weirdly-anticipated vocal appearance from Bert McCracken of The Used.

McCracken's appearance actually serves as something of a highlight, because there's a weird interest to come from the fact that while The Used's debut album is over ten years old now and the band are verging on becoming veterans in the world of emo rock, while Black Veil Brides are still rising up just how much more ambitious and bold Biersack sounds when the pair's voices are put together. That's no put down to McCracken, as he's always put on the vocal characteristics of anxiety, panic and a sort of social terror and it's probably why the band wanted him on this song because no one presents that emotion quite like him. If anything it seems like McCracken is on that song to highlight the strength of Biersack's vocals which always play a more commanding characteristic. Maybe I'm completely wrong with my analogies. Either way, their duet is cool.

And while many would like to cast off the idea of Black Veil Brides being an emo band, it can't be denied that emotion is spread, particularly in the album's closing moments. Lost it All may be a modern example of one of those perfect ballads that takes you  from one spectrum of emotion to another in five minutes. Opening with a cold piano melody that conjures up feelings of failure and gothic despair amongst Andy's shiver inducing vocal performance which gradually progressives into something that feels warm, lush and unexpectedly life affirming, as the rest of the band join in and extra vocals come in from Automatic Loveletter frontwoman Juliet Simms, putting on a female balladeer performance positively reminiscent of Clare Torry. As the song ends with Pitts' unwinding solo the song's message of losing it all has sort of changed from being "You've lost it all. You've ruined everything, feel guilty!" to "You've lost it all. Shit happens, but we'll get over it with friends and beer." Maybe I'm completely wrong in my analogies again. But by the time the album actually ends with lead single In the End, you realise that the power, devotion and entire outburst of the band's full creativity and emotional force just makes them a band in a league of their own, not necessarily above but in no way comparable to any of the metalcore or glam-rock revival bands they were being grouped with a year and a half ago. This is their sound and it belongs to no one but them.

Of course, I am saying that In the End is the album's final track. It isn't actually, it ends on one of the many interludes that the band refers to as F.E.A.R. Transmissions voiced by Aiden frontman Wil Francis. That's the main sign that the album is taking itself too seriously. With these constant segments of essentially Bad-guy film speeches backed up strokes of symphonic backdrops, it's meant to be the band wrapping up the album's concept of fighting against fear resembled by authority and religion and all'a that. Necessary is not a word I'd use to describe them, though they sometimes serve as nice intros to full songs.

But when they all last under a minute it's hardly worth complaining about. Particularly when the music itself is so substantial. Truth be told, part of me wanted to dislike this album. Part of me wanted to see that it was just some basic hard rock songs made for kids who describe classical music as "Epic". But it's so much more. It's a sign that the Black Veil Brides have matured from the people they were when they recorded Set the World on Fire as I have matured from the person who listened to Set the World on Fire and probably described it as "Epic." And when you hear the kind of effortless confidence, sense of determination and full emotion and belief in what they're doing that pours out across Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones, you realise that this isn't the same band that everyone was vomiting out slanderous remarks about on the internet a year and a half ago. Sure, there are similarities and they'll never impress any of the true metalheads that originally showed disinterest purely from a musical point of view, but this is no longer the band that gave bullied high school kids a place to run to. This is something more. This is a band on an adventure. And what a way to kick off 2013 that is.

Black Veil Brides' Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones is out now via Universal Republic Records. The band will tour the UK in February on The Kerrang! Tour with Chiodos, Tonight Alive and Fearless Vampire Killers.

2013: Let's Think This Through

So, how's everyone doing? Has the recovery methods practiced throughout the later hours of the 1st of January come into effect yet? I know it's taken a full day for it to work today otherwise I would have done this yesterday. Instead I was stuck on zombie mode. A fucking happy new year indeed.

Seriously though, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year and got everything you wanted and experienced much joy and goodwill and all'a that. If you are friends with me on Facebook, or follow me on Twitter, or use Google images to get the covers for the album you downloaded for free, you may know that the last thing I put on this blog was my 2012 Retrospective and Top 350 albums list. If you didn't know it was because the kind people at Blogger wouldn't allow me to change the date that the post was published, meaning it's way back in the January 2012 section, which is really weird. It's like I'm predicting the albums of the future and telling people that this is what will happen in 2012. Maybe it should stay that way as I convince everyone of clairvoyant powers.

I'm extremely proud of that post and I'm already confident that I'll never be able to write anything else that tops it, but I can see that it was maybe a tad too long, so if I do something like it again, a shorter number may have to be in order. But, after it was published and I had completed my extremely heavy promotion session of the post, I really was immersed in that feeling that it was the finest thing I'd ever done and would have therefore been a good swan song for Ramblings of a Rock Fan, that nothing more needed to be done. We had reached the end. And then I found myself washing dishes while working at my local butchers with dish upon dish being piled up endlessly and without any sort of joy in sight for the rest of the day and I sort of realised that this is the only real way over the past year and a half that I've managed to make a name for myself and at a stage so fresh into my real work at University towards becoming a journalist, I couldn't just throw it away. I need this for my future.

But here's the thing. 2013, is definitely going to be the most active year of my life. It's time I have a think of what's going down throughout the year. Well, to kick things off I have a Media Law exam in three days, which will be a tonne of fun. After that, there will be a major step up in University work that I will need to put all my focus on. Along with that I made it a New Year's Resolution to finally learn to drive, which will give me something big to do in Blairgowrie, and guess what, I also turn eighteen, meaning I can pretty much do what I want, so that I can forget that I have to write about music and go out to clubs and bars instead, as well as that, this summer, I'm heading to Florida (YEEEAAAAHHH!!!) and also spending a few days at a little piece of turf called Donnington Park for a little party they throw known as Download Festival, where I will lose my mind watching Queens of the Stone Age, Slipknot and many others, although my entire time depends solely on seeing those two. And though I still have ambitions for this blog, who knows how frequently it can happen.

I kind of had a plan to do something like one post a week which summarizes all the big releases of the week with some compacts but still slick reviews, but I'd rather keep things the way they are now. More than that I had more plans for non review material. I definitely want to get some more interviews with up-and-coming bands, have more writing done by people that aren't me and every now and then, just write some biography pieces on bands I like, for no other reason than they're a band I like, whether they're massive and have lots of stories outside the music, or are underground dwellers that deserve more recognition.

Seriously though, I'm happy to be back writing. It seems like maybe I've become something like a watchful eye in the world of rock music making sure that only the good things occur. I mean when I'm blogging, I hear people I know know talking about rock bands they love that I've maybe introduced them to and everyone seems to celebrate the joy of bands that only need riffs and choruses to get their messages through. And as soon as I stop typing and turn my back away, musicians I've admired over time are exposed in a different and entirely new sinister light. Of course I'm talking about Ian Watkins.

That's basically where I'm at right now. Drawing up plans, making up lists and looking at lists of upcoming albums, tours and news that we should all get excited about. Everything Everything have an album out on birthday, that's pretty cool, huh?

So happy new year, everyone, I genuinely don't know when I'll write again. I might have some mental breakdown that stops me from writing during the year. Who knows what will happen. I suppose, we'll have to make our way through the next twelve moths and watch the world of music progress along with us. Alright, feeling energized yet? Good. The headbanging starts now!

Review: Crystal Castles - (III)

 Been waiting a while to write about this one, frankly it's taken me this long to find the words to describe it. But after a recommendation, or rather demand from a friend to check out and review the new Crystal Castles album, I couldn't exactly refuse. It was an eventuality that I check them out anyway with mass critical acclaim surrounding their simply titled third album (III). And in a world where gaining critical acclaim is by making an album that turns heads the world over, this is definitely a deserving album.

 It's not exactly an album of the rock music variety but with the band's name emerging in crowds of fellow indie bands, there should be an association but on my first full time of listening to the band, the music doesn't have the cool indie vibes I was expecting. What the album does is serve as a beginners guide to industrial dance music, without having the simplicity of many "beginners" bands. And it keeps you constantly gripped in utter suspense.

 Opener Plague sets the musical ideal of the album as a rise of synthesizers upholding a soulful tone that plunges straight into darkness. And within this shift of club-friendly synthesizers into a much more blackened grinding atmosphere, the imagery immersing within one's mind is that of a grim reality of life, particularly in regards to the whole idea of clubbing, which I'm sure you'll know becomes less and less glitzy and glamourous the more the night goes along. The contrast between the poppy basslines and harsh industrial soundscapes is the musical equivalent of that popular film/TV show advertising technique where the uplifting good-times scenes are harshly disrupted by the quick shots of random civilians being hacked up by a faceless stranger in front of a burning building. Or something.

 The rest of the album continues in the vein of distressing dance music with your attention constantly focused on the beats and scathing backdrops produced by the band that sound reminiscent of names like Ministry and Godflesh. With it's range of broken samples, the likes of Kerosene and Pale Flesh uphold the undead nightclub imagery where all the pleasure of dancing is grounded to a chilling halt. And the haunting performance of Alice Glass really serves as the iron plated icing on the cake.

 Often, Glass' performance actually succeeds in making the album a dreamier affair. Siren-esque if you will, as she willingly drags you closer to her voice before realising you've walked into the undead nightclub. Affection's performance sounds positively framed for a shoegaze band with synthesizers adapted to match it. Even in the horror, her vocals are a source of immense charm, expressed best in the moments where production is at it's most sparkling on the likes of Wrath of God and Telepath.

 But the prime focus of this album is certainly set on having a trick up it's sleeve delivered through intense trance beats and horrific industrial soundscapes, reaching the height of it's intensity on Sad Eyes, a song that would be easy for me to describe as an industrial take on the Big Brother theme tune, but would therefore reveal an insultingly low knowledge on dance music as a whole. And yet ending the album on the deceptively warm Child, I Will Hurt You, perhaps the most shocking moment that effectively turns around all you've heard of the album so far, sounding like a far more delicately woven effort from the band which actually seeks to uplift. Except it doesn't. It leaves you stunned.

 As the album ends and you crawl out of the undead nightclub covered in cuts and mental scars that will never leave you, you realise how engaging an album (III) is. In many ways, it's contradictory in it's statement as Crystal Castles take the beloved style of mainstream dance music, a style of music designed to resemble escapism from the grind of real life, particularly in the context of a club, and slam it together with this cold industrial soundscaping that re-instate the grim reality of life and horror that goes beyond that. It's an album to mess with your perceptions, haunt your dreams and leave you feeling uneasy. And there's nothing more exciting than an album like that.

Crystal Castles' (III) is out now via Polydor. The band are on tour of the UK now.

Review: Cradle of Filth - The Manticore and Other Horrors

 I'm almost too much of a Cradle of Filth fanboy to let this review happen, but needs must so let's go for it. It's no secret that Suffolk's main icon have long since lost their shock factor and immense profiling. Once a time came when they were the public eye's first guide to an extreme metal band, being name-checked in all aspects of mainstream culture. They were referenced on Coronation Street, The IT Crowd and the immortal internet cartoon Burnt Face Man and managed to cause a stir in the public's eyes with the release of their "Jesus is a Cunt" T-Shirt. But these days are long gone and since then they seemed to have entered a low stage of their career, with the release of last year's Darkly, Darkly, Venus Aversa being the first time I felt disappointed listening to an album back in my fifteen-year-old state of "Oh, I listen to Slipknot and Cradle of Filth. I'm so dark" atrocity.

 So, now that the band isn't the same band I viewed as icons in my confused teenager days (Wait, I still am a conf-) hearing the announcement of the release of their tenth album The Manticore and Other Horrors isn't nearly as exciting as it may have once been. And going into the album with that state of mind means you're only going to come out thinking the same about the music.

 It's not a complete lull in any way though. It starts off promising enough, with The Unveiling of O actually having an intro track once again, the staple of a Cradle of Filth album,  something that Venus Aversa was painfully lacking in. And as this grandiose opener bursts straight into the massively sized opening of The Abhorrent, signs of Cradle regaining their extremity can be heard, as the perfect mix of heavy riffage and showmanship meet with Dani Filth's new vocal style continuing to sprawl in a dirty narrative tone, showing that this is a band that still wants to uphold it's theatricality.

 That said, references to riffs is important for The Manticore, as this album finally allows guitarists Paul Allender act as the driving force on several songs. For Your Vulgar Dedication and Manticore, his riffs actually manage to be catchy and take on a greater crust punk and rock and roll influence. And  with this album being promised to be a more rock and roll release from the band, hearing them slightly more stripped down is enjoyable.

 And that's one reason you'll leave this album disappointed because that moment of a stripped down Cradle of Filth is actually very rare. Across the album, the band continue to churn out overblown extreme metal works practically leaking symphonic and choral effects that just don't make any real impact on the songs. Plus, Dani's attempts to bring as much theatricality as possible loses it's charm very quickly. Frost on Her Pillow is painfully unscary and melodramatic, while his narrative on the simple opening of Palid Reflection effectively ruins what could have been a very cool rock and roll opening. By the time you get the usage of digital vocal effects on Succumb to This, it's difficult to keep oneself listening to the album.

 With that, it's difficult to know what Cradle of Filth can really do from here because The Manticore and Other Horrors sounds like blatant evidence that their days of recording classic albums are probably behind them. I could see Dani working well as a producer, maybe. Either way, they probably should find something new because I really don't know how much longer I can go on with hearing a band that I have so much confused respect for do something so lacking in quality or substance. They try to put on a more rock and roll signature to their work, but it has little bite and makes you realise how much better a band Goatwhore are. Even when there's so much going on in the background with orchestras and choirs, the songs are still unremarkable. All you can see here is a band that was once ferocious within the public eye officially marking out their fall from grace. It's agony. Fifteen-year-old me is crying in the corner right now.

Cradle of Filth's The Manticore and Other Horrors is out now via Peaceville. The band will play at The Forum in London on the 19th December

Review: Hacktivist - Hacktivist

 To look at the debut EP from London quintet Hacktivist is to take a real examination on the way that all forms of music has advanced in the past few years. You have to examine the youthful, more richly textured take on progressive metal that has formed in the beloved "djent" scene and you have to look at the way that electronics and hip hop has been bubbling in the UK underground scene to give the grime style an extreme edge that would never get any artists that practiced it in it's true form a spot in the singles charts. The idea of bringing together a union of the two styles seems ludicrous. But this isn't a band that thinks so.

 Now obviously, the idea of rap metal isn't new and in the constant wave of new deathcore bands, there has been some evidence of certain bands with frontmen choosing to throw us back ten years by unleashing their inner Fred Durst *coughs* Emmure *coughs* Deez Nuts *coughs*. But Hacktivist are truly putting something new and fully extreme on the table here. Formed by former members of Heart of a Coward, a band doing the rounds for genuinely heavy progressive metal in Britain, meeting with vocalist J Hurley an aspiring grime artist, the band have fused their styles together as you can immediately hear from the start of New Age, a hopelessly apt title expressing exactly what bands like this are trying to introduce, which opens with a tensely toned backdrop crafted on airy synthesizers creating misty atmospheres of sorts, before the intense djent breakdowns slam into action accompanied by the intense rapping between Hurley and Ben Marvin. And with heaviness coming from both aspects and backed by the overwhelmingly powerful backing texture weaved together by the guitar and electronic arrangements by Timfy James, the music does really send you beyond the feeling of being sat down in earphones.

 Throughout the album the band effortlessly reveal their ability to be on top of their game in all they do. Hurley and Marvin's rapping on Unlike Us and Cold Shoulders is spat out with a razor edged ferocity and speed that perfectly compliments the sharp grooves of James. And with a scathing attitude from their rapping, it almost sounds as heavy as the Meshuggah sized guitars and basslines of Josh Gurner. Cold Shoulders in particular is a fine demonstration in just how dramatic and awe-inspiring the band's songwriting can be as the rapping and soaring melodies from James are carried off with a sweat-inducing urgency and breathtaking sense of woe as the band's lyrical assaults on society reaches it's peak.

 While Blades and the band's eponymous track are also similarly breathtaking but overall do little to divert from the style of the rest of the EP, being similarly awash within in-your-face rapping, immersive backdrops and blasting electronics that break the riffs apart to emphasise how heavy the entire music really is.

 But a problem of repetition with music like this really isn't that big a problem because the entire EP is an immense gathering of something entirely new, fresh and a spectacular representation of the advancement of UK music in fields of metal and hip hop. It's heavy in both the powerhouse crushing of progressive grooves and the pulsing vigor of Hurley and Marvin's energetic rapping. And with this combination of filth, immersive wonder and headbang-inducing blasting, Hacktivist really are taking us into the future.

Hacktivist's Hacktivist is out now via self-release.

Review: Motionless In White - Infamous

 I remember about this time last year, I had built up some kind of desire to make a post which would basically comprise of em talking about how I disliked Scranton sextet Motionless in White as they appeared to be on the cusp of becoming the next big thing in the world of metal. It was on my first listening, I couldn't get into it, their music seemed to lack structure, felt disjointed and the melodic moments just left me longing for the return of the much richer sounding Eighteen Visions. But that probably would have been a bad idea because 2010 debut Creatures turned out to be one of those albums that need to be listened to several times to get fully into. And when you did, there was no going back. So now we come to the group's second album Infamous their first release as a fully recognised bad who have some reputation of taking brutal metalcore beatdowns and bringing in giant influence from a gothic metal point of view to darken up the edges that other breakdown-heavy bands were relying on. And does the music live up to the group's reputation of being truly infamous? You fucking bet it does.

 What basically seems to have happened is that with Creatures, the band took the world of metalcore by storm. The people who loved their meaty breakdowns writhed in moshpits to the immense density of Abigail and Immaculate Misconception and with that they became the band that could turn this state of metalcore into something much more interesting and theatrically brutal. But Motionless in White didn't have time for that scene and the idea of staying in the same group of bands as For All Those Sleeping, Make Me Famous, I am King and many many many, oh god so many more didn't seem right. And with this reputation from being a fearsome metalcore band the band have gone on drop the main principles of what they achieved on Creatures and done their very own thing for Infamous taking their influence from somewhere that could never touch the metalcore world. And I know five words that could effectively sum up where a large proportion of their influence seems to have been taken from: The Golden Age of Grotesque.

 I know that the band have on countless occasions talked about their love for Marilyn Manson, but the overall performance on Infamous takes it to a whole new level. Some of the heaviest sing-along choruses can be heard on the massive A-M-E-R-I-C-A the band's bitter examination of Hollywood and how icons are made there and the structure is so Golden Age-esque you can hear shades of Manson in every section of the song. Likewise, the jaw dropping rush of The Divine Infection is highly reminiscent of mOBSCENE and Hatefuck is a perfect reflection of Slutgarden sounding as fresh as the original song does nine years on. Even the tense balladry of Sinematic sounds like it fits perfectly within Manson's less-than-accomplished 2007 effort Eat Me, Drink Me while still being carried off with the band's raw heaviness.

 But there's all kinds of influences across this album from the darkened performers that gave the 1990's and early 2000's that stopped being the godly figures you thought they were as soon as you got halfway through sixteen. And when you hear these songs it suddenly makes those bands a whole lot cooler again. The rumbling rock and roll melodies accompanied by blasting electronics that form Devil's Night that show off a startling Rob Zombie influence to their songwriting, while the bleak piano opening that is immediately triggered into a jaw-dropping extreme metal riff-fest from Rick Olson and Ryan Stickowski that opens the album Black Damask (The Fog) was clearly constructed with a Cradle of Filth influence on mind, which continues onto If It's Dead, We'll Kill It in which frontman Chris Motionless manages to out-Dani Filth Dani Filth. At his melodic moments, Motionless obtains his Eighteen Visions reminiscence but has also taken what sounds like influence from early HIM releases, bringing in an extra sense of gothic bleakness. Even traces of Disturbed can be heard with the grooves that open synthetic love with an opening growl of "AH-HAH" from Motionless that would make David Draiman proud.

 But this is no album that shows a band falling fully into a realm of recording commercially successful alt metal. Motionless in White are a tight band make no mistake. The grooves of Burned at Both Ends sounds closer to Machine Head in their songwriting while Puppets 2 (The Rain) proves there's absolutely no reason to lose faith in them as a metalcore band just yet. The breakdowns are slammed down to create a venomous brutality while Underdog delivers the grooves with gritted teeth and a spaying of "Fuck yous"'s that immediately conjures up Pantera imagery that proves that Motionless in White are so much more than a band in white make up and dyed hair. This really is an band not to get on the wrong side of. These people are genuine rockstars.

 But most of all, what this album does is make me think of when I was fifteen years old and possessed a music collection that I'm now glad I've gone beyond. That music taste only really featured alternative metal and groove metal and metalcore bands. My taste has moved beyond that and become much more in depth but surely there was a time when I was happy to just listen to that. Infamous is an album that proudly wears it's influences from the likes of Marilyn Manson, Rob Zombie and Cradle of Filth on their sleeves and still use them to create a collection of songs that sees Motionless in White move on from the beatdown after beatdown formula of the other bands that Creatures put them on the same stage as and become more mature, more accomplished and more real musicians than their first album could ever have set them up to be. And in their intense performances with these influences, you're reminded of how good albums like The Golden Age of Grotesque really are and it definitely puts you in the mood to listen to those albums with a smile on your face and realise just how indestructible the mainstream sounding metal that got big at the start of this century really was. And this time last year, I was going to tell you not to believe the hype of this band. No, believe it. This is an album that makes The Golden Age of Grotesque the coolest album in the world again while being a masterpiece on it's own.

Motionless in White's Infamous is out now via Fearless. The band will tour the UK in January with Asking Alexandria, While She Sleeps and Betraying the Martyrs.

New Found Power: Cold Summer

 With enough luck, I should be able to let this new feature to my blog take off. I've always wanted to have the chance to interview members of up and coming bands from across the world, so with enough luck I can interest some bands and make this at least a monthly thing, with the title of "New Found Power" because the world really doesn't have enough Damageplan references.

For my first interview of this feature, I've been lucky enough to pose questions to Wakefield quartet Cold Summer, who I got to know in June with the release of their second full-length EP Wake, a collection of bold songs bursting with hardcore energy, giant hard rock melodies and a wide outburst of emotion throughout. It was the follow-up to their debut EP Transitions released in January, the first steps of a young British rock band bursting with grated potential to be leaders in the country's current rock music scene where bands like Young Guns and Lower Than Atlantis reign with their ability to craft songs with intoxicating hooks while displaying progressive and post-hardcore influences off as well. But I haven't looked at the band since June, so it seems like time we did some catching up...

Last time you were featured here was when I looked at the stellar Wake EP in June, which feels like ages ago since I was still at school. How has life in Cold Summer camp been since then? 

Not too bad really, we’ve been busy writing some new songs to add to our set and since that’s taken a lot of the time we have around working full time and everything else in life, we haven’t unfortunately spent a lot of time on the road . I wouldn't say we’ve neglected it but we haven’t been out there as much as we’d like to be. Our last show was back in August supporting Lemuria and it’s just come to my attention and I was sincerely in absolute shock it had been 8+ weeks since we’d played a show. However the shows we have done have been pretty great so we’re now looking forward to a few more of them in November / December playing some new tracks as well as the ones off of Wake.

As you said, one of the big stories is that you guys are in the middle of recording some new songs. Is the material on Wake a good indication of what to expect? Or will there be some unexpected curveballs thrown in there?

Wake was our first release we were happy with. We’d previously released a demo with our old vocalist in the early stages of the band and Transitions was discarded to some extent. I think people could see we were still developing but the way they were executed and factors involved didn’t work for us so I’d say yeah Wake is a reference point and a good indication of a fairly new band finding our sound so yeah, I mean there will be some characteristics people will perhaps hear on our new songs, but will no doubt see other ideas/inspiration coming into play now we are in this supposed comfort zone of finding the bands sound with a settled group of people involved.

Are there any further plans for a full album in sight yet?

Well, a big factor for us is with continuing our recording partnership with Bob Cooper (Hawk Eyes, Watch Commander, Burn Daylight) we’re really set at our next release being a full album, it's going to include songs from both the Wake session (with additional mixing, mastering, vocal takes) and the 3 songs we've just recorded now, we had some limitations with time and money before so we felt a tiny bit under whelmed only releasing a 5 track EP because we were really happy with those songs but had several we were still working on that we didn't have finished in time to record, let alone the money together to get them down in the studio.

I was happy to see more things being done with A is for Arson with it gaining radio play and having a music video made, which is seriously awesome because it's definitely one of my favourite individual songs of the year. Are you planning on doing anything further with it like including it on further EPs?

Yeah, we felt that was the best one to work with as a music video. It was the most suitable song to build visually around the music and lyrics we’d created using implicit and sub textual connotations with the help of a friend acting and the set we put together, though I think literally ‘burning buildings down’ would have got us in a lot of trouble! Having radio play is something completely new to us and we were quite appreciative that these all came off the back of pretty much reviewers like yourself and who just happen to work at a radio station. If all goes to plan, yeah all the songs off of ‘Wake’ will make it onto our debut album, it is a bit of shame though that the music video is currently offline due to some red tape legal issues between us and the production company who filmed it, so we’re looking at filming another one soon for one of the new songs especially if this isn't resolved.

When you toured with Lemuria in August, did you win yourselves some new fans at those shows? And how's the turnout for your local shows, do the people of Wakefield come along for some post-hardcore?

Well yeah I think to say we’ve not been on the road as much as we would have liked, things have gone really well, we always seem to get a good turn out at shows wherever we play, I guess this is a combination of good luck and we try our best to help promoters out with promoting the shows too. One thing that excites me is we get to play a variation of shows with slightly different styles (but all in the punk / hardcore realm I guess!) like when we played with Lemuria & our friends Hearts & Souls we were pretty much the heaviest band on the bill, the week before we had played in Wakefield with some heavier bands (Foundations, Anchored by Avarice) so it definitely works for us being able to play these different shows and not sound out of place, have someone who’s never heard of us before listen to our record when they get home.. or worst of all clear the room.

In Wakefield it’s a very weird predicament. It’s a very healthy musical city, you can name several high profile bands that have come from this place, you can name some bands that have toured and toured for a decade from here and you can no doubt be here all day naming bands from here that are currently active, what there seems to be though is something you could call a music scene, well for for our style I guess. I have to fully back the indie music scene as there seems to be some form unity or scene as you will.  Like any place it’s clicky I guess. We’ve actually not played Wakefield that much apart from like our first show, there isn’t that many venues putting shows on, our practice rooms sometimes host DIY shows where we’ve played one, but usually they are down the straight forward hardcore route.. so we’ve not been asked to play one of those yet, once we add some two step parts I can see that happening. I saw a friends band who did face a few confused faces and folded arms when they did! The Hop is a good venue but we’ve had a few invitations to play that we’ve had to decline due to clashing with other shows we’ve had booked but our fourth ever show  there is our next one this coming Saturday, so at least when we do play it’s a special one and we’re supporting a great punk rock band called The Cut Ups who are on their UK Tour.

Looking on your Facebook description page, the list of bands that influence you is amazing as well as fairly diverse, going from Queens of the Stone Age to Tool to A Day to Remember. How do you manage to look at the style of this giant list of bands and manage to do your own thing with it? And what's your collective favourite band out of them or favourite band ever? I'm tragically into talking about just bands.

Yeah I guess that list can be a bit of a misleading one as I’m sure some of those bands don’t particularly mix that well and it is a diverse one, we just put it together as bands most of us listen to on a regular basis with varying taste and I guess a bit of tolerance as well. I don’t agree with it being a source of validating a bands sound or genre specific, I’m confident one or two boxes are firmly ticked in that we’re a band passionate about writing our own music and bands who put out records we love, I think that’s our outlook as a band so we aren't really into being too tied to rules of what you can and can’t listen to if you want to be classified as a genre specific band, having said that I think if we’re to be given a tag, the post hardcore tag suits us fine, we’re influenced by bands of that genre, we like heavy, aggressive, emotional music but we also like to write melodic, structured songs that sometimes that style of music can’t delve into without sounding like another band.

Well, it's not the first time Facebook's been misleading. Coming from Wakefield in West Yorkshire, is there some kind of bursting wave of underground bands worth checking out that no one knows about? Who are the other local heroes?

West Yorkshire is quite active and its encouraging stuff we have some really great bands around us that have a similar outlook but with us all not really sounding that alike at all. For me an underground band that have threaten to surface as of late are Marmozets, they are from Bingley and have been lucky enough to play a few high profile tours and festivals this year, they put so much energy into their playing, and then coupled with the fact they are very good musicians it opens so many doors for their song writing especially on the EP ‘Vexed’ and single ‘Good Days’ that has just come out, for me they have The Perfect Beverage of passion and progression. My friends play in a band called Curses who make a bit of unholy racket they put out an awesome EP a while ago but as of late have been a bit quiet despite in the past playing Ghostfest and supporting bands like La Dispute and Touché Amore. They’ve been hard at work writing some new songs and they have a bit of a line up shuffle so they should be back playing shows very soon. Again on the heavier side of things we have our friends in Armgeddin’ Outta Here who have put out a great first demo as of a late and we’ve played with a couple of times, really good dudes and they are awesome live. Our friends in Hearts & Souls well like a lot of bands I like to talk about do what they do in a similar fashion to us, they really do their own thing and despite our two bands sounding very different we still play shows with these now and again, and it has been pretty interesting hearing this bands sound evolve further when we’ve heard their new stuff live over the past couple of months.

 Big thanks to the guys in Cold Summer for their words. Do yourself a favour and listen to and buy Wake. It's definitely worth it, especially if it's a sign of what's to come for this band. They're really cool guys who know what they're doing and what they're talking about. And it's always great to get the words of other people on this blog.

If you are a singer or member of a rock and roll band and would like to have some kind of interview, you can contact me, by finding me on Skype at "andyrfdavidson" or finding me on Twitter at @AndyrfDavidson or finding me on my Facebook page. After all how cool would it be to introduce the world to some New Found Power, right?

Cold Summer's Wake is out now via Self-Release.