Album Review: The Weight - Prisoners Of The Flock

Cutting their DIY teeth with constant tours, all ages shows and support slots for local and international hardcore greats, Adelaide heavy-hitters The Weight finally release their debut album Prisoners Of The Flock. From the opening notes of Born From The Spear, it's clear what we have here – a crunchy modern hardcore sound dripping with aggression. “The lucky few are buried quick”, as an opening lyric certainly doesn't beat around the bush. The rhythms ebb and flow between time signatures and patterns, and are held together by tight snare-driven drumming and rolling tom and bass beats. These underscore the dirty and down tuned guitar riffs that dominate the space.

Vocalist Ben Juett is oddly low in the mix at times, and his occasional weaknesses as a hard/metalcore singer do shine through against the tightness of his band mates, though for the most part his passionate screaming does hold the record together rather well. Album highlights A Moral Thought and the title track show a real maturity in hardcore songwriting that's beyond the band's years, with truly impressive melodic flourishes being brought to the fore, if only for brief moments.

The 12 tracks seamlessly blend together, for better and worse, but do create a totally cohesive and aggressive 32 minute, Sick Of It All-cum-Earth Crisis attack of sound. Though the irony can't be avoided when hearing a track called Impervious To Influence and noting how steeped in modern hardcore this band obviously is. This album won't win over any converts to 'brutal' music, but outside of genre familiarity there's very little to complain about on this punishing debut.