Album Review: While She Sleeps - This Is The Six

With This Is The Six, Sheffield's While She Sleeps have dropped one of the best metalcore releases of the year. The quintet slip into that genre, however, while employing a range of heavy styles, tackling everything from thrash and hardcore to more straightforward elements of punk and metal across the record.

Taking this flawless amalgamation, the young English quintet have released a debut LP that is impossible to slow down. The wild soloing and thick breakdowns of Sean Long and Mat Welsh are manic and possessed, while Adam Savage's rapid-fire drumming would knock some teeth loose without the slightest hint of irony. However, the band balance the sonic violence with heart-on-sleeve confessionals, while the scattered piano found throughout provides the music with room to breathe while enveloping it all in a moody darkness that never sounds over the top or contrived. To the casual listener This Is The Six might seem like a wall of channelled aggression, but the lyrics on tracks like Our Courage, Our Cancer and Love At War show the Brits are unafraid to get deep and let go of some feeling.

This is where vocalist Lawrence Taylor stars, his impassioned cry made to move mosh pits. The long-haired frontman's vocal tone, verses and delivery make you feel like you are part of something strong and unifying, and with loads of gang choruses built around his cries the tracks all but scream for heaving chaos. Be prepared for this shit to seriously open up come Soundwave '13. Until then, you'll just have to be content to thrash around your livingroom some.