It is now only just over a week to go until we get to invade the fields of Castle Donnington again, rock out to a whole host of rock and metal music in a field, and get drunk with friends. To celebrate the countdown to one of the UK’s biggest rock festivals I have decided to highlight a number of smaller or less well known bands that you may have missed on the line-up.
There seems to be a plethora of fantastic Japanese bands on show at this year’s downloads. We have already highlighted the incredible Vamps, next up we have the post-hardcore monsters that are Coldrain. The band formed in 2007 and hail from Nagoya, Japan. Their sound is a mix of melodic singing and intense screams, reminiscent of a very pure post-hardcore sound but they have little tinges here and there, an drum and bass sample hidden in there every now and then just to keep you guessing and to make themselves that little bit different. Their sound in total works fantastically, and something which Japanese bands suffer from is sounding too Japanese. I know that may sound rather xenophobic, but it’s the reason why the likes of Maximum the Hormone and Dir En Grey haven’t really worked in the west as much. The sound that they’ve produced is very refined and fantastically put together that you’re going to remember the chorus’ for a while after the set has finished, maybe thanks in part to the fact that their tracks are sung completely in English by half-American lead vocalist Masato.
Coldrain already holds a really meaty back catalogue, consisting of three albums and two EPs. Every year the band releases new material, which can be detrimental to most, as it could wear them out and make each release increasingly more and more irrelevant. Instead they just have that many incredible ideas for tracks running around their heads that they feel they need to release it, so for the last 6 years they’ve released alternate albums and EPs, with the latest EP ‘Until The End’ due out later this month. Track wise the band really have some stand-out tracks including ‘The Revelation’ which is simply one of the best post-hardcore tracks we’ve heard recently which just holds an incredibly refreshing feeling around it. Recently the band also released a new video for ‘The War Is On’ and is a must watch video for anyone preparing to see this band live.
The one defining factor surrounding Coldrain, isn’t that they’re doing anything differently, in actual fact they’re producing sounds which you may have heard a thousand times, but they just sprinkle their own personalities on everything they create, such as the small electro tinges thrown in here and there which seems to be all the rage at the moment, but is subtle enough to not draw your attention to far away from the basis on what makes the band. Post-hardcore fans certainly need to sit up and pay attention to this band as they’re going to break into the UK in a big way.
Release to Own: ‘The Revelation’
Tracks to listen to: ‘The Revelation’, ‘The War Is On’, ‘No Escape’
You can catch Coldrain on the Red Bull Stage, Saturday 14th June 2014 at Download Festival
