We have claimed it before, but it really needs to be reiterated in light of wars’ debut EP, And The Sea Will Claim Us All, it sounds like they have more experience than they really should have at this point in their careers. In the grand scheme of the music industry, wars are a band of toddlers taking their first steps into the world of music, and yet they seem to have really set off sprinting into the distance, leaving other bands in their wake.
Hardcore music has in some ways become a bit stale, where everyone seems to be copying each other and essentially blurring the genre into one grey mess. And The Sea Will Claim Us All has enough technicality and interesting hooks woven into each track that they’re able to climb their way out of this scene of mediocrity and build themselves a stage to launch their career onto bigger things.
‘Gamblers Ruin’ sets the EP off in the brutal and primal direction that the rest of the release will take you. Lead vocalist Rob Vicars’ vocals are altogether violent and unrelenting, only giving you respite when they make way for Sam Barnard’s more melodic tones. Thankfully the tracks don’t take a one stop brutal assault all throughout, and give you time to breath and take in each chord and drum beat, as really it could leave you quite dazed and confused if left to the high tempo and destructive nature all the way through.
It’s really quite difficult to pick holes in this achievement, but if I were to be picky, it feels, especially on first listening, that the band evolves and climbs out of their shells more and more as the EP flies along. Two of the latter tracks ‘Weathered Eyes’ and ‘The Leviathan And The Liar’ are both as fantastic as the first two offerings, but overall you do get a sense of a more polished article from the later two. Sam’s vocals also feel a lot stronger in the last two tracks, and ultimately the songs feel more and more complete. This isn’t even that much of a problem, as the two opening numbers are strong enough on their own to really prove their worth; they just seem to be shown up by arguably better songs.
As a debut EP, and debut music full stop wars have already got an incredible achievement under their belts. Although arguably not a genre breaker, it’s strong enough in all aspects to really make an impact, and with the growing confidence from the band throughout the EP and hopefully a growing confidence within themselves to move forwards and do even bigger and more beautiful things in the future.
