Shattercones – This Septic Isle (2021)
With their single ‘Love on Repeat’, Shattercones has us wallowing in misery and moping just the right amount. They are now crying with brooding despair tinged with frustration through their EP This Septic Isle. Through the sounds of the EP, they unleash their furious feelings about the current political and societal situation in the UK.
Each track is a unique pissed off missive from the band that captures the weary feeling that many in the UK are filled with. Infinitely annoyed, frustrated and upset yet oddly beautiful, the music drops you into a whirlpool of emotions that are easy to relate to. By the end of the EP, you might be feeling worn out while wondering where this music has been your whole life.
The EP opens with ‘Ghoul Driver’ that pulls you in with a rather cinematic western gothic tone. You can see the wide horizon wavering from the rising heart and feel the building of tension through the instrumentation. It is a truly epic way to open the EP and captures the imagination perfectly. As the western gothic tones roll through you, they lead you toward the vocals. The dark soar of vocals pick up the threads of black satin ribbons and twirl through around your brain. There is an almost desolate feeling to the vocals as they seem to call out into a ghost town. Through all of this, the band brings a feeling of wishing things could go back to how they used to be in the face of the yawning emptiness that has replaced it.
‘Say Goodbye’ has a lighter feeling to the opening line that exudes a sort of humid heat. This sighs and rolls into an almost funerary march. There is the real feeling of a lament within this track that twist and turns around slightly ghostly backing vocals and the most pleasantly plucked guitar line. The vocals are powerful in their emotive flow as they reach into your chest and slowly squeeze. It is a building sadness and despair that has been woven into the track and handled so masterfully that you can’t get enough of it. The strings add a gothic edge to the track while creating new textures and depths.
The vibrations that open ‘Butterfly Room’ shake through your brain and get you quaking to them before the drums hit you. Between the buzzing tones and almost dizzying movement of the guitars, you are filled with a rather anxious energy. This is an intense track that is akin to an assault on the senses resulting in a building tension that you know has to come to a head at some point. While the melody has you going a little crazy, the vocals bring a spoken-word edge that strangely calms the energy and makes it more potent. This is an extremely interesting track that uses very avant-garde elements to really get the message across.
The EP comes to a close with the dark and ominous tones of ‘The Man Who Ate Capitalism’. The percussion shakes and stomps into a dark march while the guitar mourns over them with serpentine precision. The vocals are a smooth melodic flow that hooks you and soars through your senses. The march of the music leads you to the chorus which is a call of voices en-mass. The slithering movement of the song brings a new dimension to the descriptive lyrics that offer rich imagery while tackling the problems in the world. A darkly seductive track, it seems to capture the slow build of momentum against the status quo.
Shattercones have gone all out with their new EP This Septic Isle as they bring western gothic and cinematic tones to our ears. Each track captures an uneasy feeling that most can connect with through the melodic flows or anxiety-ridden shakes. The diversity of the musical elements in the EP showcase the prowess of the band and get you hooked even further to their dark tones.
Find out more about Shattercones on their website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Spotify.
