St. SinnerDysphoria (feat. Belle Haven) [Single]

With a fade-in and scream of “Dysphoria!” one would be bracing for some kind of breakneck riff, streaking by like a blur. Prepare for the redirect if you want to live. Sydney’s up-and-comers St. Sinner instead take the Deftones route; crashing over you like looming waves.

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Guitars lope towards us like giant kaiju out to reclaim what’s theirs, receding for the verse that’s just vocals, bass, and drums. Taking a leaf out of Underoath’s (or if you want to nitpick, Sleepwave’s) Big Book of ‘Core Choruses that Definitely Won’t Bore Us™, singer Rory Maclean belting out his frustrations in spellbinding fashion as a gargantuan wall of guitars close in on the listener. All told, it’s pretty impressive production coming from a mere three piece.

[It’s] one that the emo set and heavy aficionados will clamour for in equal measure.

Jumping out of hyperspace, Belle Haven’s unmistakable pipemaster David De La Hoz and his mournful baritone lends a bit of emo soul to the track; if it wasn’t a thing before, it certainly is now. But here’s the kicker – it only gets more ferocious from this point. After an Architects style seething spoken-word section meanders over machine drum breaks, double kicks go from ludicrous speed and straight into plaid; landing jackhammer blows as a gang of demons escape from the psyches of tortured men. Well, it sounds like that. Another misdirection done well.

A Eurovision-style keychange into another sumptuous, endlessly hummable chorus rounds out a rousing track, one that the emo set and heavy aficionados will clamour for in equal measure. St. Sinner have blessed us with an operatic – but never histrionic – banger that will appeal to a huge cross section of the black t-shirt set. We’re glued to this St. Sinner station for what comes next.

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