UNI/VSHellhound (Single)

If there was ever a time where metal and ‘core looked prescient, that time is now.

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Brisbane’s prog-metal-core UNI/VS have capped off this shiteful year with Hellhound; with a video featuring a guy running around a wasteland in a gas mask. I suppose metal’s themes of war, pestilence, and pandemic become relevant eventually, like a broken clock being right twice a day. One might say we’re inured to the world’s indifference by now, thanks to this shouty scary music we all seem to crave.

A slip into madness is given form by a skull-crushing breakdown, pulverising what’s left of this desolate landscape into sand.

Wafting in on echoes of muscle and dust, Hellhound kicks down the door (like the guy in the video) with breakneck riffing and robotic, precision leads uploading itself into your brain. Vocalist Scott Willis’ flicks a switch and his screams ala Sam Carter (Architects) plunge into hellish, CJ McMahon (Thy Art Is Murder) like depths. This isn’t pure ‘core all the way around; it’s cut with prog metal ear-nuggets and hard-driven slabs of meaty guitar. Willis lets his voice take flight in the refrain, taking cues from his ‘core contemporaries such as Parkway Drive or The Amity Affliction.

A slip into madness is given form by a skull-crushing breakdown, pulverising what’s left of this desolate landscape into sand. The band walk away and we wonder: what will we find on album number three? Let’s hope us metalheads are wrong long enough to find out.

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