Well, here we are again with another metalcore/hardcore band from Australia that is destined for great things. This time, the band is In Hearts Wake. Their new album, Divination, is currently streaming over at Kill Your Stereo (link below) and it will officially be released on August 31st via We Are Unified Records.
The first thing that I noticed on Divination is that the vocalist of In Hearts Wake has a nasty (in a good way) scream. The other vocals (the cleans) surprised me when I listened to In Hearts Wake for the first time. The cleans on Divination are really good overall, but on the track entitled “Inertia (The Hermit)” which features Garret Rapp of The Color Morale, they are overused. This causes “Inertia (The Hermit)” to come off as a filler track and the weakest track on the album. Believe it or not, this is actually the only major flaw on Divination.
I don’t know what it is about In Hearts Wake’s Divination that has reeled me in and kept me hooked, but it has somehow managed to do so. There is a lot of chugging that is very similar to what you hear from Legend and I, along with many others, grow a bit tired of that after a while. The instrumentation is pretty standard over the course of this 34-minute album, although there are a few flashes of brilliance. The tracks that stood out to me instrumental-wise were “Traveller (The Fool)”, “Survival (The Chariot)”, “B.I.A (The Hanged Man)”, “Shapeless (Judgement)”, and “Release (The Moon)”.
One of the coolest parts about Divination lies in the guest vocalists that In Hearts Wake managed to nab to help them out on some tracks. Winston McCall of Parkway Drive proves why he’s one of the most well-known vocalists in metalcore near the end of “Departure (Death)”, Chag Ruhlig of Legend (and ex-For The Fallen Dreams) makes an appearance on “The Unknown (Strength)”, and Adrian Fitipaldes of Northlane can be heard on the eighth track entitled “Shapeless (The Judgement)”. Both Winston and Chad display their aggressive style on their respective tracks while Adrian’s vocals are less aggressive and during an ambient passage.
Another thing that I must talk about is how heavy some of the breakdowns on Divination sound. A few tracks in particular that contain massive breakdowns are “The Unknown (Strength)”, “Survival (The Chariot)”, and “Winterfell (The Tower)”. These are the kind of breakdowns that make you want to start throwing down in your bedroom, especially the one on “Survival (The Chariot)”. The brief Halo soundclip that says “killing frenzy” cues the initial breakdown, and a few seconds later, the vocalist calls out “mother fucking bounce”. Let me tell you one thing; you are bound to do just that.
As I insinuated earlier in my review, In Hearts Wake is not necessarily breaking new ground here, but they’ve created something spectacular and fresh while using blueprints that many other bands have used before. If you’re a fan of their compatriots in Hand Of Mercy, Northlane, or Prepared Like A Bride (or any metalcore band for that matter), I strongly recommend giving Divination its fair share of spins.
Links: Facebook – Stream
