Structures is a five piece progressive metalcore/hardcore band from Toronto, Ontario. Their newest album, Divided By, is their first release as a part of Sumerian Records. They showed plenty of promise on their first release (they actually released another EP when they were called Charity’s), the All of the Above EP, which was released last year. They really went above and beyond with this release. Divided By is basically a ‘fuck you’ to the bands that only make music to get rich and famous, as well as a ‘fuck you’ to those who doubted Structures. The intro track is most definitely going to be the new ‘Departure’. I can almost guarantee that they will use At Las[t] as the opening song at shows for a long time to come. The second track, Hydroplaning, was the song that really had me excited for Divided By. The pre-production version was released in the early summer months and I was almost counting down the days until they were going to release this album. I’m glad they made a few changes to it, because the album version is even better.
Moving forward, Encounter… was on the All of the Above EP, but it was re-recorded for Divided By. Again, the changes they made to this song worked out perfectly. Although the intro isn’t as good, the rest of the song is much cleaner. The fourth track, Paralyzed, is the track that is really saying ‘fuck you’. Listen to the lyrics and you will know exactly what I mean! The next track was also on the EP. I am not sure which version of The Pursuit Of I like more, but both of them are great. I do miss the guest vocals that were on the EP though.
Next up is Clockwork. Brace yourselves for one of the angriest songs ever. It is an extremely aggressive song, mainly because of the outstanding guest vocals of Alex Erian (Despised Icon) and Kevin McCaughey (Ion Dissonance) during the breakdown. Speaking of guest vocals, the next track also has them. Relapse; Signs features a good guest vocal spot from Frankie of Emmure. Haters will always hate on Emmure because of their lack of creativity, but Frankie has some of the best screams in the scene right now.
The eight track, Tunnel Vision, is the weakest on the album. That’s not to say it’s a bad song, but it seems to really drag on in the last minute. The final two tracks on Divided By are my favourites. I.N.T.E.N.T. is packed with various different aspects. It’s heavy, it’s melodic, it has a catchy clean vocal segment, and an ambient outro. The closing track, /, is one of the most creative songs that you will ever hear from a ‘core’ band. This song features some great guitar leads and riffs, and is mainly clean vocals, but has one of the heaviest breakdowns on Divided By. It is the perfect end to a near perfect album. The only flaw that this album has is the production quality. The mixing is sub-par, and it is quite noticeable, but you have to take this all with a grain of salt. This is Structures’ first release on a label and they were probably just experimenting and trying to keep this album as true as possible. With the release of Divided By, Structures has solidified themselves as a top-notch Sumerian band. Divided By is primarily a progressive metalcore/hardcore album, but it has aspects that make it seem pop-punk (clean vocals), djent (bouncy), and deathcore (mass brutality) at times. 
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