Moments – Outlast EP

By RingMaster Review on May 27, 2017 • ( 0 )

With potential as vocal and uncompromising as their snarl, Belgian outfit Moments release their new EP this month. Containing five hungry and irritable tracks, Outlast is a ferocious attack of hardcore and metal which manages to be a swiftly striking incitement of impressed pleasure and a slow burning cauldron of even richer promise.

Hailing from Tessenderlo, the quintet emerged in 2011 and has increasingly forged and earned a potent reputation and following at home and more recently across Europe with their live presence. They have shared stages with the likes of Bury Tomorrow, While She Sleeps, Our Last Night, and Stick To Your Guns as well as played numerous festivals such as Groezrock, True Spirit Festival, Summerblast, Cerberbrus and Rock Herk to great success. Now they are ready to poke at bigger attention with Outlast, a release declaring the possibility of a new potent force in hardcore town.

The EP makes an instant impact with its outstanding opener What If. As a busy street scene surrounds ears, the sonic trespass of guitars brews, swiftly taking over the landscape with wiry grooves and rapacious riffs. Dries Monsieurs’ vocals are just as quickly invasive and impressing, his ire coated roar supported by equally caustic tones and sounds from across the band. A raw yet infectious scent reminding of The Ghost of a Thousand carries appetite and imagination off into the irritable heart of the track, the hooks and grooves of guitarists Jeffrey Beutels and Kristof Fransen addictive as the imposing swings of drummer Benjamin Hendrickx simply bite upon the senses. It is a stunning start which is never quite matched again within Outlast but tenaciously and enjoyably supported by the likes of next up All It Takes.

The second song harries ears with an initial scrub of riffs, drums throbbing upon impact to match the resonating tone of Gert-Jan Vandervoort’s bass. If the first song it was a lingering threat, in its successor a predatory declaration is made yet with a catchy grooving as enticing as anything conjured by voice and guitar elsewhere. Harmonic backing to the throat scraping attack of Monsieurs is a great contrast to the antagonistic charge driving the song as too the citric melodic enterprise aligning with the sonic trespass abrasing the senses.

As the EP, the song simply grows in strength and enjoyment with each listen, a quality shared by all and indeed next up Crossroads which maybe did not quite hit the mark as fully the first few times around but blossomed to be another definite pleasure. It does not quite have the individual traits of its companions but employs more recognisable hardcore bred threads in a bold and heated metalcore spiced union of harsh and melodic craft.

Our Faults, Our Failures is a bracing tempest of emotion and sound straight after, it’s scalding sonic web as intensive as the rhythmic harassing and vocal animus of raw emotion and displeasure. It too is a grower reaching loftier heights with time whilst revealing open potential of bigger and bolder things with Moments. The band has been suggested for fans of artists like The Ghost Inside and Hatebreed, this track gives all the reasons why whilst still creating its own highly agreeable character again adding to that promise.

Outlast closes as it began, with a track which commands a quick appetite and hunger for its punk and metal quarrel. Riffs and hooks collide with the senses, sonic tenacity further searing the damage as rhythms create fresh bruises with every attack. It is addictive stuff, vocals almost cursing listener and world in tone alone, the bass showing a mutual discontent in its texture and grumble.

Moments is a band on the rise, Outlast a release which leaves a lingering scar and together a pair creating another reason to anticipate hardcore nurtured noise becoming especially exciting sometime soon.

Outlast is released May 26^th.