Reviews: In This Moment, Brat, RØRY, Scene Queen (Matt Bladen)

In This Moment - Witch (Better Noise Records)

It's probably not that controversial to say that the bands reviewed after this wouldn't have the impact and possibly the attention without In This Moment.

At a a time when the NWOAHM was all the rage In This Moment exploded out of that scene with aggression and grooves, topped with the incredible vocals of Maria Brink. From the metalcore beginnings into the gothic alternative metal act they are today, In This Moment have taken many shapes but have always been the guided by the creative drive of Maria Brink.

The band is her artistic outlet, curating the lyrics, music and visual presentation of the band and this month record is still a defiant, emotionally driven collection of songs that balance fury and femininity as Brink puts it herself: "Witch is my declaration of inner transformation, it's about embracing the duality within".

Begining with the punishing Shame, Witch starts off with exactly the kind of metallic battery you may expect from In This Moment, glitchy industrial twitches against down-tuned alt metal riffs, the synths creating the introspective atmospheres on I Want To Believe which features Dayseeker.

One of three guest on the record which includes Kim Dracula on the furious Heretic and Kat Von D on their cover of Pink Floyd's Another Brick In The Wall. It's their own tracks that punch through with Crawl right up there with beats of NiN, Sleeping With The Enemy features Brink's magnetic vocal delivery and cleverest lyrics as Father brings synth wave elements to the balladry.

In This Moment still dwell in their own electronic darkness on Witch, introspective and thumping, with those unique vocals just capping everything off, it's modern alt metal with gothic feminine overtones that still manages to impress. 8/10

Brat - Manslayer (Prosthetic Records)

Brat return with their new release Manslayer.

The title is self explanatory I should think, revenge, women taking back their power and their bodies from men who have taken that away, doing so at the end of a knife, the barrel of a gun or a stiletto heel through the face like the album cover.

Drawing influence from the lyrical content of country music, where women get revenge on this who have wronged them but Brat do it with a gore soaked death metal and grindcore assault, so the imagery is dialled up to slasher movie levels.

In fact the movie theme is present on the first half of this two part record. It's the struggles fond themselves having to combat in the world of the interweb and 'celebrity' they display these struggles however through some horror movie themes, including body horror, nightmares and serial killers.

It's Brat becoming more violent, channeling the sheer intensity of their live show into a record which has influences from bands such as Nails or Full Of Hell, once where metal and grind aren't genres, they're ways onomatopoeic ways to hurt you as you listen. Disgusting barks and growls, over abusive riffs and blastbeats, death metal, grind, thrash and much more from the 'extreme' side.

The second half of the record is where the real bimboviolence happens, everything before the interlude is traumatic, an event that causes what happens after it, tracks such as Femicidal Vengeance, which features solos from David Davidson from Revocation and Ways To Kill Your Husband are drenched in murder and bloody vengeance. As is Blistered Tongues which has Candace Buckingham from Walls Of Jericho adding her insanely vicious vocal to the whirlwind of aggression, the two frontwomen delivering and intensity and terror.

Manslayer moves Brat away from being genre tag into a more brutal and ferocious force of female anger, beware the Manslayer. 8/10

RØRY - Bloodletting (Sadcøre Records)

First emerging as an online advocate for understanding ADHD and neurodivergence through viral social media page ADHD Love and as the co-host Late Bloomers Podcast, doing both alongside her partner Richard Pink, Roxanne Emery has become one of the premier voices for mental health in this new influencer led world.

However after so much turmoil in her life a new found sobriety, love and family around her pushed her to have another go at music. Re-entering the music world as RØRY, her previous album went to the UK Top Ten and took her to stages such as Download Festival, these songs of sadness striking a chord with listening public and now RØRY returns with album number two, Bloodletting.

The sadness has been replaced by anger, therapy forcing her to confront decades of suppressed emotions, “I realised I was sick from being nice. I’d spent so much of my life being the bigger person" she says and on Bloodletting she confronts the emotions of rage, resentment, jealousy, revenge and hatred, writing the heaviest and most intense music yet.

RØRY even took vocal lessons and learned to scream to really hammer the aggression of this record home, it can be felt as [the death of a people pleaser] leads into the Kids These Days which I'm sure fans of Nigel will love, but that's the point, confronting toxicity, in all it's forms, be it what were surrounded by today or from her past on Dead Girl Walking, yet holding a candle to where you're from no matter how complicated on Hometown.

It's a record that balances rage and retribution, confronting all these things that had been buried for long, pouring out these emotions in the music, as lost loved ones are honoured on the heartbreaking A Cure For Cancer and the choice is made to live on Strange and [do you want to live?] closing the album on a defiant sting that tugs at the coldest of hearts.

RØRY moves from sadness into catharsis, apologies into rage, but importantly shows RØRY developing as an artist with her most diversely offering yet. 8/10

Scene Queen - Metalicious (Hopeless Records)

From Bimboviolence to Bimbocore its the new EP from Scene Queen

While I'm still not quite on board with the tag 'bimbocore', though it's reclaiming that term, you can't fail Scene Queen for using to describe her music. Pink, glitter, club mentality meets crushing modern 'core' music, taking aim at the often misogynist metal genre.

Especially the bands where the guys wear deep V-necks and run on the spot, or the ones with backwards caps and baggy jeans, Scene Queen does this from the opening of Pink Flip Phone which is a nu metal trapped in a glitter bomb, ready for the Millennial audience who remember Y2K and the Motorola Razr.

From here it's electronic pulsations on Manicure, which moves from club beats to sickening deathcore breakdowns on this rage fuelled threat to anyone that abuses women. It's beginning of Scene Queen showing off a more hybrid style than in her debut.

The songs get much heavier, the vocals having much more harsh screams than before on Tracksuit and the title track which features Left To Suffer, there's also a strong pop influence on tracks such as Shopaholic, which refences Destiny's Child or the bounce of Tits Out At Brunch.

More extreme, more pop, more bimbocore as Scene Queen follows up Hot Singles In Your Area with something more Metalicious. 7/10